I recently returned to the VMware vSphere Server 7.0 EE-Lab to start exploring and creating content around VMware Cloud Foundation. The lab features some powerful DELL R720 and R730 servers, perfect for delving into VMware Cloud Foundation.
After several months away from the EE-Lab, I attempted to access the VMware vCenter Server 7.0, only to be greeted with the dreaded:
HTTP Status 500 – Internal Server Error
There are two possible reasons for this error
1. Certificate Expiration
2. Storage on /storage is 95% or less
Unfortunately Certificate Manager is not supported on run on vCenter HA, so this requires one of the nodes to be made active, and the destruction of vCenter HA before we can run Certificate Manager .
Check the video and commands used I’ve highlighted in the steps below for troubleshooting
In this video, I’ll walk you through the steps to repair and restore the vCenter Server 7.0, which is running in High Availability (HA) mode, and share some helpful tips and tricks along the way.
Other videos I have published in this video
Part 43: HOW TO: Reset vCenter Server 8.0 root and Administrator@vsphere.local passwords
Part 45. HOW TO: Create a new Distributed and VMKernel Portgroups on a VMware vSphere Distributed Switch for the vSphere Cluster for use with vCenter Server HA
Part 46. HOW TO: Create, Configure and Deploy VMware vCenter Server High Availability (HA)
1. Reset the root lockout
use the command
pam_tally2 -–user=root –reset
2. Check /storage on vCenter Server appliance
use the command
df -h
to check if /storage is above 95%
3. Check certificates
use the following min-script to check if certificates have expired
for store in $(/usr/lib/vmware-vmafd/bin/vecs-cli store list | grep -v TRUSTED_ROOT_CRLS); do echo “[*] Store :” $store; /usr/lib/vmware-vmafd/bin/vecs-cli entry list –store $store –text | grep -ie “Alias” -ie “Not After”;done;
Go to Step 7, if you are running vCenter Server HA, you got some more configuration to go throw, so go to step 8.
4. Check vCenter Server build version
use the command
vpxd -v
5. Check vCenter Server uptime
use the command
uptime
6. Check vCenter Server services
use the command
service-control –status –all
7. if you find you have expired certificates from
use the command
/usr/lib/vmware-vmca/bin/certificate-manager
Select option 8.
8. if using vCenter Server HA you will need to destroy the cluster
use the command
vcha-reset-primary
vcha-destroy -f
9. forgotten Administrator@vsphere.local password ?
use the command
/usr/lib/vmware-vmdir/bin/vdcadmintool
source
