{"id":35,"date":"2010-07-07T00:57:53","date_gmt":"2010-07-07T00:57:53","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/kristau.net\/blog\/?p=35"},"modified":"2010-07-07T00:57:53","modified_gmt":"2010-07-07T00:57:53","slug":"easiest-way-to-create-a-vmware-esxi-4-bootable-usb-flash-drive","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/kristau.net\/blog\/35\/","title":{"rendered":"Easiest Way to Create a VMware ESXi 4 Bootable USB Flash Drive"},"content":{"rendered":"

Here\u2019s a quick tip on how to create a bootable USB<\/span> flash drive from which you can install ESX<\/span>i.<\/p>\n

    \n
  1. Download UNetbootin<\/a> (available for Windows and Linux).<\/li>\n
  2. Download the latest ESX<\/span>i .iso file from VMware<\/a>.<\/li>\n
  3. Format your USB<\/span> flash drive (1 to 2 GB should work, I used a 4 GB one) with a FAT32 file system.<\/li>\n
  4. Fire up UNetbootin and select the option to use your own .iso file.<\/li>\n
  5. Make sure you choose the RIGHT<\/span> USB<\/span> flash drive \u2014 Best Practice would be to have only your target drive connected while doing this!<\/li>\n
  6. Click OK and let it cook<\/em>. This may take a few minutes.<\/li>\n
  7. Cancel the prompt at the end to reboot \u2014 you don\u2019t want to reboot, really.<\/li>\n
  8. Unmount your USB<\/span> flash drive and test it on ESX<\/span>i compatible hardware!<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

    There are some limitations to this method:<\/p>\n

      \n
    • Target system must support USB<\/span> boot (very few don\u2019t)<\/li>\n
    • Won\u2019t work with an EFI<\/span> BIOS<\/span> unless that BIOS<\/span> supports booting a legacy mode BIOS<\/span>. Even then, it still may not work.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n

      And, yes, you can do this with the regular ESX<\/span> .iso file, but you\u2019ll need to purchase licensing for those installs eventually. You can register ESX<\/span>i for free use!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

      Here\u2019s a quick tip on how to create a bootable USB flash drive from which you can install ESXi. Download UNetbootin (available for Windows and Linux). Download the latest ESXi .iso file from VMware. Format your USB flash drive (1 to 2 GB should work, I used a 4 GB one) with a FAT32 file […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7,9],"tags":[75,76,97,100,195,202,203,210],"class_list":["post-35","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-technology","category-virualization","tag-esx","tag-esxi","tag-hints-tips-tricks","tag-install","tag-technology-2","tag-unetbootin","tag-usb","tag-vmware"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/kristau.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/35","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/kristau.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/kristau.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kristau.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kristau.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=35"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/kristau.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/35\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/kristau.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=35"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kristau.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=35"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kristau.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=35"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}