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TheTechie
Contributor
Contributor

Not enough licenses installed trouble

I'm having issues with the licenses and unable to manage my VMs..

I bought the VMware Foundation management kit which has 3 hosts (2 sockets) licenses. I thought I had it setup to use local license server with downloaded license files but today while trying to reboot a VM I got error "There are not enough licenses installed to perform the operation.". I checked and apparently each host was set to use the evaluation license so I switched it to use the license server. However I still get the error.

I search a few other posts but haven't found anything to help me. Did I miss setting something up?

Setup:

I have two ESXi 3.5 hosts and a VC server which is also that licensing server.

Each host has two quad cores (2 sockets).

Observation:

On each host configuration tab > Licensed Feature I have set License source to IP of license (VC) server.

ESX Server Edition is set as unlicensed and that the only option available.

In the Administration tab under Licenses it says:

VirtualCenter foundation management Server cost: 1/Server Remaining: 0 & total: 1

VirtualCenter Agent for ESX Server Cost: 1/CPU Package Remaining 2 & Total: 6

Thanks for any help.

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Troy_Clavell
Immortal
Immortal

is your vCenter Server set up properly? Click on the top Administration Link---VirtualCenter Management Server Configuration

What does it say under License Server and VirtualCenter Server Edition?

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TheTechie
Contributor
Contributor

Thanks for the help, here the info:

License Server:

Evalucate VirtualCenter Server is unchecked.

Use License Services on this VirtualCenter Server

Virtual Center Server Edition is set to VirtualCenter Foundation Managment

Change host license server settings to match these: is checked.

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Troy_Clavell
Immortal
Immortal

here's the KB I was talking about which also contains more information that may be useful

....and, although I don't know much about foundation, do have anything under the Administration button--Licenses tab that has a remaining of 0 (zero) besides vCenter?

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a2alpha
Expert
Expert

If you have been using evaluation license the chances are you have a feature enabled like HA / DRS / vMotion to which in your actual license you are not entitled to. Once you get the hosts licensed properly it realises this and gives you that error.

This happened to me and removing all features and re licensing it seemed to work. (minus the features I hadn't bought!)

Hope this helps.

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a2alpha
Expert
Expert

What happened to me was I had removed a host and tried adding it back in to which I got that error.

Sorry missed it on the last post!

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TheTechie
Contributor
Contributor

Tory: Under the licenses tab VirtualCenter Foundation Management Server has 0 remaining of 1 Total. However I assume this is correct as it is the vCenter server.

a2alpha: I didn't use any of the advance features but when I switched off evaluation it did say something about having an issue with Backup consolidation or something. I'm not sure where to check if this feature is enabled or where I can disable it. I'm willing to try removing the hosts and then readding them to the vCenter to try and fix this, I'll be dissapointed to lose the statistics but I can live with it.

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TheTechie
Contributor
Contributor

I think there something wrong with my license server setup.

I switch a host license source from license server to a standard ESXi serial license key which allowed me to control the VMs by sending shutdown and power up commands.

I then tried to switch the license source to use license Server and set the license server IP. I go the standard error about some features aren't licensed (I don't use vMotion, etc so that fine). ESX Server edition goes back to being unlicensed and the ‘There are not enough licenses.." error returns whenever I try to control a VM.

Any ideas?

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