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Tutorial: Install DSM 7.x with TinyCore RedPill (TCRP) Loader on ESXi


flyride

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Hello guys,

 

Thank you for this tutoriel is very well done and easy to understand.

By the way I encouter an issue, after the reboot task (Step 8 ), I select SATA in the Grub menu and the loading is starting.

But I'm stuck on "Booting the kernel."

I tried to do the tutoriel from scratch several times, but the result is the same (so that means I'm constant :D )

I installed the Synology Assistant to try reaching the VM, with no result.

 

My ESXi is 6.5 version, build 13932383

I used the Tinycore Redpill v0.9.4.8

And I tried these 2 DSM release numbers :

ds3622xsp-7.1.1-42962
ds3622xsp-7.2.0-64561

 

If someone can help me or give me some clue ?

Thank you in advance

Stephane

 

 

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17 minutes ago, Stephane said:

Hello guys,

 

Thank you for this tutoriel is very well done and easy to understand.

By the way I encouter an issue, after the reboot task (Step 8 ), I select SATA in the Grub menu and the loading is starting.

But I'm stuck on "Booting the kernel."

I tried to do the tutoriel from scratch several times, but the result is the same (so that means I'm constant :D )

I installed the Synology Assistant to try reaching the VM, with no result.

 

My ESXi is 6.5 version, build 13932383

I used the Tinycore Redpill v0.9.4.8

And I tried these 2 DSM release numbers :

ds3622xsp-7.1.1-42962
ds3622xsp-7.2.0-64561

 

If someone can help me or give me some clue ?

Thank you in advance

Stephane

 

 

 

Unfortunately VGA console is not yet implemented on my side, you will not see anything on the screen after that. 

 

Only if you add a serial port and access that using e.g putty you 'll be able to access the console after that point. 

 

I'm planning though soon to add console support as well.

Edited by pocopico
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Hello pocopico,

 

You helped me !

I put a virtual serial adapter with a file output and I can see that my DSM booting correctly.

The issue come from my part, my local firewal unable Synology Assistant to work correctly.

Everything is OK now.

 

Thank you for your help.

Stephane

 

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  • 2 months later...

Hey, so I haven't followed this tutorial since I've ended up using ESXi for testing purposes and was astonished by what I was able to achieve.

The main reason for me was to get hardware transcoding, and as it turns out, an Optiplex 5080 cannot get the i915 activated, always results in crash upon the loading of the driver. So I figured that I'd set up Linux for Jellyfin, and then DSM... but I discovered that anything passthrough worked in DSM...

 

I installed ESXi on a 512GB NVME SSD, which will also be used for the Datastore

  • Downloaded the Arc loader vmdk flat version: https://github.com/AuxXxilium/arc/releases added it to the datastore (in the DS1520+ folder, since the image gets modified), and set it up as an existing hard drive on virtual SATA controller
  • Created a 200 GB hard drive and placed it on a virtual NVME controller (for cache) - you can create 2x200GB disks on the same SSD for read and write cache, but I've read horror stories of people loosing their volume if/when a SSD fails.
  • Save the configuration
  • enable the SATA controller as a passthrough device (raw access to disks, SMART, possible to boot baremetal without having to change anything, etc.):
[root@ESXi:~] lspci
0000:00:17.0 SATA controller: Intel Corporation Comet Lake SATA AHCI Controller 
[root@ESXi:~] lspci -n
0000:00:17.0 Class 0106: 8086:06d2 
[root@ESXi:~] vi /etc/vmware/passthru.map

 

and I added the following (corresponding info at the bottom of the file).

# Intel SATA CONTROLLER
8086 06d2 d3d0 false

 

After reboot, I can toggle both the PCI devices that I care about

Capturedecranle2023-08-11a21_54_53.thumb.png.4dc0df76465c7c2278e95c3f2bad0ab8.png

 

Back to the configuration:

add two PCI devices:

  • the GPU
  • the SATA controller

Capturedecranle2023-08-11a21_33_54.thumb.png.1cdd74ad5c78fb97f65dd3c5ac4a59ac.png

 

Save and start machine.

Follow the normal process to setup the DSM, it uses the hard drives attached to the SATA controller, like Bare metal.

 

Now, the Arc loader has an add-on for patching the i915 driver, however this wouldn't work for me, so I did it manually by using this patch (attached) made by a Chinese modder (https://imnks.com/6421.html).

so I ran the patch:

Optiplex_fan@Syno5080:/volume1/docker$ sudo python3 mod_i915_id-0913.py 
Password: 
[I] 请输入4位十六进制显卡ID(eg:7270):9bc8 <<= Here I entered the PCI_ID of my GPU
[I] 备份 /usr/lib/modules/i915.ko 到 /usr/lib/modules/i915.ko.bak 
[I] 替换 9bc8 到 /usr/lib/modules/i915.ko 的 906784 位置
[I] 删除 /usr/lib/modules/i915.ko 的 2144968 位置的校验
[I] 修改完成, 请重启确认, (源文件备份到/usr/lib/modules/i915.ko.bak, 如有问题请还原).

------ translation ------
[I] Please enter a 4-digit hexadecimal graphics card ID (e.g., 7270): 9bc8  
[I] Backup /usr/lib/modules/i915.ko to /usr/lib/modules/i915.ko.bak
[I] Replace 9bc8 at position 906784 in /usr/lib/modules/i915.ko
[I] Remove validation at position 2144968 in /usr/lib/modules/i915.ko
[I] Modification completed. Please restart to confirm. (The original file is backed up to /usr/lib/modules/i915.ko.bak. If any issues arise, please restore the backup.)

And rebooted the VM!

 

Upon reboot, the GPU is available:

optiplex_fan@Syno5080:/$ ls /dev/dri
by-path  card0  renderD128

 

in Jellyfin, the transcoding works fine up to 200+ fps

 

so while the baremetal installation wouldn't work, the passthrough with ESXi solved the problem. Bonus, I can create other VMs :p

 

mod_i915_id-0913.py

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  • 2 months later...
1 час назад, rbf351 сказал:

Tried to install on ESXi 6.7 with different version of TinyCore RedPill, and it always gets stuck in a loop upgrading DSM versions.

 

Any way to just install the latest version or bypass the update?

try using one of these bootloaders for DSM 7.2:

  1. ARC: https://github.com/AuxXxilium/arc 
  2. TCRP+M-Shell: https://github.com/PeterSuh-Q3/tinycore-redpill 
  3. ARPL 7.2: https://github.com/wjz304/arpl-i18n 

The best for me - ARC. Use arc-XXX.vmdk-flat.zip file...

... and "Other 4.x or later Linux (64-bit)"

Edited by dj_nsk
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  • 1 month later...
1 час назад, waazdakka сказал:

Hello dj_nsk,

 

If I have well understood, if I want to use ARC to automate the installation on ESXI, I just have to follow the exact same tutorial than for the classic Redpill (configuring SATA controllers, gunzip the vmdk etc., until booting on Redpill?)

 

not really. With Arc:

  1. Skip the "Preparing the TCRP Image" section - just download the latest release arc-XXX.vmdk-flat.zip and unzip it
  2. ... 
  3. "Select Add hard disk (existing hard disk) and choose the TCRP vmdk created in the previous step" Upload (upload alternately both files received in step 1) - arc.vmdk - Select
  4. ...
  5. Skip the "System-Specific Parameters and SATABOOT" section
  6. Boot to Arc configuration menu, choose model and DSM version, Enter, Enter, ... Ok Rebooting to DSM :)
  • Thanks 1
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On 11/26/2023 at 1:08 PM, dj_nsk said:

not really. With Arc:

  1. Skip the "Preparing the TCRP Image" section - just download the latest release arc-XXX.vmdk-flat.zip and unzip it
  2. ... 
  3. "Select Add hard disk (existing hard disk) and choose the TCRP vmdk created in the previous step" Upload (upload alternately both files received in step 1) - arc.vmdk - Select
  4. ...
  5. Skip the "System-Specific Parameters and SATABOOT" section
  6. Boot to Arc configuration menu, choose model and DSM version, Enter, Enter, ... Ok Rebooting to DSM :)

Thanks, I will test all of this tonight!!

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  • 4 weeks later...
On 11/26/2023 at 4:08 AM, dj_nsk said:

not really. With Arc:

  1. Skip the "Preparing the TCRP Image" section - just download the latest release arc-XXX.vmdk-flat.zip and unzip it
  2. ... 
  3. "Select Add hard disk (existing hard disk) and choose the TCRP vmdk created in the previous step" Upload (upload alternately both files received in step 1) - arc.vmdk - Select
  4. ...
  5. Skip the "System-Specific Parameters and SATABOOT" section
  6. Boot to Arc configuration menu, choose model and DSM version, Enter, Enter, ... Ok Rebooting to DSM :)

With Arc, does the VM always boot into Arc first to give you an opportunity to reconfigure the loader? If not, how does one do that?

 

Also, I will be running on a PC with an i3-8100 connected to a Q370 and one each NVMe SSD and SATA HDD. Given your installation history, should I use DS918+ or DS920+ as the model?

 

Thanks

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1 час назад, unmesh сказал:

With Arc, does the VM always boot into Arc first to give you an opportunity to reconfigure the loader? If not, how does one do that?

When booting, you can first select - Boot DSM/Configure Loader for a few seconds (as with normal boot without VM)

1 час назад, unmesh сказал:

should I use DS918+ or DS920+ as the model?

920+ will be better for working with NVME (but you can also install a patch for 918+)

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  • 2 weeks later...

Hi there,

I went through the installation instructions and all seemed okay, but when I search with Synology assistant, it can't find the new DS918p ...
Actually, I run an ESXI 6.7 on an hp Server. Could this be the cause? In the tutorial and installation guide Ver. 7 of VMware is mentioned.

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9 часов назад, hpk сказал:

Hi there,

I went through the installation instructions and all seemed okay, but when I search with Synology assistant, it can't find the new DS918p ...
Actually, I run an ESXI 6.7 on an hp Server. Could this be the cause? In the tutorial and installation guide Ver. 7 of VMware is mentioned.

Is it visible in the virtual machine console that it is loading normally?

Is the received IP address visible there? (I don't remember what TCRP shows)

You may not have followed this part of the instructions: "When using a virtual network adapter (such as VMXNET 3), its MAC address and the loader's MAC address setting must match...."

Or it should be done this way (this is in ESXi 8, but it is also possible in 6) -  in order for Xpenology loaders to be able to change the MAC addresses of virtual network cards: Networking - vSwitch - Edit - Security - MAC address changes - ACCEPT

 

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Posted (edited)

Thanks for your suggestions.

 

1) It is starting, however there is not much seen in the console: "Loading Linux - Loading initramfs - Starting kernel with SATA boot"

2) It doesn't get an IP from my router 

3) Matching MAC adresses: Is there more to do than "./rploader.sh serialgen DS918+ realmac" ?

Quote

tc@box:~$ ./rploader.sh serialgen DS918+ realmac
Serial Number for Model = 1790PDN001168
Mac Address for Model DS918+ = 00:11:32:A3:15:19
Real Mac Address : 00:0C:29:46:3B:70
Notice : realmac option is requested, real mac will be used

4) MAC address changes were already accepted, I didn't neet to modify

Edited by hpk
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