Need help with Vmware ESXi Install

fuzion1 · Dec 15, 2012, 3:41 PM

I have having trouble setting up Pfsense on vmware esxi. I have it installed, and have my IP settings Wan & Lan setup properly, but i cannot get the gui to come up. I think the problem is in my switch configuration below. I only have 1 physical NIC to work with. Can someone help me understand what I am doing wrong? I am wanting to setup pfsense to where all my VM's connect through it.

heper · Dec 15, 2012, 4:02 PM

you can't have your LAN & WAN on the same interface … you'd have to work with VLAN's & a managed switch

fuzion1 · Dec 15, 2012, 4:10 PM

Thanks for your reply. I am a noob when it comes to setting up esxi. Could you please elaborate on how to do this? By the managed switch are you saying i need to get a managed switch from my hosting provider?

johnpoz · Dec 15, 2012, 5:22 PM

You need more than 1 nic on your esxi host!! Or you have to need a "local" network switch that understands vlans.

You mention hosting provider - is this esxi host at some datacenter, colo?

If so then you don't need multiple physical nics in the host - and your wan would be tied to the internet. If you just wanting to allow gui access from the internet. Then do so.

Or you just run a VM on the lan side of your pfsense and use that to connect.

But your setup is not right for that sort of config. You have your lan tied to the physical world using the same nic - this is wrong for VMs behind 1 internet nic. Just create a new vswitch on esxi and connect lan nic of pfsense to this vswitch.

fuzion1 · Dec 15, 2012, 6:48 PM

John,

Thank you so much for your reply. Yes, i am hosting my esxi in a datacenter. I think i am understanding you correctly. I setup a seperate vSwitch in esxi, but i did not have a physical NIC tied to it. You can see below in the picture. I called it LAN. I then tied pfsense, and my virtual machine to this LAN, and set pfsense setting to the LAN & WAN i have setup.

I then went into my virtual machine, and set Gateway to the pfsense LAN IP, but i still cannot access the web gui. What am i doing wrong?

johnpoz · Dec 15, 2012, 7:29 PM

what interfaces in pfsense do you have tied to the vswitches? What IP is on the lan interface, what ip and netmask do you have on your other virtual machine?

Can you ping the pfsense lan IP from your virtual machine? Where are you trying to access the pfsense gui from?

fuzion1 · Dec 16, 2012, 1:09 AM

Interfaces:

I have the WAN vswitch0 tied to WAN in pfsense.
I have the LAN vswitch1 tied to the LAN in pfsense.

I have the IP 10.3.1.0 and subnet 255.255.255.0 set in pfsense for the LAN.

I have the IP 10.3.1.2 and subnet 255.255.255.0 and gateway 10.3.1.0 set in the virtual machine.

I am able to ping 10.3.1.0 from the virtual machine.

I am trying to access the gui from internet explorer 9.

Is there somewhere in vmware esxi where i have to input my LAN ip range or something?

From the picture above does it look like i have it setup properly?

johnpoz · Dec 16, 2012, 1:19 AM

10.3.1.0 ?? .0 ??

That's not a valid IP with that mask - that is the wire of that network. Set it to .1, not sure why you of thought to use .0 ? Now if you were using say /22 or /23 then ok 10.3.1.0 would be valid. But with /24, 10.3.1.0 is the wire, .1 through .254 are valid hosts and .255 would be broadcast. Yes .0 in the last octet can be a valid IP address but not with the mask you have set of /24

Then why would you jump to .2 for your vm - did you set something as .1?

What I meant by which interfaces, are you sure its your lan interface in pfsense, and your wan, etc. So you wan has a public IP on it and you can get to that? I see your exsi is public 74.50.x.x – You sure you want to expose your esxi control to the public internet? Not something I would suggest.

fuzion1 · Dec 16, 2012, 3:06 AM

John,

Thank you so much for helping me. Changing the IP to .1 worked!

Thanks a lot

johnpoz · Dec 16, 2012, 4:31 AM

No problem dude - glad you got it sorted. Have not seen anyone use an invalid IP in a long time ;)