vCenter search failing - Login to query service failed, 403 forbidden

[Matt_B1]

After upgrading from vCenter 4.1 to 5.0, I get this error.

Login to the query service failed
The server could not interpret the communication from the client. (The remote server returned an error: (403) Forbidden.)

The magic solution from VMware KB 2014317 is to reinstall vCenter.

http://kb.vmware.com/selfservice/microsites/search.do?language=en_US&cmd=displayKC&externalId=201431...

When I specified the FQDN, it did pop up the warning about it not being resolved.  The error doesn't make sense since it has worked in the past and nothing has changed on the server.  How can I edit this FQDN entry without reinstalling vCenter?

[Troy_Clavell]

if it were me, I would follow the advise in the KB article and reinstall vCenter. It should only take about 15 minutes.

[Matt_B1]

I gave in and uninstalled vCenter and then did the install again.  It was actually very quick and clean without overwriting data.  However, the search error persists.  I have a case open with VMware so hopefully they can figure this out.

[vLarus]

This might help if your FQDN has changed.

http://kb.vmware.com/selfservice/search.do?cmd=displayKC&docType=kc&externalId=2007039

And this one could also help if you want to go and check out the settings in the ADAM db.

http://kb.vmware.com/selfservice/microsites/search.do?language=en_US&cmd=displayKC&externalId=103399...

Good luck.

[Matt_B1]

I tried switching from FQDN to IP based on the KB and that still not did not work.  However, I was able to resolve the search eror and vCenter Service Status of "Cannot access the health service".  Our vCenter host had some incorrect DNS search suffixes and DNS servers which I corrected.  I uninstalled vCenter.  I then deleted these 3 folders (see below), reinstalled vCenter (pointing to the existing DB and NOT overwriting), rebooted the vCenter host and the issues went away.  I was able to use FQDN and did not have to specify IP as done in the KB2007039.

C:\Program      Files\Vmware\Infrastructure\Inventory Service

C:\Program      Files\Vmware\Infrastructure\VirtualCenter Server

C:\ProgramData\VMware\VMware      VirtualCenter