Novell Netware 5 VM - Networking Issues

[mtk089]

I tend not to ask for help unless I need it. I've been banging my head on my desk over a week on this one. I can't find an answer anywhere.

I've been trying to move completely away from VMWare and one Legacy machine is giving me difficulty. It is not in production but we use it in the office as a reference from time to time. I cannot completely get rid of it.

It's running Novell Netware 5 and I cannot get a network configuration to work for me, no matter which adapter or driver I try. It does work as a VM in ESXI 6.7. The closest I've gotten is using a Realtek 8139 driver for Netware 5 that I found in the dredges of the internet. It's the only driver the VM will recognize, but the VM completely freezes on reboot when used.

Can anyone provide me with a driver for E1000 or Realtek that might work? Or an autoexec.ncf configuration that will work with the standard installed drivers?

 

[carter69]

I tend not to ask for help unless I need it. I've been banging my head on my desk over a week on this one. I can't find an answer anywhere.

I've been trying to move completely away from VMWare and one Legacy machine is giving me difficulty. It is not in production but we use it in the office as a reference from time to time. I cannot completely get rid of it.

It's running Novell Netware 5 and I cannot get a network configuration to work for me, no matter which adapter or driver I try. It does work as a VM in ESXI 6.7. The closest I've gotten is using a Realtek 8139 driver for Netware 5 that I found in the dredges of the internet. It's the only driver the VM will recognize, but the VM completely freezes on reboot when used.

Can anyone provide me with a driver for E1000 or Realtek that might work? Or an autoexec.ncf configuration that will work with the standard installed drivers?

I would be interested what your process was to move it from vmware to proxmox. I have one in vmware ESXI that runs on ESXI but I have yet to successfully get it to boot fulling under proxmox. I spent today messing around with various options, and it runs super slow during boot and pegs the CPU.

 

[mtk089]

I did get it to work, but it took a lot of tinkering. Getting the network drivers configured was my biggest problem. If you are experiencing the same thing.......

The first thing I needed to do was locate working drivers. I managed to find e1000 drivers that worked. I can get them over to you if you need them. I added the drivers onto the Novell server VM through a Windows 98 client VM.

I exported a vmdk of the Novell VM from ESXI and transferred it onto my Proxmox server. I probably threw it in /media temporarily.

I created a new VM in Proxmox with no storage and imported the vmdk with the following command:

qm importdisk <New Novell VM numerical #> <vmdk file name> <storage location, such as local-lvm or local-zfs> -format qcow2

Then I needed to configure the networking to make it fuction properly, but it booted up after the import. If you need some assistance with networking, I'm happy to show you what I did.

If you can't get it to boot, check and make sure you are using BIOS and not UEFI. That's the only think I can think of.

 

[carter69]

I will try doing the import convert in one action and see if I get anything different. If you would not mind sharing what your hardware and options settings are that would be great. I read another thread that someone had to shut off ACPI and KVM to get his to boot up. Mine got further but something was causing it to go so slow, but in the end after hours of sitting there it never did finish booting.

 

[ths_prox]

Hi, it is great to know I am not he only one needing to migrate a Network 65 into Proxmox. I am having the same issue w/ the network drivers ! It would be great to get some clarity on how @mtk089 solved this issue. Also Can you share your VM configuration ? It took me a lot of tinkering w/ the hw specs to get the VM to boot up. I still need to get my graphics card to work - even standard VGA id not working properly (getting a "purpleish" screen. Help here would be greatly appreciated !

 

[carter69]

Hi, it is great to know I am not he only one needing to migrate a Network 65 into Proxmox. I am having the same issue w/ the network drivers ! It would be great to get some clarity on how @mtk089 solved this issue. Also Can you share your VM configuration ? It took me a lot of tinkering w/ the hw specs to get the VM to boot up. I still need to get my graphics card to work - even standard VGA id not working properly (getting a "purpleish" screen. Help here would be greatly appreciated !

I have not yet found the right combo for the VM hardware settings to get it to fully boot (with or without network), I am guessing something goes into a loop because the CPU goes up when mounting the disks and it never finishes.

 

[ths_prox]

I have not yet found the right combo for the VM hardware settings to get it to fully boot (with or without network), I am guessing something goes into a loop because the CPU goes up when mounting the disks and it never finishes.

You basically need to change the CPU to a Core2duo or Pentium type, the OS to Other, disable ACPI. I have imported the haddock image from a fully functional Network VM running on Virtualbox into Proxmox. my VM boots , but the network interface does not come up and it is slow... so I am definitely not on the right settings.

 

[carter69]

You basically need to change the CPU to a Core2duo or Pentium type, the OS to Other, disable ACPI. I have imported the haddock image from a fully functional Network VM running on Virtualbox into Proxmox. my VM boots , but the network interface does not come up and it is slow... so I am definitely not on the right settings.

Thanks will give that a try here in a bit. I believe MTK089 said he found some network drivers that he got working.