Hi,
I have a home computer running the ESXi 7.0b (Build 16324942) hypervisor, supporting multiple VMs. This system has been working well over the last 6 months.
We recently had a sudden power outage (blackout). Since power was restored, ESXi has failed to complete the boot process, always getting stuck at "Initializing InitVMKernel: VMKAcpi_LateInit ...".
Unfortunately I've not been able to find the cause of this issue. Any help would be much appreciated.
System Info:
- HP Compaq 8200 Elite SFF PC
- Processor: Intel i5-2400 CPU @ 3.10GHz
- RAM: 8 GB DDR3
- SSD: 128 GB LITE-ON LCH-128V2S-11 (containing ESXi Datastore for hosted VMs etc., not ESXi bootloader)
- BIOS: J01 v02.32
- BIOS Setup Utility: Aptio Setup Utility v2.10.1208 by American Megatrends
- Booting in UEFI (non Legacy/BIOS) mode
Here is some associated info:
- ESXi boots from a USB drive connected to the server
- "Loading ESXi installer..." completes
- "Initializing InitVMKernel..." starts and progresses (grey and yellow screen)
- Gets stuck at step "VMKAcpi_LateInit"
- I also tried with new USB drived loaded with ESXi 7.0bc, and then ESXi 7.0.2 (build 17867351), and both cases found that it gets stuck at this same step
- I have not been able to find what is happening during this stage (hoping that this knowledge might provide a clue as to the cause)
- ACPI apparently means Advanced Configuration and Power Interface
- Is there a way to access log files during the initializing phase? Note: ALT+F12 is not working for me during this phase.
- I ran the "DPS Self Test" on the SSD, via the BIOS Setup Utility - "All Tests Passed"
- I have been able to successfully load and run Ubuntu from a live DVD
- This showed no signs of detected hardware issues
- I have been able to successfully load Rescatux 0.73 (a (Debian Linux based rescue disk) from a live DVD
- This recognizes the filesystem on the SSD (/dev/sda1) to be "VMFS_volume_member", however says that it is an "unknown filesystem"
- Also reports "Syslinux GPTMBR (3.74-4.03) is installed in the MBR of /dev/sda.
- I tried loading and using vmfs-tools on the Debian based rescue system, however command "sudo debugvmfs /dev/sda1 df -h" results in message saying "VMFS: unsupported version 6, unable to open device"
- Maybe there is a way to use this Debian based rescue system to attempt to check and repair the VMFS filesystem (e.g. with fsck, or similar)?
- Maybe my problem is unlikely to be caused by potential corruption of the SSD at /dev/sda?
Any help would be much appreciated.
