{"id":14480,"date":"2026-10-09T14:53:27","date_gmt":"2026-10-09T12:53:27","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/irg-net.com\/?p=14480"},"modified":"2026-10-09T15:10:35","modified_gmt":"2026-10-09T13:10:35","slug":"dell-xr4000-witness-node-upgrade","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/irg-net.com\/index.php\/dell-xr4000-witness-node-upgrade\/","title":{"rendered":"Dell XR4000 – Witness Node Upgrade"},"content":{"rendered":"
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If you run a two-node vSAN cluster at the edge, you need a witness. Dell\u2019s PowerEdge XR4000w<\/strong> is a compact witness sled that does the job nicely, but it comes with a catch: it is a stripped-down server without an iDRAC<\/strong>, so you cannot simply mount an ISO through a virtual console. The first ESXi installation has to be done over a serial connection<\/strong>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In this post I walk through the whole procedure we used to bring up a witness host in our data center: preparing the laptop, building a bootable USB stick with the right kernel options, installing ESXi 8.0 Update 3 over the serial console, configuring the management network, and finally installing Dell\u2019s witness drivers so that the host shows up in the iDRAC of the vSAN nodes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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What you need<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
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  • A Windows laptop<\/strong> with a free USB-A port and admin rights<\/li>\n\n\n\n
  • A USB-A to micro-USB cable<\/strong> (the micro-USB port on the XR4000w front panel is the serial console)<\/li>\n\n\n\n
  • A USB stick<\/strong> (we used a 32 GB stick)<\/li>\n\n\n\n
  • The CP210x Universal Windows Driver<\/strong> (Silicon Labs USB-to-UART bridge)<\/li>\n\n\n\n
  • A terminal program such as PuTTY<\/strong><\/li>\n\n\n\n
  • Rufus, to write the bootable USB stick<\/li>\n\n\n\n
  • The Dell-customized VMware ESXi 8.0 ISO, for example VMware-VMvisor-Installer-8.0.0.update03-24859861.x86_64-Dell_Customized-A08.iso<\/li>\n\n\n\n
  • The two Dell witness drivers for ESXi 8.0: Dell OS Agent for Witness<\/strong> and Dell OS Driver for Witness<\/strong><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n
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    About the Hardware<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

    The XR4000w is a sled, built for the Dell PowerEdge XR4000 chassis. On the front you will find a power button, a USB port, two RJ-45 network ports and the micro-USB console port. There is no iDRAC and no video output, which is exactly why the serial console matters. The sled we installed reports an Intel Atom C3500 CPU at 1.60 GHz with 16 GiB of memory and a 960 GB NVMe M.2 boot device.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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    Step-by-Step Installation<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

    1. Install the serial driver on your Notebook<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
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    1. <\/li>\n<\/ol>\n\n\n\n

      To open a serial connection over USB, Windows needs the CP210x Universal Windows Driver<\/strong>. Download and install it, then open Device Manager as administrator (devmgmt.msc). If the adapter shows up with a yellow \u201c!\u201d, right-click it and update the driver.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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      2. Connect the Notebook to the Witness Sled<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

      Plug the USB-A end of the cable into your laptop and the micro-USB end into the console port on the front of the XR4000w. Windows should now assign a new COM port. Check Device Manager to see which one it is (in our case COM4).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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      3. Open the serial session in PuTTY<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

      In PuTTY, choose the connection type Serial<\/strong> and enter the following:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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