Network Guys

Share your knowledge!

Installing Realtek Driver on ESXi 6.7

Hello guys!

I tried to install the Sophos XG on the ZOTAC ZBOX MI549 but the OS can’t find the realtek network card so I decided to install an ESXi server to the hardware to run Sophos XG in a virtual machine. I installed the vmware ESXi 6.7 (VMware-VMvisor-Installer-6.7.0-8169922.x86_64.iso) image (use Rufus for ISO copy to your USB stick). After the initial IP configuration I saw also only one network adapter, so I had to install the realtek driver manually. At first, activate SSH to connect via PuTTY:

now connect to your ESXi server via SSH (be sure you have configured a working gateway and DNS server to connect to the internet) and check your network cards:

[root@localhost:~] lspci -v | grep "Class 0200" -B 1
0000:00:1f.6 Ethernet controller Network controller: Intel Corporation Ethernet Connection I219-LM [vmnic0]
Class 0200: 8086:156f
--
0000:6c:00.0 Ethernet controller Network controller: Realtek Semiconductor Co., Ltd. RTL8111/8168/8411 PCI Express Gigabit Ethernet Controller
Class 0200: 10ec:8168

as you can see, both adapters are visible to the system, but the drivers for the vendor ID 10ec:8168 are not available. You can also search for hardware compatibility at the VMware Compatibility Guide (select the filter “IO Devices”). In my case, I can use these commands to download the drivers from a specific source:

esxcli software acceptance set --level=CommunitySupported
esxcli network firewall ruleset set -e true -r httpClient
esxcli network firewall ruleset set -e true -r dns
esxcli software vib install -d https://vibsdepot.v-front.de -n net55-r8168

the driver download and installation was successfull:

Installation Result
Message: The update completed successfully, but the system needs to be rebooted for the changes to be effective.
Reboot Required: true
VIBs Installed: Realtek_bootbank_net55-r8168_8.045a-napi
VIBs Removed:

type in “reboot” to restart your ESXi server. After the reboot, I could saw both network adapters!

Happy Weekend! :)

12 Responses

      1. [root@localhost:~] esxcli software vib install -d https://vibsdepot.v-front.de -n net55-r8168
        [DependencyError]
        VIB Realtek_bootbank_net55-r8168_8.045a-napi requires com.vmware.driverAPI-9.2.2.0, but the requirement cannot be satisfied within the ImageProfile.
        VIB Realtek_bootbank_net55-r8168_8.045a-napi requires vmkapi_2_2_0_0, but the requirement cannot be satisfied within the ImageProfile.
        Please refer to the log file for more details.

  1. Doesn’t work…

    [root@localhost:~] esxcli software vib install -d https://vibsdepot.v-front.de -n net55-r8168
    Installation Result
    Message: Host is not changed.
    Reboot Required: false
    VIBs Installed:
    VIBs Removed:
    VIBs Skipped: Realtek_bootbank_net55-r8168_8.045a-napi

    [root@localhost:~] esxcli software vib list | grep 8168
    net55-r8168 8.045a-napi Realtek CommunitySupported 2020-02-08

    any suggestion?

  2. I know this is old, but it took me WAY TOO LONG to find the solution and this thread helped… Thanks

    I found the Realtek 8125 2.5GBe driver here
    https://pan.chiphello.com:40272/?dir=/%E9%A9%B1%E5%8A%A8/RTL8125

    – Login to vSphere Web UI
    – From the left hand side under ‘Navigator’
    – Select ‘Host’
    – Click ‘Actions’ from the top menu then ‘Services’ >> ‘Enable Secure Shell (SSH)’
    – Copy the .vib file to a datastore
    – SSH into the ESXi server
    – Open CMD
    – ‘SSH root@~IP ADDRESS~’
    – it will then ask for your root password, type it in
    – Run these commands, be sure you have configured a working gateway and DNS server to connect to the internet
    – `esxcli software acceptance set –level=CommunitySupported`
    – `esxcli network firewall ruleset set -e true -r httpClient`
    – `esxcli network firewall ruleset set -e true -r dns`
    – Now Install the driver
    – `esxcli software vib install -v /vmfs/volumes/datastore2/…/net-r8125-9.006.04-1.vib`
    – It should come back with something like:
    – Installation Result
    – Message: The update completed successfully, but the system needs to be rebooted for the changes to be effective.
    – Reboot Required: true
    – VIBs Installed: net-r8125-9.006.04-1
    – VIBs Removed:

    Reboot ESXi and job done ;)

Leave a Reply

Click on the button to load the content from jetpack.wordpress.com.

Load content

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.

Certificates

ekahau Certified Survey Engineer
ATP_wsrgb
ACMP2
suca
Post Categories
Post Archives