Booting an ESXi host over UEFI PXE hangs with the message "Using 'simple offset' UEFI RTS mapping policy"

Products

• VMware vSphere ESXi

Issue/Introduction

When attempting to boot an ESXi host over UEFI PXE with default configurations, the process leads to system hang with the below message.

Shutting down firmware services...
Using 'simple offset' UEFI RTS mapping policy

Note: The last message conveys how far the bootloader got before stopping.

Environment

• ESXi 7.x
• ESXi 8.x
• ESX 9.0

Cause

 Host is not updated with the latest Firmware.

Resolution

Contact the Hardware Vendor to update physical server Firmware (BIOS) version to the latest and attempt the install.

UEFI RTS (UEFI Runtime Services) refers to the functions and services provided by the UEFI firmware to the ESXi after the boot process is complete. If the server is of latest BIOS, in order to workaround this, disable UEFI RTS using the below steps.

1. From ESXi 8.0U2 ,Shift + U hotkey is provided which essentially disables the RTS 
   1. Reboot the host.
   2. When the Hypervisor progress bar starts loading, press Shift+U. This must be done while the bar is loading, not after.
      
      
2. Pre- ESXi 8.0U2
   1. Boot the installer via bootx64.efi with -U from iPXE
   2. Add norts=1 on a brand newline in the ESXi boot.cfg file in the ESXi installer media which is located in efi/boot/boot.cfg. See About the boot.cfg File
      and steps to modify the boot.cfg  file.
      
      Example of /efi/boot.cfg

bootstate=0
title=Loading ESXi installer
timeout=5
prefix=http://<server>/os/esxi/7
kernel=b.b00
kernelopt=runweasel ks=http://<server>/os/esxi/7/ks.cfg
norts=1
modules=jumpstrt.gz ......
build=7.0.2-0.0.17867351
updated=0


3. For the iPXE item:
   
   kernel nfs://${fog-ip}:/images/os/esxi/7/efi/boot/bootx64.efi -c nfs://${fog-ip}:/images/os/esxi/7/efi/boot/boot.cfg -U
boot || goto MENU

If this issue is presenting in an autodeploy scenario, refer to the following KB for a tweaked version of the fix: VMware ESXi 7.0/8.0 with Auto Deploy fails to boot with error "Shutting down firmware services... Using 'simple offset' UEFI RTS mapping policy" 

NOTE: Autodeploy deprecation has been published in VCF 9.0 release notes

Additional Information

Please note that using 'norts=1' and/or '-U' option(s) will disable access from the VMKernel to the UEFI Runtime Services which has some side effects. 
1. Without UEFI Runtime Services access the ESX installer will not be able to change the machine boot order so the host may not boot from disk unless specifically configured to do so. 

2. Machines booted with this VMKernel option may not be powered off programatically i.e. if the host 'shut down' operation is invoked the ESX OS will be shut down but the host itself will remain powered on showing a message that it is safe to power of the machine.

 

Reference

https://knowledge.broadcom.com/external/article/441578/      AutoDeploy does not set correct ESXi boot order