• VMWare ESXi - [Errno 28] No space left on device

    There are many articles with the infamous VMWare "No space left on device" message. Most suggest installing the tools VIB separately, or before the upgrade. While that did work for me on one host, it did not for another. I thought I would let you in on what did work.

    [root@ESXi-2:~] esxcli software profile update -p ESXi-6.7.0-20190802001-no-tools -d https://hostupdate.vmware.com/softwa...epot-index.xml
    [OSError]
    [Errno 28] No space left on device

    On a whim, I downloaded the update package and ran it locally vs online from the VMWare repository. When I did that, the message was clear:

    [root@ESXi-2:~] esxcli software profile update -d /vmfs/volumes/diskstation_nfs/update-from-esxi6.7-6.7_update03.zip -p ESXi-6.7.0-20190802001-standard
    [HardwareError]
    Hardware precheck of profile ESXi-6.7.0-20190802001-standard failed with warnings: CPU_SUPPORT WARNING: The CPU in this host may not be supported in future ESXi releases. Please plan accordingly.

    Apply --no-hardware-warning option to ignore the warnings and proceed with the transaction.
    Please refer to the log file for more details.

    I took the given advice and ran the command with the --no-hardware-warning option.

    [root@ESXi-2:~] esxcli software profile update -d /vmfs/volumes/diskstation_nfs/update-from-esxi6.7-6.7_update03.zip -p ESXi-6.7.0-20190802001-standard --no-hardware-warning
    Update Result
    Message: The update completed successfully, but the system needs to be rebooted for the changes to be effective.


    It completed successfully. But I should note, a few years back I had a test ESXi host. I ran an update (didn't get this message) and rebooted the host. It stopped on boot with an "Unsupported CPU" message, essentially bricking my test ESXi server. Sure, we can all read the HCLs, but many ESXi instlallations are home labs with limited budgets and we just do what we can so we can apply that to our professional situations.