There are a number of reasons you may want to update your NIC drivers and firmware. Maybe it’s just a best practice recommendation from the vendor, or perhaps you’ve run into a bug or performance problem that warrants this. Whatever the reason, keeping your NIC drivers up to date is always a good idea.
There are several ways to go about updating your drivers, but the tried and tested ‘esxcli’ method works well for small environments. It’s also a good choice to ensure you have maximum control over the process. The below video will walk you through the update process:
Remember that finding the correct NIC on the VMware Compatibility Guide is one of the most important steps in the driver update process. For help on narrowing down your exact NIC make/model based on PCI identifiers, be sure to check out this video.
Another important point to remember is that some server vendors require specific or minimum firmware levels to go along with their drivers. The firmware version listed in the compatibility guide is only the version used to test/qualify the driver. It’s not necessarily the best or only choice. VMware always recommends reaching out to your hardware vendor for the final word on driver/firmware interoperability.
Stay tuned for another video on using VMware Update Manager to create a baseline for automating the driver update process!
I hope you found this video helpful. For more instructional videos, please head over to my YouTube channel. Please feel free to leave any comments below, or on YouTube.
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