Previous Versions of ESXI-Arm\Fling \ Runtime no boot partition found

[Zigg Ricky]

Hi, I am looking for previous versions of ESXI-arm\Fling. The latest version 8.0U3 installation attempt on PI 4

model B seems to error out during installation\partitioning stage that it could not find a valid boot partition.

--- An unexpected error occurred -----------

See logs for details

RuntimeError:/vmfs/devices/disks/mpx.vmhba33:C0:T0:L0 no boot partition found

Has anyone seen this error? 

The installation succeeds when I use an older version ESXI-arm 7.0.0. Is there a dependency to the new version of ESXI-arm that I am failing to pre-install? 

[Cyprien Laplace]

Hi,

Can you give some additional context:

• Is it happening on an upgrade of a previous installation of ESXi Arm Fling?
• Is this a fresh installation over an already partitioned disk that was used by a previous installation of ESXi?
• Is this a fresh installation over a disk that was not used for ESXi before?

If you're doing a fresh installation, can you try deleting all existing partitions before running the installer?

Cheers,
Cyprien

[Zigg Ricky]

Hi,

• Is it happening on an upgrade of a previous installation of ESXi Arm Fling? It's happening on both an upgrade and a fresh installation of ESXI arm Fling
• Is this a fresh installation over a disk that was not used for ESXi before? The install fails on a brand-new disk and disk that was previously used by ESXi/ 

I have also tried formatting the disk using Raspberry PI imager and balenaEtcher before attempting the installation. The Disks I am using are SATA SSD 1TB Western Digital connected via USB. 

All seems to work well if I try to install ESXI-arm 7.0.0. I have also tried to install ESXI-arm 8.0U3  over a fresh install of ESXI-arm 7.0.0 and it still fails with the boot partition missing error. 

[Cyprien Laplace]

Oh, for ESXi 8.0 and USB disk installation you may have seen that there is an additional dialog about the "ESX OSData". This is mentioned in the chapter "4.3.1 Installation target"  of the updated Raspberry Pi Fling manual:

The easiest way to install ESXi is to use a USB stick as installation target. You can re-use the USB stick that

you booted the installer from (it will be overwritten), or insert a second USB stick that you install ESXi on.

When asked for a ESX OSData store when installing on a USB attached disk simply press enter to skip this

step.

If you have checked that box, the installer will delete the boot partitions to make the OSData... and then complain that the boot partitions are missing.

Let me know if this was indeed the case.

Cyprien