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Approxee's avatar
Approxee
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May 03, 2014

F5 VE Lab Licence - Need help with Linux

Hello Fourm,

 

I recently purchased a couple of F5 LAB licences. I also brought a couple of good spec new PCs to run the new F5 VEs on.

 

The problem is I cant get to the point where I can run the F5 VE. I have installed ubuntu 14.04 and the very latest version of VM player. I have got this all installed OK or at least looks OK. When I try and open the ova file the VMPlayer just crashes and closes. I have been trying to get this going for a week now, with no success. It is going to be something I have done as I am new to Linux.

 

I know that probably VMplayer is not supported by F5, so that may be the problem

 

Does anybody have a setup guide using a VM software that is on a free licence. I only need this to prepare for my 301b and 302 exam.

 

Thanks Graham

 

application delivery
deployment
LTM

5 Replies

  • Brad_146558's avatar
    Brad_146558
    Icon for Nimbostratus rankNimbostratus
    May 03, 2014

    Hi Greece Monkey,

     

    Virtualizing the F5 appliance can be tricky, the first thing I'd suggest is getting a hypervisor that we know can support it. I know ESX can, you can try and run a trial version (not sure if they still offer a free version anymore). I believe QEMU is supported and F5 even offers .qcow files, but I've never ran F5 on QEMU.

     

    Also the way in which you configure the network adapters is important. The management NIC should always be first. If you are in VMWare land make sure the management NIC has it's type set to "Flexible" while all other NICs are VMXNET3. I'm sure QEMU will have similar caveats.

     

    • Brad_146558's avatar
      Brad_146558
      Icon for Nimbostratus rankNimbostratus
      May 03, 2014
      Also, if you do go down the VMWare route, make sure to get the Virtual Edition specific to your hypervisor.
  • Kevin_Stewart's avatar
    Kevin_Stewart
    Icon for Employee rankEmployee
    May 03, 2014

    Your best bet is probably to download the trial version of either VMware vSphere ESXi or Workstation. VMware hypervisors are easily the best supported and have the most resources for troubleshooting any issues. ESXi will run on the bare metal, in lieu of your Linux OS, and Workstation will run within your OS. You'll probably get better performance with vSphere too since you don't have to support 3 layers.

     

  • Approxee's avatar
    Approxee
    Icon for Nimbostratus rankNimbostratus
    May 06, 2014

    I have tried for a number of days now, the only way I can get it to work is with Oracle VirtualBox, I tried QEMU over the weekend, but I could not get it to work at all.

     

    The problem is now, that the VM only has a mgt interface with no TMM interfaces available. Is this normal before it is licensed do the interfaces how as an unlicensed box. I dont want to licence the box, to find the VM is not set up right and then I have problems with the licence.

     

    Can you change the number of interfaces after the VE has been licensed or is it fixed from the point of licence

     

    Graham

     

  • Brad_146558's avatar
    Brad_146558
    Icon for Nimbostratus rankNimbostratus
    May 06, 2014

    If you are running an 11.x version of the BIG-IP I don't believe you will be able to configure any of the interfaces inside of the appliance until you get passed the licensing screen.