Pradeep Singh | 4th Sep 2017
Hardware and Software Details:
Following is the list of Hardware and Software components I used for this article –
- USB 3.0 to Gigabit Ethernet Network Adapter – TP-Link TL-UE300
- x86_64 Hardware – Mini PC Intel® NUC Kit NUC6i7KYK
- Hypervisor – VMware vSphere Hypervisor – ESXi 6.0
Follow these steps to install the Driver for the TP-Link USB 3.0 to Gigabit Ethernet Network Adapter to ESXi running on Intel Nuc Skull Canyon –
1. Download USB Ethernet Driver for ESXi 6.0:
Download the image from the following link –
https://bintray.com/gomesjj/VIBs/r8152_esxi60_vib/2.06.0-4
Just for the backup, I have uploaded this file to my GitHub Repo – Link
2. Enable SSH to ESXi 6.0:
- Login to the VMware vSphere Client (vCenter Server).
- Select the ESXi Host from Inventory
- Click on “Configure” Tab
- Scroll Down to “System –> Security Profile”
- Locate “SSH” service and start it.
3. Upload Firmware File to ESXi Host:
3.1 Upload the file on ESXi using “sftp” or secure ftp client such as FileZilla –
PRADEESI-M-91HZ:Desktop pradeesi$ sftp root@192.168.101.14 Password: Connected to 192.168.101.14. sftp> sftp> put r8152-2.06.0-4_esxi60.vib Uploading r8152-2.06.0-4_esxi60.vib to /r8152-2.06.0-4_esxi60.vib r8152-2.06.0-4_esxi60.vib 100% 34KB 34.2KB/s 00:00 sftp>
3.2 Move the Firmware file to “/var/log/vmware/” directory using the following command
cp r8152-2.06.0-4_esxi60.vib /var/log/vmware/
4. Install the Firmware:
Install the firmware using the following command –
esxcli software vib install -v /var/log/vmware/r8152-2.06.0-4_esxi60.vib -f
Following is the console output for this command –
[root@localhost:~] esxcli software vib install -v /var/log/vmware/r8152-2.06.0-4_esxi60.vib -f Installation Result Message: Operation finished successfully. Reboot Required: false VIBs Installed: Realtek_bootbank_r8152_2.06.0-4 VIBs Removed: VIBs Skipped: [root@localhost:~]
5. Check the NIC Cards:
List the available NIC cards using the “esxcfg-nics -l” command. You should be able to see the USB NIC Card in the list –
[root@localhost:~] esxcfg-nics -l Name PCI Driver Link Speed Duplex MAC Address MTU Description vmnic0 0000:00:1f.6 e1000e Up 1000Mbps Full 00:1f:c6:9c:bd:8c 1500 Intel Corporation Ethernet Connection (2) I219-LM vmnic32 Pseudo r8152 Up 1000Mbps Full c0:25:e9:2d:af:38 1500 Unknown Unknown [root@localhost:~]
References:
Want a USB Ethernet driver for ESXi? You can have two
Functional USB 3.0 Ethernet Adapter (NIC) driver for ESXi 5.5 & 6.0
IoT Bytes 