The hardware health status of hosts in vCenter does not auto-refresh

Products

• VMware vCenter Server
• VMware vSphere ESXi

Issue/Introduction

The hardware health status section within ESXi is displaying outdated update timestamps for all hosts. The hardware health information refreshes only at irregular or random intervals instead of updating automatically at expected intervals.

 

Environment

7.0.x

Cause

This is expected behavior. Although "hostd" is configured to send a health report every 90 seconds, it restricts any new health updates from being transmitted unless an API call is explicitly triggered.

Resolution

The fix will be included in the upcoming "ESXi 9.1" release. For older versions, the following workaround can be applied:

Workaround:

1. SSH to the ESXi host and get the current config of vpxa
   
   

   # configstorecli config default get -c esx -g services -k vpxa -outfile vpxa_config.json
   Data written to vpxa_config.json

   
   
   
2. Edit the vpxa_config.json and update the value of "host_health_system_throttle_interval" to 1 (highlighted below) and save the file.
   
   

   ...
      "core": {
         "debug_options": {
            "disconnect_hostd": false,
            "ignore_snapshot_config_cache": false,
            "simulate_invalid_snapshot_mo": true,
            "simulate_invalid_snapshot_mo_once": false
         },
         "host_sync": {
            "get_changes": {
               "asyncvmxblob": true,
               "delay": 0,
               "envbrowser_refresh_rate": 300,
               "timeout": 0
            },
            "guestdisk_use_percentage_diff_check": false,
            "heartbeat": {
               "interval": 10,
               "stress_delayed_heartbeat": 300,
               "stress_duration": 180000000,
               "stress_enabled": false,
               "stress_missed_heartbeat": 500
            },
   
   "host_health_system_throttle_interval": 0, <<-- Update this value to 1
   
            "max_event_reporting_delay_seconds": 60,
            "ratelimit_sync_period": 150
         },
   ...

   
   
   
3. Save the vpxa config to config store.
   
   

   # configstorecli config current set -c esx -g services -k vpxa -infile vpxa_config.json
   Set: completed successfully

   
   
   
4. Restart vpxa
   
   

   # /etc/init.d/vpxa restart

   
   
   
5. Retry the operation and verify if MOB is updated.