vCenter Upgrade Fails at VCENTER_UPGRADE_PRECHECK Stage with "Unable to get vCenter upgrade status" in VCF 9.x

Products

• VCF Operations

Issue/Introduction

During a VMware Cloud Foundation (VCF) environment upgrade (e.g., from version 9.1.0.100 to 9.1.0.200), the vCenter upgrade fails at the VCENTER_UPGRADE_PRECHECK stage. The SDDC Manager UI displays a generic failure message, and internal logs indicate a failure to retrieve the upgrade status from the vCenter Reduced Downtime Upgrade (RDU) endpoint.

Error Message:

vCenter upgrade failed at the VCENTER_UPGRADE_PRECHECK stage. Unable to get vCenter upgrade status. Please contact GSS for further assistance. Error Code: xxxxxxxx

Symptoms:

• SDDC Manager /var/log/vmware/vcf/lcm/lcm-debug.log shows an HttpServerErrorException$BadGateway: 502 Bad Gateway on a GET request for the RDU status endpoint: https://<vcenter-fqdn>/lcm/rest/vcenter/lcm/deployment/migration-upgrade/status.
• Logs may also report: java.lang.RuntimeException: Mapping does not exist at LogicalInventoryClient.java:745.
• The system fails to locate the resource bundle for RDU: Can't find resource for bundle java.util.PropertyResourceBundle, key VC_RDU_GET_STATUS_FAILED.remedy.

 

Environment

VCF Operations 9.x

Cause

This issue typically occurs due Stale or incomplete data in the SDDC Manager bundle repository (update_repo).

Resolution

Step 1: Restart vCenter Services

1. Log in to the vCenter Server Appliance (VCSA) via SSH as root.
2. Reboot the vCenter appliance to clear any hung RDU tasks or stale service states:
   
   reboot -f
    

Step 2: Clean SDDC Manager Bundle Repository

1. Log in to the SDDC Manager via SSH as vcf.
2. Switch to root or use sudo.
3. Locate the specific bundle ID associated with the upgrade (found in the LCM logs).
4. Remove the contents of the update_repo directory for that bundle to ensure a clean re-download:
   
   rm -rf /nfs/vmware/vcf/nfs-mount/bundle/<BUNDLE_ID>/update_repo/*
   
   (Note: Replace <BUNDLE_ID> with the actual UUID from your environment.

Step 3: Retry Upgrade

1. Return to the SDDC Manager UI.
2. Re-download the vCenter upgrade bundle if prompted.
3. Retry the upgrade to the target version.

Workaround

If the RDU-specific pre-check continues to fail despite the steps above, attempt a Regular Upgrade (bypassing the Reduced Downtime path) if the environment's maintenance window allows for standard downtime.

Additional Information

Related Article: vCenter RDU Upgrade fails with "Upgrade validation has failed" (KB 404467) - Covers ndu.json cleanup and RDU-specific workarounds.