Sun Ultra20 + ESXi 3.5U2 + Sun Ray Server + Solaris10U6 = One Inexpensive Lab

macOS, Scripting, Solaris, VMWare 1 Minute

Warning: this is an old post I am consolidating as you can see from the versions. No comments on this Post, Thanks


I know long title but it describes my experiment very accurately. My goal in phase one was to put together a very quick and dirty solution for SRS (Sun Ray Server) in my home. It consists of some components I had lying around the house as well as some new. I will get into detail later on but wanted to get this started for now. Here is an overview of the components used in this solution:

  • Sun Microsystems Ultra20: 6GB Memory, 2x160GB SATA, SAS Controller, Ext. 500GB eSATA.
  • Iomega StorCenter Raid 1 500GB (usable): NAS, CIFS, FTP and AFP Compatible, Gigabit
  • VMWare ESX Server 3.5 U2: VMs – Solaris 10 U6 and SRS 4
  • Sun Ray 270 Client
  • Dell 21″ Display
  • ioGear MiniView switch
  • 2 Gigabit switches: linksys 8 port and dlink 8 port (not really needed for SunRay just had them)

Configuration Steps:

External Sata:

  1. First steps after connecting the external Sata disk in my case I put a 500GB Maxtor in a Maddog eSata case and connected it to my Sun (LSI) SAS controller. I purchased cables with the PCI plate attached for a cleaner install and then used an eSata cable to connect the disk. These were readly available from MicroCenter.
  2. Make sure you fdisk the drive first and change the type to “fb” you can refer to this site for details: http://communities.vmware.com/message/713185;jsessionid=4E7B2BBEB9128F8D0EBCBEFC4CDEFAF5
  3. I loaded ESXi 3.5 U3 successfully by leveraging the SAS card and external disks. Using the on-board controller would not work with ESXi, worked fine with ESX, uggg. So I had to buy the SAS 4 port controller.
Currently I have the following Virtual Machines:
  1. OpenSolaris 2008.11
  2. Solaris 2008.10
  3. Windows XP
  4. Mac OS X (Experimenting now, we sill see how this goes)
  5. Virtual Studio (VMWare)
  6. Sun Storage (Fishworks Simulation, Trying to get this converted to ESX)

More info on the way stay tuned!

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2 thoughts on “Sun Ultra20 + ESXi 3.5U2 + Sun Ray Server + Solaris10U6 = One Inexpensive Lab”

  1. hello, I would like to deploy a sun ray server too, do you have any hints about deploying it?My hardware is a 32 bit 4x xeon 3ghz…

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  2. No nothing special just follow install guide. If you went to class it is pretty much how your would have setup a SRS in training. This one just used Solaris for the client but for customers I used Windows on VMWare for SRS and the client OS.

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