I had to configure a bunch of ESXi 5.1 servers with LSI 9240-4i hardware RAID controllers the other day. This RAID controller is perfectly supported in ESXi 5.1 but it lacks the monitoring features.
To have these, you need to install first the LSI SMIS package on your ESXi hosts. With this, the ESXi server acts as a proxy to query the RAID controller from the network. Then you need a Windows computer running LSI MegaRaid Storage Manager (MSM) software.
But that is not enough. With just that, you will not be able to connect to the ESXi server. You will be able to detect a server but it will have a 0.0.0.0 IP address. And if you try to connect to it, you will get a “unable to connect to CIMOM server” error.
This has to do with MSM using multicast and ESXi only answering to unicast packets.
Fortunately, some guy found out a workaround which consists of running a multicast to unicast proxy (written in PHP, LOL). The full explanation to use it is right here: http://www.tinkertry.com/esxi-5-1-can-run-lsi-megaraid-in-a-vm/ .
Optionally, you can run the multicast to unicast proxy as a Windows service with the help of NSSM, as indicated right here: http://kb.stonegroup.co.uk/index.php?View=entry&EntryID=199 .
And voilà, now you are able to monitor the controller from MSM and configure things like Patrol Read. Enjoy!