cannot connect to ESX 3.5 in vCenter v4.0

[lakr]

Just upgraded vCenter to 4.0. after that som of my existing ESX 3.5 will not connect to VC. error message i get is "a general system error occured" I'm not sure if this is an error caused by VC or ESX 3.5

also see an other error in the eventlog " cannot upgrade vCenter agent on ESX-server in cluster Unknown installer error.

[ejward]

Hasn't licensing changed in 4? Maybe that could be it?

[lakr]

the licensing is ok, the ESX 3.5 servers connect's to the old licenserver, and i can see the usage of this in vCenter 4.0

The exact error message is "cannot install the vCenter agent service. unknown installer error"

on the ESX-server the following message appears Operation timed out.

[Troy_Clavell]

have you tried to restart hostd? At the service console type

service mgmt-vmware restart

Is your host in a disconnected state in your vCenter instance, or are you just trying to add it into the cluster?

[lakr]

yes I have tried to restart the service, also tried to remove a server from vCenter and uninstall the vpxa, and then connect to it again without succes

[Troy_Clavell]

you may try to manually install the management agents following this KB

[lakr]

followed this guide and manualy removed and installed the agent with no succes, error message when connecting to vCenter is "a general system error occured"

[admin]

is vCenter having any trouble communicating with the license server?

Is the license server Windows service running?

Is the license server listening?

Check the license server status?

Type netstat -ab at the command line 2.Verify that The lmgrd.exe process is listening on port 27000 The VMWARELM.exe process is listening on port 27010

Check this kb for VC Agent upgrade:

VMware-GSS,

VMware Communities User Moderator

[Schorschi]

After months of running ESXi 3.5 Update 3 in vCenter 4 Beta2 and RC1, today, ESXi 3.5 Update 4 has the same issue with vCenter 4.0 GA. Exact same issue. Manual install of agent does not appear to be valid for ESXi, all referenced kb articles and such in this thread are for ESX classic.

[admin]

Hi,

Can you upload the log files? You can get them by

Start -> VMware -> Generate vCenter Server log bundle - Extended

Thanks.

Max

[lakr]

Did an reboot of the ESX-servers and it solved itself

[admin]

Glad to know it works now.

Thanks.

Max

[Schorschi]

Since we are in the middle of our stateless ESXi solution, and ESXi is all but painless to re-loaded, I did some testing, about of 11 or 12 rebuilds, I have see the issue once. Out of the some extensive re-load testing at least 15 or more tests, we did with beta2 and rc1, and about the same with ESX 3.5 Update 3, saw this 1 or 2 times, or something similar, so the occurance rate for this or very similar issue is approaching 10% for us, that is not peanuts when we could have deployments approaching 200 or 300 in a single day. However, so far this has happened only on ESX 3.5 Update 3 and 4, so far.

[sharifm]

I had the same problem and rebooting the esx did not resolve it. I turned off all the VMs and put the esx into maintenance mode. This made the install succeed. Try it.

Regards

Sherif

[Semka]

I have 2 ESXi 4.0 hosts , 1st host i have upgraded from 3.5 and 2nd installed with 4.0 from scratch , 1st host got same problem and 2nd installed successfully , seems like this problem happens with upgraded hosts only

[schlipac]

Hi I am have an issue related to the above - I have upgraded Virtual Center to vSphere and an ESX host to 4i -upon connecting this host to the vCenter server, the vCenter agent intaller runs and then errors out at about 16% complete?

is it recommended to manually install the agent on 4i?

[TomP1]

Thanks. The restart agent did the trick for me.

[ydjager]

A reboot of the ESXi server solved this problem for me.

[Texiwill]

Hello,

Moved to vCenter forum.

Best regards,
Edward L. Haletky VMware Communities User Moderator, VMware vExpert 2009

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[shaded2]

Reboot did not work nor did maintenance mode:(

any ideas.

Mine is not an upgrade.