How to create a bootable USB flash drive to install VMware ESXi 5.5 from: 1. Get a USB flash drive with at least 500 MB disk space 2. Create a MBR partition scheme 3. Create a FAT32 partition 4. Flag that partition bootable 5. Copy all files from the ESXi install iso to the flash drive 6. Rename ISOLINUX.CFG to SYSLINUX.CFG 7. Edit SYSLINUX.CFG: Under "LABEL install", append "-p 1" to "APPEND -c boot.cfg" 8. Get syslinux-3.86, and run "syslinux /dev/sdb1" (where sdb1 is your USB stick's FAT32 partition) 9. Unmount the flash drive 10. Plug the flash drive into your soon to be ESXi server, boot from USB, and install.