Post upgrade ESXi host lost all network connectivity and also went to not responding state.

Products

• VMware vSphere ESXi

Issue/Introduction

• The Distributed Virtual Switch (DVS) configuration appeared to be missing or inaccessible on the upgraded hosts as reviewed from DCUI.
  
  

• Execution of net-dvs -l via DCUI returned the error: failed to get config data: not initialized.
  
  

• Querying vmkernel adapters via esxcli network ip interfaces list returned the error: Unable to Get Proxy Portset Name: Status(bad0031)- Not Initialized.
  
  

• Non-HPE Hardware (e.g., Dell, Cisco, Supermicro) containing legacy HPE-signed VIBs, or HPE hardware with deprecated management VIBs.

Environment

VMware ESXi 8.0 U3

Cause

• The presence of incompatible third-party VIBs (eg HPE-related VIBs on non-HPE hardware).
  

• The LCM pre-check report shall highlight these conflicting drivers as potential blockers for a clean upgrade transition.

• If the upgrade was forced or if the vSphere Lifecycle Manager (vLCM) baseline did not include specific third-party vendor addons, these conflicting VIBs remain in the bootbank, preventing a clean transition to the ESXi 8.0 Unified Driver Framework.
  
  

• The Not Initialized status indicates that the networking proxy portset failed to load because the underlying configuration state was corrupted or blocked by these conflicting drivers.

Resolution

• A rollback to version 7.0U3 successfully restores the host responsiveness and DVS/vSwitch functionality. Refer: Reverting to a previous version of ESXi 6.x, 7.x or 8.x
  
  
• Perform a manual removal of all irrelevant HPE VIBs from the ESXi host via the command line interface. Removing the conflicting vibs ensures a "clean" upgrade path, allowing the ESXi 8.0 network stack to initialize without vibs conflicts.
  
  esxcli software vib remove --vibname=<name>
• Perform the upgrade to ESXi 8.0U3 using vSphere Lifecycle Manager (LCM) after the environment has been cleaned of conflicting vibs.