How to get Device Identifiers for I/O Devices

Recently I got a few questions about the VMware HCL and how to verify I/O devices without knowing all the key details of  the device. Let’s start of by looking at the VMware HCL, note that there are additional fields on which a search can be done for I/O Devices.

The Device Identifiers are separated into the following items:

VID Vendor ID
DID Device ID
SVID Subsystem Vendor ID
SSID Subsystem ID

Getting the Device Identifiers on your ESX(i) Host is done by taking a look at the current running PCI config by issuing the following command:

For an ESX Host: cat /proc/vmware/pci

For an ESXi Host: lspci –p

The output will display all the Device Identifiers needed to verify the I/O device against the VMware HCL. (in this example the details of a HBA).

More information on Device Identifiers in combination with PowerShell can be found in this excellent article of Luc Dekens.

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  1. VMware Compatibility Guide (HCL) Web 2.0 C | Ficto & Ciencia

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