vSAN Health Service - Cluster health – vCenter state is authoritative

Products

• VMware vSAN

Issue/Introduction

This article explains the Cluster Health - vCenter state is authoritative check in the vSAN Health Service and provides details about why it might report an error.

 

Impacts/Risks:

• If all hosts in the vSAN cluster are not using this vCenter Server as the source of truth for vSAN cluster configuration, this could cause a Network Partition on the vSAN cluster, which could lead to other issues such as inaccessible objects. 

Environment

VMware vSAN (All Versions)

Resolution

Q: What does the Cluster Health – vCenter State Is Authoritative check do?

This check verifies that all hosts in the vSAN cluster are using the current managing vCenter Server as the source of truth for the cluster configuration, including the vSAN cluster membership list. During normal operation, the vCenter Server can publish the latest host membership list and update the configuration for all hosts in the cluster. This health check reports an error if vCenter Server configuration is not synchronized with a member host, and is no longer accepted as the source of truth.

This issue can lead to auto-update failures for the configuration, including the vSAN cluster membership list.

Q: What does it mean when it is in an error state?

If this check is red, it means that the hosts listed in the out-of-sync table are not using this vCenter Server as the source of truth for vSAN cluster configuration. This problem can occur when you replace and recover a managing vCenter Server. The hosts with configuration problems are configured to be managed by the previous vCenter Server.

The problem hosts are listed with information for the previous managing vCenter Server.

Q: How does one troubleshoot and fix the error state?

To resolve this issue, navigate to Cluster > Monitor > Skyline Health. Under Cluster > vCenter state is authoritative, click one of the following buttons depending on your installed build:  "Update ESXi configuration" or "Remediate Inconsistent Configuration"

This action synchronizes all hosts in the cluster with the current vCenter Server and forces the vCenter Server configuration, including the vSAN cluster membership list, to all member hosts.

If the issue persists after clicking  "Update ESXi configuration" or "Remediate Inconsistent Configuration", verify the following:

1. Check Advanced Configuration /VSAN/IgnoreClusterMemberListupdates on All Hosts
   Ensure that the advanced setting /VSAN/IgnoreClusterMemberListupdates is set to 0 on all hosts in the cluster:
   
esxcfg-advcfg -g /VSAN/IgnoreClusterMemberListupdates
   
   If the value is set to 1, revert it to the default value of 0 by running:
   
   esxcfg-advcfg -s 0 /VSAN/IgnoreClusterMemberListupdates
   
   

2. Verify vSAN Cluster UUID Consistency
   
   Check if there is a difference in the vSAN Cluster UUID between vCenter Server and the ESXi hosts.
   For more information, refer to the following KB vSAN Cluster UUID not in sync between vCenter and ESXi (VMware vCenter state is authoritative)

Q: What are the potential side effects of clicking Update ESXi configuration?

This action overrides the existing vSAN cluster configuration on all hosts in this vCenter Server cluster. Verify that all ESXi hosts from the vSAN cluster are added to the vCenter Server cluster. Any host that is not part of this vCenter Server cluster are removed from the cluster.

Incorrect configuration settings can be pushed to all hosts in the vSAN cluster, and can cause problems. Before you take action, verify that all vSAN configuration settings in vCenter Server are correct, such as fault domains, deduplication, encryption, and so on.