For some people, they have found that their virtual machines aren’t starting up with the host, leaving their virtual machines off until manually logging into the host and forcing a start.
After some research I found that VMs not auto-staring with the host is a bug in the following host software:
- VMware ESXi 5.0 Update 1
From the forums I found, some people found this would be the case after upgrading from previous versions to the above version. I had this fault with a fresh install of the system.
Luck for us there is a patch.
Download and Transfer Patch
Download the ESXi500-201207001 from this VMware site (free download).
Once you have it downloaded, use the vSphere client to transfer the ZIP file to the local datastore of your ESXi server by using the Datastore Manager.
Installing Patch
WARNING: A reboot of the host is required for this patch.
- Use vSphere to put the host into Maintenance Mode
- Use SSH to connect to the server. Login as root.
- Use the following command to install the patch
esxcli software vib install -d /vmfs/volumes/[DATASTORE]/[PATCH_FILE].zip
- The installation should complete without error. Reboot host server using vSphere client.
Thanks to Chris for his help article.