MegaCli

Install and use MegaCLI on VMware host

Posted on by Jesper Ramsgaard

Over the last decade, I had the fun of how having to manage an LSI based RAID controller. Never on Windows machines, where the GUI-based Storage Manager tools are simple to work with.

Even though I usually find the vib and get it installed I always struggle to remember how it’s installed and what the commands are. This time I will write it down for the future me, or you?

Procedure

  • Find the MegaCLI vib file and download it…
  • Copy vib to ESXi host
  • Install vib
  • Use MegaCLI for whatever purpose you got

Finding the vib

This is where I struggle the most. LSI was bought by Avago and soon after Avago was bought by Broadcom. So the support links for the downloads have been 404 and using Broadcom’s support site is an education degree that I do not own. This time the link was this, giving you a zip file containing the MegaCLI package for all platforms.

If the link does not work for next time, or maybe a newer version is out. I also managed to find it on https://www.broadcom.com/support/download-search. Make a keyword search for MegaCLI, expand the “management software and tools” from the results and choose the newest “MegaCLI x.x Px” For now it’s MegaCLI 5.5 P1 version 8.07.07.

Install MegaCLI

We now got the zip, extract it and under the “VmwareMN” folder there is the vib that we are gonna be needing.

### SCP it to the host
jr@mbp:~ jr$ scp /Users/jr/Download/8-07-07_MegaCLI/VmwareMN/vmware-esx-MegaCLI-8-07-07.vib root@[ESXHOST]:/tmp/

### SSH to the ESXi host and install. Reboot afterwards
[root@esxhost:~] esxcli software vib install -v /tmp/vmware-esx-MegaCLI-8-07-07.vib

If you are lucky and get a “Could not find a trusted signer” when trying to install the vib the workaround is to add “–no-sig-check” at the end of the esxcli command, after the file path. Since I downloaded it from Broadcom’s own site, I trust it.

After the host reboot(which is very annoying, but necessary). We can not find MegaCLI binary under /opt/lsi/MegaCLI/

Useful MegaCLI commands

### Enclosure information
 /opt/lsi/MegaCLI/MegaCli -EncInfo -aALL

### Virtual drive information
/opt/lsi/MegaCLI/MegaCli -LDInfo -Lall -aALL

### Physical drive information
/opt/lsi/MegaCLI/MegaCli -PDList -aALL

### Silence active alarm
/opt/lsi/MegaCLI/MegaCli -AdpSetProp AlarmSilence -aALL

### Disable alarm
/opt/lsi/MegaCLI/MegaCli -AdpSetProp AlarmDsbl -aALL

### Enable alarm
/opt/lsi/MegaCLI/MegaCli -AdpSetProp AlarmEnbl -aALL

### Prepare for removal
/opt/lsi/MegaCLI/MegaCli -PdPrpRmv -PhysDrv [E:S] -aN

### Unconfigured Bad to good
/opt/lsi/MegaCLI/MegaCli -PDMakeGood -PhysDrv[E:S] -aN

I found a guy that did a bit more advanced MegaCLI scripting, its bit old but still very useful. You can find the site here. I have done some copy-pasting from the script, but all credit goes to the guy behind the link.

### List disk status
/opt/lsi/MegaCLI/MegaCli -PDlist -aALL -NoLog | egrep 'Slot|state' | awk '/Slot/{if (x)print x;x="";}{x=(!x)?$0:x" -"$0;}END{print x;}' | sed 's/Firmware state
://g'

Conclusion

CLI is awesome, so many possibilities and so flexible. In my opinion its a bit hard to find, but after you got it installed its easy. I have tested this on ESXi6.7 and it world as it should. I hope you can use some of it.