Virtual machine experiences immediate network disconnection with error "RPC service unavailable"

Products

• VMware vSphere ESXi

Issue/Introduction

A virtual machine loses network connectivity immediately following an automated or silent VMware Tools installation sequence. Remote management interfaces fail, and the guest operating system logs may report "RPC service unavailable" errors.

Environment

VMware vSphere ESXi 7.x

 

VMware vSphere ESXi 8.x

VMware Tools

Cause

This behavior occurs when the REBOOT=R (Really Suppress) flag is supplied during a silent VMware Tools upgrade. During the installation process, the existing VMXNET3 driver is removed, and the updated version is staged. The newly staged driver cannot complete initialization or bind to the guest operating system's network stack until a full system restart is executed. Suppressing this restart leaves the virtual machine without an active or functional network interface.

The /vmfs/volumes/<DATASTORE_UUID>/<VM NAME>/vmware.log file for the virtual machine exhibits the execution string containing the reboot suppression flag:

YYYY-MM-DDTHH:MM:SS In(05) vcpu-0 - Guest: Command line: /s /v/qn REBOOT=R
YYYY-MM-DDTHH:MM:SS In(05) vcpu-0 - Guest: Installing VMware Tools 13.0.10.0 (build-25056151)
YYYY-MM-DDTHH:MM:SS In(05) vcpu-0 - Tools: Running status rpc handler: 0 => 1.
YYYY-MM-DDTHH:MM:SS In(05) vcpu-0 - Tools: Changing running status: 0 => 1.

Resolution

To resolve this issue and restore network function, establish a remote console session to the virtual machine through the vSphere Client and perform a manual reboot of the guest operating system.

To prevent network isolation during automated upgrades, the VMXNET3 driver must successfully bind to the network stack via a system restart. Ensure your deployment scripts and configuration tools (such as SCCM) follow one of these two options:

• The REBOOT=R or REBOOT=ReallySuppress arguments must be omitted from silent installer commands unless an immediate, programmatic system reboot is scheduled within the exact same execution block.

• Plan updates to coincide with predefined maintenance windows so that the required system restart can be performed immediately, allowing the VMXNET3 driver to bind to the operating system network stack correctly.

Additional Information

Installing VMware Tools on a VMware vSphere virtual machine running Windows OS