Vcenter server service won't start

[ashleymilne]

A few weeks back I rebooted a physical server running Windows Server 2008R2 that has Vcenter 5.1U3 installed on it, for some reason the Vcenter server service wouldn't start and so I could not use it. I did some research but could not find much info on what could be causing the problem and thought maybe it was just a fluke, this past weekend the server was rebooted again and still the service won't start. Further research seems to indicate that something is using port 443 that might be preventing the service from running, but I can't figure out what. The server running Vcenter is doing a lot of other things such as running Veeam but nothing has changed on the server in terms of new software installations that would break Vcenter that I can think of. How should I proceed?

Thanks

AM

[weinstein5]

The most common cause of the vCenetr Service not starting is the inability to reach the SQL database - things like network issues, or credential problems -

[rcporto]

Try run the following in a elevated command prompt: netstat -ano | find "443"

Find the PID of the the process running on port 443 and look at the Task Manager for the process, this way you will identify which process is running on port 443.

[SureshKumarMuth]

1. Disable  windows firewall on the machine.

2. Disable antivirus.

3. Check which process uses port 443 and stop it.

4. Goto run--> msconfig--> services ,exclude all non windows and vmware services and try rrebooting the machine.

Regards,

Suresh

[CoolRam]

The most common problem is that when  vcenter server is up and looking for the db but the db is still in the restart mode. To avoid such problem insert delay in the vcenter server start. That will avoid such scenario. If this won't be scenario then put error log.

[Anjani_Kumar]

I also faced the same issue in my environment but the resolution was different.

From the vpxd.log i found out there was issue with the version lower than 5.5 u2.

in resolution i did :1. started the STS (secure token service) first and

2. Started the vcenter service after that. That fixed the issue.

Not sure if the same issue with you or something else.

[Srinivasu13]

Try this:

VMware KB: Starting the VMware VirtualCenter Server service fails with the error: Failed to create S...

[Prakas]

Whenever this happens to me I will check out the logs in event viewer. It can give some relevant information on why the service is not starting. Also it is worth checking whether DB has any inactive sessions preventing the service from starting.