1

Hi all,

Have an issue I’m struggling to get to the bottom of. I’ve inherited a VMWare 5.5 environment (I’m not in charge of the money, don’t scold me). Yesterday I rebooted the Windows box with VCenter on it and now I’m unable to log in via the VSphere desktop client - always incorrect username and password (using my domain credentials that did work). Backups are also failing as they can’t connect.

I’ve managed to get into the web client with the administrator@vsphere.local account, but there is weirdness:

First, I’m getting a message at the top of the page that says:

Could not connect to one or more VCenter Server Systems and it references the Windows box’s FQDN:443/sdk

Second, looking in Single Sign On > Users and Groups > Application users, I see:

vm.png

Finally I’m seeing messages when I click various menu options, such as:

Capture2.pngCapture.png

I can connect to individual hosts to manage the VMs but I don’t know where to go from here and can’t find much in the way of help. I’m also a little concerned that this might get worse in ways I don’t know about.

Any guidance gratefully received.

Thanks!

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2

I think your SSL, probably a self-signed one has expired. Looks like this KB applies: VMware Knowledge Base

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3

Thanks for the reply - I did read that KB but put it on the back burner as it says the symptoms are:

“Unable to log in to VCenter using the VSphere web client” - but I can.

“The VMware VirtualCenter Server service is unable to start” - but it does.

Though the certificates expired message would suggest otherwise :slight_smile:

4

Maybe the single sign on service is not running on this server. Have you been able to log in to the management interface for this vcenter server?

Usually it’s in the following format;

https://appliance-IP-address-or-FQDN:5480

Are you able to log in as the “root” account?

Hope this helps.

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5

Thanks. This is a Windows box, not the appliance.

I can get onto the web interface with domain or local credentials just no the Windows client. I could handle that if it weren’t for all the other errors on the web that prevent me from doing anything meanginful.

Forgive the sparse answers, my VMWare knowledge is not “up there”.

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It’s ok mate, I’m not that much of an expert on it either. And I haven’t really worked with that version of vCenter, only from version 6.0 upwards and on appliances only.
Have you checked to see if that machine has plenty of free space on its hard drives? I have a version 6.0 that run out of space, but I just deleted it, and created a new appliance and then re-linked the esxi hosts to the new one. That saved me a lot of work trying to fix the older one that was completely broken.

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7

In the majority of cases, when vCenter starts playing the fool, it is easier to deploy a fresh new vCenter, rejoin the hosts and redo the configuration instead of trying to fix the old instance. In your case, I would also use this opportunity to jump straight to VCSA 6.5U2 (the latest version that supports ESXi 5.5), getting rid of Windows-based vCenter, which is discontinued anyway. Just check the compatibility and prerequisites, and you are good to go Installing vSphere 6.5 U2 update without messing things up - VMWARE BLOG . Depending on the hardware you have, that should not take more than a couple of hours and will not break anything.

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8

Well, I had a crack at re-creating the certifcate for VCenter as it has indeed expired. I’m wary of going much further with that approach as I may be in an even worse position if it goes horribly wrong (at the moment, if I change the date on the Windows VCenter box pre-expiration, I can get in quickly if ever I should need to).

First thing my manager said is that we should probably try moving to the appliance - which he has done in his environment - so we’ll do that I think, at least I won’t be flying blind. Sadly we have R710 servers which aren’t compatible with 6.5U2, but I can use the 5.5/6.0 appliance.

Thanks all.

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9

When doing the install of the new appliance, choose to do a migration install, allow it to connect to the old service on the Windows machine. This should bring over all of the old settings into the new appliance for you.

This article below might help you.

All the best.

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I can’t do a migrate as that will take across the expired certificate, apparently. So I think it’s go from afresh. We’re looking to upgrade to 6.7 whilst we’re at it too.

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Ok, I see. Not to worry, a fresh install is not difficult either. Just make sure that you can lo in as “root” to each ESXi host, as you will need to detach it from the old Windows machine and attached them to the new VCSA.

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