Cant get ROCK installed on vmware ESXi - please help

Tinkering
1

Hello,
There are many topics about Roon virtualisation, although none of them explain step by step how to install ROCK on ESXi.

I have so far downloaded ROCK and:

  • Mounted the unpacked .img file as an iso and tried to boot from it - no success.
  • Written img to USB key with etcher, inserted USB to ESXi host, added USB Device in VM settings - no success.
  • Tried converting img to iso using special tools - Errors.

Please advise.

Thanks.

2

I don’t have a direct answer but…

I was never able to get it installed with ESXi directly. I had to use something local (VirtualBox, Fusion, etc. take your pick it), hook-up a real keyboard to the VM, install, and then create an OVM export of the VM. I could then import the OVM directly into ESXi where it happily did it’s thing for over a year before I retired it.

1 Like
3

AFAIK Rock is specially made for Intel NUC. It expects to have NUC hardware and checks for it. It is not supported on any other hardware (virtual nor physical). If you want to run it on some other platform, you need to first install an operating system (Windows, Linux or Mac) and then the Roon Application on top of that.

4

How do I make the bootable image or usb? I can not boot from the .img file.
I have VirtualBox installed.

5

I don’t have my notes and I was using a much older version of ROCK when I did it. Don’t know if they have made changes. Try a Google search “boot virtualbox from usb”. You’ll find some hits. There isn’t anything super-special, last I tried, about getting it to boot like any other stick based Linux. There are also ways to convert a bootable USB image to an ISO… again… I honestly forget exactly what I did to get the img to boot but I do believe I used VBox.

6

You have to use VboxManage to convert img to vmdk.
This tool came with VirtualBox.
Google for instruction.

7

Thank you for the reply, but I can not boot the ROCK image in the first place. I dont have any sort of image yet - other than blank VM profile - RAM, CPU, HDD, Network - virtual HW ready for the system to get installed.

The problem I have is to boot the ROCK to allow me to install it.

8

I don’t understand what are you doing.
You have to convert the ROCK .img file to a .vmdk one.
After that, you must create a new virtual machine under ESXi and use converted vmdk file as HDD.
You don’t have boot the .img file directy, just to use VboxManage to convert it from CLI.

Or, can try this tool: https://cloudbase.it/qemu-img-windows/

2 Likes
9

Thank you for your reply, it pointed me into right direction.
It wasnt obvious at all how to proceed with img file.
To be honest it was quite quirky.

I have years of experience with virtualization iso imaged etc. But i have never had to follow such procedure as using img file converted to ovf to mount is as a HDD1, the adding manually HDD2 to the VM so that ROCK software from img/HDD1 could install itself on to the HDD2 - and then to Remove HDD1 from that VM all together.

Usually there are bootable ISO images that can be mounted to CD/DVD drive and then content can be installed on the HDD on VM - like every other Linux or Windows OS.

10

This is an unnoficial workaround.
BTW, it is not supported by Roon team. :grinning: