ESXi 6.0 host inventory reports virtual machine as invalid

Products

• VMware vSphere ESXi

Issue/Introduction

Symptoms:

When the virtual machine is removed from a vSphere 5.x inventory and then added to vSphere 6.0 inventory, you experience these symptoms:

• The virtual machine shows an Invalid status.
• The configuration file (.vmx) contains entries used for vSphere Replication ( hbr_filter) .
• Powering on a virtual machine fails with error:
  
  Host is not compatible with the vsphere replication configuration supported by the virtual machine
  
  
• The /var/log/hostd.log file contains entries similar to:
  
  
  • CannotRetrieveCorefiles: VM is in an invalid state
    
  • Marking configuration as invalid: N3Vim5Fault20GenericVmConfigFault9ExceptionE(vim.fault.GenericVmConfigFault)

Note: The virtual machine is registered correctly in ESXi 5.x host.

Environment

VMware vSphere ESXi 6.0

Cause

This issue occurs due to stale vSphere Replication entries in virtual machine configuration file (.vmx).

Resolution

This is a known issue affecting ESXi 6.0.

Currently, there is no resolution.

To work around the issue, remove the vSphere Replicatoin Host-Based Replication (HBR) hbr_filter entries from the .vmx file:

Note: Virtual machine should be added to vSphere Replication in the vSphere 6.0 environment.

1. Shutdown the affected virtual machine.
2. Connect to the ESXi host the virtual machine resides on using a SSH session. For more information, see Using ESXi Shell in ESXi 5.x and 6.0 (2004746).
3. Navigate to the location of the virtual machines .vmx file:
   
   /vmfs/volumes/virtual_machine_datastore/virtual_machine_folder/
   
   
4. Edit the virtual machine using a text editor:
   
   vi virtual_machine.vmx
   
   
5. Remove all the entries containing hbr_filter.
   
   For example:
   
   hbr_filter.configGen = ""
   s csi0:0.filters = ""
   hbr_filter.rpo = ""
   hbr_filter.destination = ""
   hbr_filter.port = ""
   hbr_filter.gid = ""
   hbr_filter.protocol = ""
   hbr_filter.quiesce = ""
   hbr_filter.opp = ""
   hbr_filter.pause = ""
   scsi0:0.hbr_filter.rdid = ""
   scsi0:0.hbr_filter.persistent = ""
   
   Note: You may also comment out each line by preceding each line with a #.
   
   
6. Save the changes and exit the text editor.
   
7. To find the vmid, run this command:
   
   vim-cmd vmsvc/getallvms | grep -i VM_Name
   
   
8. To reload the virtual machine into inventory, run this command:
   
   vim-cmd vmsvc/reload vmid
   
   For more information, see Reloading a vmx file without removing the virtual machine from inventory (1026043).
   
9. Power on the virtual machine.

Additional Information

Reloading a vmx file without removing the virtual machine from inventory
Using ESXi Shell in ESXi 5.x and 6.x