Power-on VM fails with error: "Failed to start the virtual machine. The device type "true" specified for "pciBridge" is not supported by VMware ESX 8.0.x"

Products

• VMware vCenter Server
• VMware vSphere ESXi

Issue/Introduction

• While attempting to power on a virtual machine (VM), the following error message is encountered in the vSphere Client or Host Client immediately after initiating the power-on operation.

Task error: Module DevicePowerOnEarly power on failed. Failed to start the virtual machine. The device type "true" specified for "pciBridge" is not supported by VMware ESX 8.0.x.

• Virtual machines may go into an inaccessible state soon after the above error.

Cause

• The pciBridge parameter in an affected virtual machine's configuration (.vmx) would be inadvertently set to 'true'. This misconfiguration rendered the virtual machine inaccessible due to the unsupported configuration on the specified ESX version.

Resolution

• Take backup of the virtual machine configuration file (.vmx).

cp /vmfs/volumes/<datastore_name>/<vm_name>/vm_name.vmx /vmfs/volumes/<datastore_name>/<vm_name>/vm_name.vmx.backup

• Use vi editor to edit the virtual machine configuration file (vmx). Refer: Adding/Deleting/Editing a host entry on vCenter server or ESXi host using vi editor (345284)
• The problematic virtual machine's configuration file (vmx) may look like this:

pciBridge4.present = "TRUE"
pciBridge4.virtualDev = "true"
pciBridge4.functions = "8"
pciBridge5.present = "TRUE"
pciBridge5.virtualDev = "true"
pciBridge5.functions = "8"
pciBridge6.present = "TRUE"
pciBridge6.virtualDev = "true"
pciBridge6.functions = "8"

• Review and correct the configuration file (.vmx) by performing a comparison with the configuration of a functional virtual machine. Update the pciBridge parameters to ensure consistency with the reference configuration provided below.

pciBridge4.present = "TRUE"
pciBridge4.virtualDev = "pcieRootPort"
pciBridge4.functions = "8"
pciBridge5.present = "TRUE"
pciBridge5.virtualDev = "pcieRootPort"
pciBridge5.functions = "8"
pciBridge6.present = "TRUE"
pciBridge6.virtualDev = "pcieRootPort"
pciBridge6.functions = "8"

• If virtual machine is in an invalid state, remove the virtual machine from the inventory and then register the virtual machine from the vSphere client. If the virtual machine is in a valid state, skip this step and reload the virtual machine by following the next step.
  • Reload the virtual machine configuration using the following command:
    
    1. To find virtual machine id (vmid):
       • vim-cmd vmsvc/getallvms | grep -i <vm_name>
    2. To reload the virtual machine configuration:
       • vim-cmd vmsvc/reload <vmid>

• Power-on the virtual machine.