Summary
Requirements
Instructions
Changelog
Comments397
Bugs9
Apple iMac and Macbook's built-in wireless card is known to have limited coverage as it does not feature an external antenna for better signal reception, however we can easily boost the Wi-Fi signal strength and range of any Apple Mac computer using external USB wireless dongles with external antenna.
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USB has become one the most widely adopted connection type in the world & USB network adapters are also popular among Edge computing platforms. In some platforms, there is either limited or no PCI/PCIe slots for I/O expansion & in some cases, an Ethernet port is not even available. Another advantage of a USB-based network adapter is that it can be hot-plugged into an system without a reboot which means no impact to the workload, same is true for hot-remove.
This Fling supports the most popular USB network adapter chipsets found in the market. The ASIX USB 2.0 gigabit network ASIX88178a, ASIX USB 3.0 gigabit network ASIX88179, Realtek USB 3.0 gigabit network RTL8152/RTL8153 and Aquantia AQC111U. These are relatively inexpensive devices that many of our existing vSphere customers are already using and are familiar with.
- VMware ESXi 6.5, 6.7 & 7.0 (x86)
Vendor | Chipset | VendorID | ProductID |
---|---|---|---|
AQUANTIA | AQC111U | 0xe05a | 0x20f4 |
AQUANTIA | Aquantia Pacific | 0x2eca | 0xc101 |
ASIX | AX88179 | 0x0b95 | 0x1790 |
ASIX | AX88178a | 0x0b95 | 0x178a |
CISCO LINKSYS | RTL8153 | 0x13b1 | 0x0041 |
DLINK | AX88179 | 0x2001 | 0x4a00 |
INSYDE SOFTWARE CORP | Insyde Software Corp. | 0x0b1f | 0x03ee |
LENOVO | RTL8153 | 0x17ef | 0x3062 |
LENOVO | RTL8153 | 0x17ef | 0x720a |
LENOVO | RTL8153 | 0x17ef | 0x3069 |
LENOVO | AX88179 | 0x17ef | 0x304b |
LENOVO | RTL8153 | 0x17ef | 0x7205 |
NVIDIA | RTL8153 | 0x0955 | 0x09ff |
REALTEK | RTL8153 | 0x045e | 0x07c6 |
REALTEK | RTL8152 | 0x0bda | 0x8152 |
REALTEK | RTL8153 | 0x0bda | 0x8153 |
REALTEK | RTL8156 | 0x0bda | 0x8156 |
SITECOMEU | AX88179 | 0x0df6 | 0x0072 |
SUPERMICRO | Supermicro computer Inc | 0x15d9 | 0x1b83 |
TP-LINK | RTL8153 | 0x2357 | 0x0601 |
TRENDNET | AQC111U | 0xe05a | 0x20f4 |
Step 1 - Download the ZIP file for the specific version of your ESXi host and upload to ESXi host using SCP or Datastore Browser
Step 2 - Place the ESXi host into Maintenance Mode using the vSphere UI or CLI (e.g. esxcli system maintenanceMode set -e true)
Step 3 - Install the ESXi Offline Bundle (6.5/6.7) or Component (7.0)
For (7.0+) - Run the following command on ESXi Shell to install ESXi Component:
For (6.5/6.7) - Run the following command on ESXi Shell to install ESXi Offline Bundle:
Step 4 - Plug-in the USB NIC and reboot for the change to go into effect. Once the host has rebooted, ESXi should automatically pickup and claim the USB NIC (e.g. vusb0)
Note: Secure Boot can not be enabled if you decide to use the USB NIC as your primary NIC for Management Network. Since the settings do not persist, you will need to create a startup script (see instructions below for more details details) and this is not allowed when Secure Boot is enabled. If USB NIC is not your primary NIC for the Management Network, then you do not have to disable Secure Boot
Intel NUC 10 (Frost Canyon) Considerations
Update (09/21/20): With ESXi 7.0 Update 1, the built-in Intel NIC is now automatically recognized. For earlier ESXi releases, you will need to install community driver as mentioned below.The built-in Intel NIC is not automatically recognized by ESXi and requires an updated ne1000 driver which can be found here. You will need to create a custom ESXi ISO that contains this driver and install ESXi prior to installing the USB Native Driver ESXi Fling.
Persisting USB NIC Bindings
Update (10/26/20): With ESXi 7.0 Update 1 & latest v1.17+ USB Native Network Driver VIB, USB NIC Bindings are now automatically persistent across reboots. For earlier ESXi releases, you will need to follow the directions below to persist these settings.Currently there is a limitation in ESXi where USB NIC bindings are picked up much later in the boot process and to ensure settings are preserved upon a reboot, the following needs to be added to /etc/rc.local.d/local.sh based on your configurations.
Note: The vusbX vmkernel interface may not show up in either ESXi Embedded Host Client and/or vSphere HTML5 UI, this does not mean there is an issue. ESXi was never designed to support USB-based NICs for Management Network and the UI may not properly detect these devices when using the UI. It is recommended to use the ESXi Shell for any operations requiring configuration of vusbX devices.
Persisting VMkernel to USB NIC mappings
When multiple USB NICs are connected, it is possible that the mapping between vmkX to physical MAC Address of the USB NIC could random change upon rebooting ESXi. To ensure this does not happen, customers can specify the mapping by adding custom parameter to USB NIC module.Here is an example where we are mapping vusb0 to 70:88:6b:85:c0:53 and vusb1 to 58:ef:68:7f:2b:f7:
- Added support for ESXi 7.0 Update 1
- USB NIC Bindings are now automatically persistent
- 5GbE USB NICs now properly show Full vs Half Duplex
ESXi701-VMKUSB-NIC-FLING-40599856-component-17078334.zip
Aug 24, 2020 - v1.6
- Add support for Aquantia and Trendnet AQC111U (0xe05a:0x20f4) (see Requirements page for more details)
- Add support for Realtek RTL8153 (0x045e:0x07c6) (see Requirements page for more details)
- Add support for Realtek RTL8156 (0x0bda:0x8156) (see Requirements page for more details)
- Support for persistent VMkernel to USB NIC MAC Address mappings (see Instructions tab for details)
- Simplified USB NIC persistency (see Instructions tab for details)
- Resolved link speed issue for RTL8153 chipsets
Note 2: This will be the last release which will include support for ESXi 6.5
ESXi700-VMKUSB-NIC-FLING-39035884-component-16770668.zip
ESXi670-VMKUSB-NIC-FLING-39203948-offline_bundle-16780994.zip
ESXi650-VMKUSB-NIC-FLING-39176435-offline_bundle-16775917.zip
April 6, 2020 - v1.5
- Added support for ESXi 7.0
ESXi700-VMKUSB-NIC-FLING-34491022-component-15873236.zip
February 12, 2020 - v1.4
- Add SuperMicro/Insyde Software Corp USB Devices in the supported list
- Resolved invalid speed reporting for some quick devices by using the default speed
ESXi650-VMKUSB-NIC-FLING-33268102-offline_bundle-15620342.zip
November 27, 2019 - v1.3
- Resolved USB device detection issue on Intel XHCI controller
- Resolved packet record issue for ASIX USB network adapters
Usb Cards For Pc
ESXi650-VMKUSB-NIC-FLING-30940032-offline_bundle-15188510.zipSeptember 27, 2019 - v1.2
Usb Network Card For Laptop
- Added support for Aquantia Multi-Gig (1G/2.5G/5G) USB network adapter (see Requirements page for more details)
- Added support for Auto Speed/Connection detection for RTL8153/RTL8152 chipsets
ESXi650-VMKUSB-NIC-FLING-28903792-offline_bundle-14722993.zip
June 17, 2019 - v1.1
- Added support for 9 additional USB NIC devices including USB 2.0 RTL8152 & TPLINK (see Requirements page for complete list)
- Added support for Jumbo Frames (up to 4K) for RTL8153 & AX88179
ESXi650-VMKUSB-NIC-FLING-24599816-offline_bundle-13964320.zip
February 12, 2019 - v1.0 (Initial Release)
ESXi670-VMKUSB-NIC-FLING-20124247-offline_bundle-11613968
ESXi650-VMKUSB-NIC-FLING-20123976-offline_bundle-11613344