Tag: ESXi

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VMWare Hardware Virtualization is not a feature of the CPU HP Proliant Microserver Gen10 Plus v2

For a while I’ve been postponing enabling Virtualization on my new microserver. But this weekend my wife was visiting her parents and I already watched all the series I wanted to, so no more procrastination!

Yet when I started, my HP Proliant Microserver showed this warning during the installation of VMWare ESXi VSphere:

<HARDWARE_VIRTUALIZATION WARNING: Hardware Virtualization is not a feature of the CPU, or is not enabled in the BIOS>

I ignored it, hoping for the best, but when I tried to power on a VM a similar message popped up:

Failed – This host supports Intel VT-x, but Intel VT-x is restricted. Intel VT-x might be restricted because ‘trusted execution’ has been enabled in the BIOS/firmware settings or because the host has not been power-cycled since changing this setting.

FIX: disable trusted execution (Intel TXT) in the Microserver BIOS

Follow these steps:

  1. Enter BIOS (F9 during boot)
  2. Enter menu option System Configuration

  3. Enter BIOS/Platform Configuration (RBSU)

  4. Enter Server Security
  5. Disable Microsoft (R) Secured-core Support
  6. Enter Intel Security Options and disable Intel(R) TXT Support
  7. Enter Virtualization Options and make sure Intel(R) Virtualization Technology, Intel(R) VT-d and Access Control Service are enabled

Disclaimer

Now you should know I just enabled and disabled these option based on reddit and Stackoverflow posts, and since nothing production like is running on this node I’m fine if I might have missed some steps or perhaps enabled too much. Basically I’m saying; You are responsible for your own server 🙂 Check with a professional if your node is running more important tasks.

Yet if I made a booboo somewhere, I would appreciate if you would please let me know and I’ll update the post accordingly.

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Update HP Proliant Microserver BIOS without Windows

I wanted to update my MicroServer Gen8 bios to the latest version but the download site on HPE only showed .EXE files. Since I’m only running Linux on my machines it was not possible to execute that file.

You can however update the BIOS via ILO (Integrated Lights Out) if you extract the BIOS file from the executable.

First download the .EXE from the HPE site: https://support.hpe.com/hpsc/swd/public/detail?swItemId=MTX_e9bfdf20809a426cb16ef9cd81

(Currently the latest version is SP99427.exe. If you want to be sure you’re using the latest BIOS then click the tab “Revision History” to see if there are newer BIOS files available)

Extract the contents of the executable. Have a look at the directory structure below and extract the file marked "CPQJ06xx.xxx"(where “x” might change depending on versions)

.
├── How to Use.txt
├── logo.gif
├── README.1ST
├── rev_hist.txt
├── ROMPaq Flat Files
│   ├── CPQJ0613.684
│   ├── CPQSRVR2.CPU
│   ├── README.1ST
│   ├── Readme.txt
│   └── ROMPAQ.EXE
├── ROMPaq USB Key
│   ├── CPQJ0613.684
│   ├── CPQSRVR2.CPU
│   ├── HPEUSB.exe
│   ├── Readme.txt
│   └── ROMPAQ.EXE
├── Start_files
│   ├── colorschememapping.xml
│   ├── filelist.xml
│   └── themedata.thmx
└── Start.htm
3 directories, 18 files

Then log in to ILO and navigate to the page “Firmware” via the Menu Option “Administrator”

At the bottom of the page select “Browse” to select the CPQJ06 file and then click Upload.

Let the upload complete and reboot your Microserver. When you start the microserver it displays the BIOS version and date in the first line.

You can also see the version in the ILO overview page.

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