I was so confident that the Crucial T705 4TB PCIe Gen5 NVMe M.2 SSD would work with VMware ESXi without any issues that I didn’t even bother to Google or check.
I wanted to get and test what it feels like and how much of a performance boost it gives when using the fastest (R: 14,100 MB/s / W: 12,600 MB/s) NVMe drive.
I also felt that since I already have one Crucial NVMe drive that works, I didn’t need to check further. However, upon later investigation, I realized I have a Kingston drive, not a Crucial one. And what I discovered was that ESXi does not recognize this NVMe drive.
Also, when I Googled it, I immediately found William Lam’s article (Crucial NVMe SSD not recognized by ESXi 6.7 & 7.0 https://williamlam.com/2019/05/quick-tip-crucial-nvme-ssd-not-recognized-by-esxi-6-7.html), where he wrote that Crucial NVMe drives worked with version 6.5, but support was dropped in newer VMware ESXi versions.
The article suggests a solution to take the NVMe driver from 6.5 and import it into version 6.7, which would make it work. However, I see too many problems with this approach, and this issue would certainly arise with every upgrade and update. I don’t see this as a sustainable solution.
But anyway, I already have an ADATA NVMe drive that ESXi doesn’t recognize and can’t use. I was actually happy about this because my AI/ML server is currently dual boot. I have Windows 11 installed for gaming on the ADATA (XPG GAMMIX S11 Pro PCIe Gen3x4 M.2 2280 Solid State Drive) NVMe drive (read/write up to 3500/3000MB/s). This way, I can’t damage anything while using ESXi.
So, I was expecting to use the T705 in a similar manner. I planned to use it for my gaming and store games on it. At least the games would benefit from it a lot with faster loading times or no loading times at all. Games that support direct storage should have zero loading time. But there’s another problem with the Crucial T705. The ESXi server cannot shut down. It hangs at the status “Shutting down device drivers….”. This issue is caused by my new Crucial T705 drive, the world’s fastest. As a result, it won’t shut down. If I want to use ESXi, I have to remove the card, and if I want to play games, I have to reinsert it. This ruins everything, and I do not have a solution for how I can still keep my T705 inside the server.
My motherboard has one M.2 slot, but it is Gen 3, and all other PCIe to M.2 adapters I have are Gen 4. So, I bought an ASUS Hyper M.2 x16 Gen5 Card because I didn’t have any other PCIe Gen 5 adapters for M.2 drives. I am using the Gen 4 version on my other servers, and they have been working well, with no problems in cooling the NVMe drives. I can say that the ASUS Hyper M.2 x16 Gen5 Card and bifurcation work well with ESXi; I didn’t even need to change any BIOS settings, as it automatically picked the correct configuration.
I thought the Crucial T705 drive would give an amazing speed boost for my AI machine, and I considered buying more. However, now I have to wait for Intel or Samsung drives. I have never had any issues with Intel or Samsung NVMe drives, and now I can’t even keep the Crucial T705 inside my server when I use ESXi.
I am not sure how to solve the problem. ESXi can’t shut down properly. If I force shut it down multiple times, the ESXi drive gets corrupted, and the only solution is to reinstall ESXi. This kind of solution is unacceptable.
Update 14.07.2024: This is interesting. My motherboard PCIe slots are Gen 5, and I am using a PCIe Gen 4 riser cable (TT Premium PCI-E 4.0 Extender 600mm) with an ASUS Hyper M.2 x16 Gen5 Card and a Gen 5 M.2 drive, the Crucial T705 Gen5. Surprisingly, the M.2 NVMe drive is operating at Gen 5 maximum speed, even though the riser cable is Gen 4. I initially thought the riser cable also had to be PCIe Gen 5.
When I tested the M.2 NVMe drive with a PCIe adapter that is Gen 4, the Crucial T705 worked at Gen 4 speeds, which were half of the speed and the maximum for Gen 4.
This indicates how high-quality the Thermaltake Premium PCI-E 4.0 Extender cable is. Despite not being Gen 5, it is capable of supporting Gen 5 speeds.