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Refresher on Nested ESXi Networking Requirements

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Using Nested Virtualization and specifically Nested ESXi, which is running ESXi inside of a VM, has become so automatic and second nature for me and many in the VMware community, that I sometimes forget we still have brand new users who are experiencing ESXi for the very first time.

Nested ESXi is an extremely powerful capability for so many different use cases from development, testing and general learning purposes. Before jumping in and deploying your Nested ESXi environment, which I highly recommend using my Nested ESXi Virtual Appliances, you need to make sure that you have proper networking setup or you will run into all sorts of strange issues. For all VMware Nested Virtualization resources, tips and tricks, you will definitely want to bookmark this page HERE.

Disclaimer: Nested Nested ESXi is not officially supported by VMware and Nested Virtualization is only supported under limited scenarios. For more details, please refer to this VMware KB 2009916.

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How to install all versions of ESX and ESXi in VM?

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Thanks goodness for Virtualization and the ability to easily install ANY operating system inside of a vSphere Virtual Machine including the very first release of ESX 1.0, which is more than 22 years old now.


While going through the process of installing each of the major VMware ESX and ESXi releases, I had made notes for each of the VM configurations that I had used and any other issues I may have ran into. Figured I share this information in case anyone might be interested and this would also provide an online searchable reference in case I ever need to do this again for my future-self 😀

In addition to recording each installation, which you can watch via the Youtube playlists below, I also had some fun putting together this short compilation that summarizes all the VMware ESX and ESXi releases over the past 22 years. Definitely recommend checking it out and be sure to 👍🔊😉

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Self-Contained & Automated VMware Cloud Foundation (VCF) deployment using new VLC Holodeck Toolkit

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I recently came to learn about a really neat solution that was released called the VMware Cloud Foundation Lab Constructor (VLC) Holodeck Toolkit, which makes it super easy for anyone to deploy a complete functional VCF environment, fully self-contained and deploys all the required networking and infrastructure services that dramatically reduces the amount of time and effort to deploy a VCF environment for evaluation or learning purposes.

What is unique about the VLC Holodeck Toolkit is that it ships with a special vPodRouter VM, which provides all the networking and connectivity that is required to deploy a typical production VCF environment. If this sounds familiar, this is exactly how VMware Hands-On-Labs (HOL) works where isolated networking is provided to each "vPod" through their vPodRouter VM. In addition, the VLC Holodeck Toolkit also builds a custom Windows Jumphost (bastion) ISO that includes all the infrastructure services like DNS, Directory, Certificate Authority, etc. that is fully configured and ready to use once it is deployed and this is how users interact with the VCF environment.

With the VLC Holodeck Toolkit providing and building all the necessary "virtual" infrastructure, the barrier to entry is further reduced and customers can easily stand up a fully functional VCF environment running on just a single ESXi host without any special physical networking requirements. For a detailed overview of the solution, check out overview video below.


After learning about the solution, I also had the opportunity to kick the tires and provide some early feedback, which included a few additional optimizations that made its way back into the toolkit. For those interested, below is the high level workflow to go from a single ESXi host with minimal configuration to a fully functional VCF environment.

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