vCenter 8.0u2 kernel panic

[fish0101]

Hi,

I have been trying to update the vCenter server appliance in my lab from 8.0.1.00300 to 8.0.2 but after data migration the appliance restarts and only displays a kernel panic.

I have been able to pin-point this issue to FIPS mode which seems to be enabled in the GRUB boot options. Once I set "fips=0" instead of "fips=1" the VM boots normally but the update still fails according to VAMI.

This also happens when I try to deploy a new VCSA with version 8.0.2.

I haven't had any issues in the past with updating or installing the appliance on older versions. Is there something I could do?

Thank you in advance!

[ameneche22]

Same exact issue

[jworkmanplane]

Also seeing this issue. 

[pmichelli]

Just curious how you were doing the update? 
I did mine by mounting the patch  ISO (not the full release) and then SSH to the VCSA. Don't use the bash shell once you connect and run the following commands :

software-packages stage --iso

software-packages install --staged

This ran all the prechecks and updated without any issues. Took about 20 minutes

[fish0101]

I have tried multiple methods. Through VAMI (online and patch ISO) and through the CLI (with the patch ISO) as @pmichelli described but had the same outcome every time.

I believe the update process itself isn't the issue as the kernel panic also occurs when I deploy a new VCSA version 8.0.2 using the installer. Installing and updating to VCSA 8.0.0 worked flawlessly.

[ameneche22]

Same here tried all three methods and they all cause a kernel panic

1. CD Mounted
2. Update through web console
3. Update lifecycle manager

[VRO123]

Hi 

I'm also facing the same issue; do we have any solution?  

[ameneche22]

Hoping someone from Vmware is going to respond this is definately an issue.

[Camero]

@ fish0101 , ameneche22, jworkmanplane, pmichelli, VRO123,

Could all of you please confirm the Hardware (Make model, CPU) and ESXi version where the appliance is deployed and facing this issue ?

[ameneche22]

VMware ESXi, 8.0.1, 22088125
Model: ProLiant DL365 Gen10 Plus
Processor Type: AMD EPYC 7262 8-Core Processor
Logical Processors: 32

Vcenter 8.0.1 Build: 22088981

[jworkmanplane]

VMware ESXi, 8.0.1, 21495797
Dell PowerEdge R6515
AMD EPYC 7F72 24-Core Processor

Trying to upgrade from vCenter 8.0.1 22088981

Don't tell me this is an AMD problem. 😜

[pmichelli]

In my situation (upgrade worked), it was my test vCenter that has no hosts attached to it.

It is a second VM that lives in my DR cluster that I use only to test upgrades before moving to DR then to Prod clusters

The hardware backing it is a PowerEdge FX2 with FC640 Blades and Intel(R) Xeon(R) Gold 6238R CPU @ 2.20GHz for processor

Version:	8.0.1
Build:	22088981

[jworkmanplane]

@pmichelli did you ever run into the kernel panic issue or are you just telling us your upgrade worked? I'm sure plenty of people successfully upgraded using the multitude of available methods, but I'd like to hear from somebody who ran into this specific issue and what they did to resolve it. 

[pmichelli]

No kernel panic. I only replied because VMware often wants to know from folks that had problems and those that did not. Perhaps its tied to the AMD chips.  My upgrade (in a very scaled down test vCenter with no hosts or VMs attached to it) was successful with the CLI update.

[MidlandGroup01]

I have had the same exact issue

[MidlandGroup01]

Same.... failed in fips mode!

S

[Camero]

Thank you for providing the information on HW details.

Info is shared with internal teams to look at the issue.

[ameneche22]

8.0.1.00400 Build: 22368047 updated fine from 8.0.1.00300 

New release of 8.2 from October failed too 

[MidlandGroup01]

I had the same results... 8.0.1.00400 Build: 22368047 updated fine from 8.0.1.00300

I

[Camero]

https://kb.vmware.com/s/article/95172

There is no solution for the issue encountered and is limited to certain specific HW listed in the KB.

Only option for now is to deploy vCenter 80U2 on an alternate HW .