Unable to start vCenter Server Inventory service

Products

• VMware vCenter Server

Issue/Introduction

Symptoms:

• Unable to start vCenter Server Inventory service
• In the %ALLUSERSPROFILE%\VMWare\vCenterServer\logs\invsvc\invsvc.log file, you see entries similar to,
  
  org.apache.commons.dbcp.SQLNestedException: Cannot create PoolableConnectionFactory (Cannot open database "VCDB" requested by the login. The login failed.

Environment

VMware vCenter Server 5.5.x
VMware vCenter Server 6.0.x

Cause

This issue occurs if customer has a listener for DB server. When server DB-1 is down and database is moved to server DB-2, ODBC points to listener server and the vcdp.properties file points to server DB-1.

Resolution

To resolve the issue in Windows vCenter Server, ensure that the vCenter ODBC connection is pointing to the right DB. 

To ensure that the vCenter ODBC connection is pointing to the right DB:

1. Open the vcdp.properties file using a text editor.
2. Edit the file to point to the right DB as below:
   
   url=jdbc:sqlserver://<listener-DB-server>;databaseName=VCDB;integratedSecurity=true
   dbtype=mssql
   driver=com.microsoft.sqlserver.jdbc.SQLServerDriver
   
   Note: Location of the vcdb.properties file:
   
   In 6.x - C:\ProgramData\VMware\VMware VirtualCenter\vmware-vpx
   
   In 5.5 - C:\ProgramData\VMware\VMware VirtualCenter\
    
3. Save and close the vcdp.properties file.
    
4. Restart inventory service. If there are other services stopped due to above steps, restart them also.