[Nested ESXi] - How to properly configure it

Issue

Working within a LAB and/or in a nested environment often requires the deployment of new ESXi hosts. The fastest way to have new ESXi hosts deployed quickly is to clone them from a master VM.
Below few steps to follow to properly create a working VM clone in a nested environment.

Solution

• First of all, we do a normal installation in a neste environment of our ESXi master VM, giving to it minimal resources, as:
  - 2 vCPU
  - 8 GB of RAM
  - 20GB of Disk (Thin Provision)
  - 4 vNIC
  
  
  
  
  
• When started, we get into ssh and we change the VMkernel MAC address by running the following command:
  
  esxcli system settings advanced set -o /Net/FollowHardwareMac -i 1
  
  
• To have the unique UUID on each host, we need to delete the "/system/uuid" record stored in /etc/vmware/esx.conf. To do this we can edit the file and delete the corresponding line, or launch the command below, which replaces the corresponding line with an empty line.
  
  sed -i 's/^\(\/system\/uuid\).*//' /etc/vmware/esx.conf
  
  
  
  
  
  
• It is possible to shutdown the ESXi master VM and convert it to a template, or leave it as is to be cloned later when needed.
  
  
  
• When needed, we can clone the master VM to deploy our ESXi nodes. On starting up of the VM, a new UUID will be generated.
  Once the ESXi VM clones is pawered on, we can change network settings on them (IP addresses, hostnames, etc.).
  
  
• Let's generate a new certificate, typing the following command:
  
  /sbin/generate-certificates
  
  
• Let's restart the following services, in order to make the host ready for our LAB.
  
  /etc/init.d/hostd restart && /etc/init.d/vpxa restart
  
  
  

That's it.