At times you many need to pass an option to the vmkernel when it first boots. To do that during an install, press tab on the initial boot screen and then add the desired option after vmkboot.gz as shown in the 2nd image. If you are booting ESXi after an install, press shift+o on the initial boot screen, enter your options and press enter
When ESXi boots for the 1st time, at about 0:27 into the video you can see ACPI and Power Management being loaded. When ESXi is booting for the 2nd time, the options in the above image have been added and the modules no longer load (1:08). The vmkernel log file (/var/log/messages) also reflects these options.
May 23 04:32:10 syslogd started: BusyBox v1.9.1-VMware-visor-654
May 23 04:32:10 vmklogger: Successfully daemonized.
May 23 04:32:10 vmkernel: cpu0:0)BootConfig: 52: netNumPortsets = 128
May 23 04:32:10 vmkernel: TSC: 2486696254 cpu0:0)BootConfig: 54: netNumGPBuffers = 1024
......
May 23 04:32:10 vmkernel: TSC: 2487189236 cpu0:0)BootConfig: 106: xapicAMDDetect = TRUE
May 23 04:32:10 vmkernel: TSC: 2487197244 cpu0:0)BootConfig: 107: xapicForce = FALSE
May 23 04:32:10 vmkernel: TSC: 2487205420 cpu0:0)BootConfig: 108: checkCPUIDLimit = TRUE
May 23 04:32:10 vmkernel: TSC: 2487213470 cpu0:0)BootConfig: 109: vmkKeyboard = TRUE
May 23 04:32:10 vmkernel: TSC: 2487221730 cpu0:0)BootConfig: 110: vmkTerminals = TRUE
May 23 04:32:10 vmkernel: TSC: 2487229920 cpu0:0)BootConfig: 111: acpiDbgLevel = 0
May 23 04:32:10 vmkernel: TSC: 2487262302 cpu0:0)BootConfig: 112: debugBreak = FALSE
May 23 04:32:10 vmkernel: TSC: 2487270380 cpu0:0)BootConfig: 113: debugLogToSerial = 2
May 23 04:32:10 vmkernel: TSC: 2487278318 cpu0:0)BootConfig: 114: fastHzEstimate = TRUE
May 23 04:32:10 vmkernel: TSC: 2487286550 cpu0:0)BootConfig: 115: powerManagement = FALSE
May 23 04:32:10 vmkernel: TSC: 2487294628 cpu0:0)BootConfig: 116: memLowReservedMaxMB = 1024
...
May 23 04:32:10 vmkernel: TSC: 2487448208 cpu0:0)BootConfig: 129: disableTurbo = FALSE
May 23 04:32:10 vmkernel: TSC: 2487481892 cpu0:0)Boot: 314: cmdline 'vmkboot.gz noACPI nopowerManagement bootUUID=7b74833b3e445d315642e8157483517e '
May 23 04:32:10 vmkernel: TSC: 2487494198 cpu0:0)Boot: 1102: vmk.gz : 0x21b - 0xa21
...
May 23 04:32:10 vmkernel: TSC: 20007785924 cpu0:0)Initializing chipset ...
May 23 04:32:10 vmkernel: TSC: 20010942868 cpu0:0)ALERT: Chipset: 219: using mpsIntRouting/noACPI option, make sure it is on purpose
May 23 04:32:10 vmkernel: TSC: 20011012154 cpu0:0)MPS: 209: ioapic 001 (0) @ fec00000 version 0x11
Below is a list of options that you can use. You can also set many of these using the VI client. Go to Configuration \ Software \ Advanced Settings and then look at the VMkernel options.
maxPCPUS serialPort debugPort tty1Port tty1Term tty2Port tty2Term vmwirePort overrideSerialPortAddr baudRate
generalCriticalMemory fakeNUMAnodes netNumPortsets netNumGPBuffers netMaxPCPUPktCacheSize
netPktNumSlabSizes netPktHeapMinSize netPktHeapMaxSize
storageHeapMinSize storageHeapMaxSize idMem BOOTIF BOOTUUID
clockMultiplierMayVaryPerNode memmapMaxPhysicalMemMB acpiDbgLevel debugLogToSerial
memLowReservedMaxMB vmkLoadEntry vmkLoadSeed nmiAction 115200 1048576
nouseNUMAInfo nomeasureNUMALatency nosharePerNode nompsIntRouting noforceCRS
nocorrectBSPMTRRMasks nomcaFindDIMMFromAddr nomcaClearBanksOnMCE nomcaEnableScrubber
nomcaEnableAllErrorSources noACPI noupdateBusIRQ noexecutePOST nopageSharing nomemCheckEveryWord
nohyperthreading nologicalApicId nodumpDiag norealNMI nologOnScreen nonetESX2LegacyMode nonetPktBufUseSlab
nonetPanicBadDevOpen nonetNetqueueEnabled nonetDVSSyncEnabled nonoIOMMU noioapic novga64 nosmallFontForTTY
noauditMode notechSupportMode norollback nofsCheck nousbBoot nouwSwap nooem nobusSpeedMayVary noclockMultiplierMayVary
noassumeCommonBusClock noassumePerNodeBusClock nobusSpeedMayVaryPerNode notimerEnableTSC notimerForceTSC
notimerEnableHPET notimerEnableACPI notimerEnableMPMC nomemmapStressHighBitMPNs noconsole noxapicAMDDetect noxapicForce
nocheckCPUIDLimit novmkKeyboard novmkTerminals nodebugBreak nofastHzEstimate nopowerManagement
novmkLoadTPM nouseNHCC notestEarlyPanic nominMemoryCheck noskipMicrocodeCompatCheck nocustom
noipmiEnabled nodisableC1E nodisableCFOH nodisableTurbo LOG. buddyPhysicalMemoryDebugStruct noclockMultiplierMayVaryPerNode nobuddyPhysicalMemoryDebugStruct