Date/Time Issue With VMware Update 2

12. August 2008 by Tony.

This problem seems to affect both ESX and ESXi.

The problem is that as soon as the date hits August 12, 2008, all VMs refuse to power on and an error is logged indicating that the product’s license has expired. If VMs are already running, they should be fine; the problem, as I understand, only prevents users from powering on new VMs or performing VMotion operations.

If you are being affected by this bug, then your only real option at this point is to disable NTP (if it is being used) and set your date back a couple of days.

There’s no firm word yet on when a fix will be available from VMware.

Rince, thanks for the heads-up!

Update as of 9AM ET August 12, 2008 Updated ISOs and TARs for Update 2 (let’s call them Update 2 v2) will be available by noon PT tomorrow, August 13. In the meantime, the following workaround should help:

1. Disable NTPd on the ESX hosts.
2. Set the date on the ESX hosts back to some point prior to August 12, 2008. Some people have suggested using the same day and month but a completely different year in the past; this will make it easier to repair ESX log files using search/replace.
3. Set the VM to boot into the BIOS.
4. Boot the VM. In the BIOS, set the date and time properly. This will be incorrect because it gets inherited from the host. This is independent of the time sync functionality in VMware Tools. If you don’t fix this, VMs will boot up with the wrong date and/or time and that will cause additional problems (like Kerberos authentication within Active Directory).
5. After the VM has booted, ensure that time sync within VMware Tools has been disabled. Configure time sync to a reliable source. Active Directory usually handles this for Windows-based systems in a domain.

This workaround is only necessary to power on a VM, resume a suspended VM, or perform a VMotion operation. If all your VMs are currently up and running, just disable DRS/HA.

Hopefully this information will help. I’ll post more information as it becomes available.

According to the VMWare phone support this is being tracked as KB 1006716.

Looks like tomorrow will be a busy day….

From

http://blog.scottlowe.org/2008/08/11/apparent-datetime-issue-with-update-2/

Posted in VMware, General Virtualization | No Comments »