ESXi Hosts Receiving APIPA Address on TEP Interfaces

Products

• VMware NSX

Issue/Introduction

Specific ESXi hosts within a cluster are failing to acquire valid IP addresses for their Tunnel Endpoint (TEP) interfaces. Instead of receiving an IP from the DHCP server, these interfaces default to APIPA addresses (169.254.x.x), disrupting overlay network connectivity.

Environment

VMware NSX-T Datacenter
VMware NSX

Cause

The root cause is a misconfigured Uplink Profile applied to the affected hosts via the cluster-level Transport Node Profile (TNP). The specific hosts require a different Transport VLAN ID than the rest of the cluster (due to rack or site location) but are using the default profile with an incorrect VLAN.

Consequently, DHCP Discovery packets are sent onto a network segment where no DHCP server for the TEP scope is reachable.

Resolution

To resolve this issue for hosts requiring different network configurations within the same cluster, utilize the Sub-Transport Node Profile (Sub-TNP) feature:

1. Create a new Uplink Profile with the correct Transport VLAN ID for the affected local hosts.

2. Create a Sub-Transport Node Profile that references this new Uplink Profile.

3. Apply this Sub-TNP to the specific hosts in the cluster that require the unique VLAN configuration.

Additional Information

For detailed configuration steps, please refer to the Broadcom documentation: Sub-TNPs and Sub-Clusters