ESXi iSCSI Software Initiator dynamic discovery target does not persist through a reboot after upgrading to 7.x

Products

• VMware vSphere ESXi

Issue/Introduction

Provide recommended workaround

 

Impact/Risks:
Clear impact during maintenance activities or anything that requires a reboot, is adding an additional step to load the storage.

Symptoms:

• Effected ESXi hosts are 7.0 U2 or later 
• iSCSI targets are not persisting following a host reboot.
• iSCSI targets can be added back manually but targets are lost following a subsequent reboot.

 

• Review of jumpstart-esxcli-stdout.log uncovers the following error:

2022-02-16T22:35:53.565Z iScsiInterfaceImpl: Failed to apply some of the adapter configurations: iScsiException: status(80000004): General OS-specific failure; Message= IMA_VMW_AddNic

Environment

VMware vSphere ESXi 7.0U2

Cause

Remove vmkernel adapters from the network configuration that are part of the port binding for iSCSI, and keep the vmkernel adapter in the port binding configuration. 

From ESXi-7.0U1, ESXi started using config-store for iSCSI configurations. There is difference in process for the restore of iSCSI configurations during boot.

Resolution

This issue is fixed in ESXi 7.0 Update 3f, Build# 20036589

Workaround:
For hosts already upgraded to 7.x

1. Run the following command to list the vmkernel adapters on the ESXi host:

esxcfg-vmknic -l
 

2. Gather iSCSiConfig from ConfigStore:

configstorecli config current get -c esx -g storage_iscsi -k software_adapter -outfile iscsiConfig.json

 

3. Edit the output file iscsiConfig.json and remove all vmk adapters from the vmknics section that not listed on the step 1.

4. Save the changes to the json file.

5. Update the ConfigStore with the edited iSCIConfig information:

configstorecli config current set -c esx -g storage_iscsi -k software_adapter -infile iscsiConfig.json
 

6. Reboot host.  iSCSI targets should persist

For hosts yet to upgrade but still running ESXi versions prior 7.0U2 

1. Run the following command to list the vmkernel adapters on the ESXi host:

esxcfg-vmknic -l
 

2. Run the following command to check the port binding configuration and associated vmkernel adapters 

esxcli iscsi networkportal list 

3. Remove the bound vmkernel ports which are not available in networking configurations from step 1

esxcli iscsi networkportal remove -A vmhbaX -n vmk#

- Where X is the adapter id number taken from step2
- # is the vmkernel adapter id still present on step 2 but not listed in step1 

4. Host can be upgraded now. 

Additional Information