Inventory Service fails to start in vCenter Server 6.x

Products

VMware vCenter Server

Issue/Introduction

When the Inventory Service fails to start in vCenter Server 6.x, reset the Inventory Service database to resolve this issue.

Symptoms:

The hardware monitoring service on the host is not responding or not available.
The Common Information Model (CIM) agent requires a restart on the host to update the Hardware tab.
Searches fail in the vSphere Client.
Inventory Service does not start.

Note: For additional symptoms and log entries, see the Additional Information section.

Resolution

To resolve this issue, reset the Inventory Service database.

Process to reset Inventory Service database:

In vCenter Server 6.x installed on Microsoft Windows, see: Process to reset Inventory Service database for vCenter Server 6.0
In vCenter Server Appliance 6.0, see: Process to reset Inventory Service database for vCenter Server Appliance 6.0

Notes:

After resetting an Inventory Storage database, you must recreate Storage Policies/Profiles with the same name. During next sync vCloud Director picks up the Policy/Profile and the associated datastores. A sync occurs every 5 minutes unless triggered. To trigger a sync from vCloud Cloud Director, right-click vCenter Server and click Reconnect.
If Storage Profiles do not exist within the vCloud Director and the vCenter Server 6.0 environment, then there is no expected effect on vCloud Director.
If the vCenter Server environment has Site Recovery Manager, you must click Change/Modify and run Repair on Site recovery manager from the Windows Programs and Features to re-register Site Recovery Manager with the vCenter Server and Inventory Service.
All Object tags are deleted during the reset

Workaround:

To workaround the issue run the following on the vCD DB before the Reset to get the mapping which needs to be recreated:

select virtual_center.name as VC,storage_profile_inv.name as Storage_Class, datastore_inv.vc_display_name as Datastore_To_Tag from storage_profile_inv
inner join datastore_profile_inv on datastore_profile_inv.profile_moref = storage_profile_inv.moref
inner join datastore_inv on datastore_inv.moref = datastore_profile_inv.datastore_or_pod_moref
inner join virtual_center on virtual_center.id = datastore_inv.vc_id
order by VC,Storage_Class

Additional Information

You experience these additional symtoms:

This issue does not affect VMware View environments.
In the %ALLUSERSPROFILE%\VMWare\vCenterServer\logs\vpxd\vpxd.log file, you see entries similar to:

warning vpxd[7FDAA4AAF700] [Originator@6876 sub=Default] Failed to connect socket; 0:0'>, >, e: system:111(Connection refused)
error vpxd[7FDAA4AAF700] [Originator@6876 sub=HttpConnectionPool-000006] [ConnectComplete] Connect failed to , TCP:localhost:10080>; cnx: (null), error: N7Vmacore15SystemExceptionE(Connection refused)
warning vpxd[7FDAB76DE7A0] [Originator@6876 sub=VpxdAuthClient] [ConnectAndLogin] Failed to loginBySamlToken: N7Vmacore15SystemExceptionE(Connection refused)
In the %ALLUSERSPROFILE%\VMWare\vCenterServer\logs\insvc\inv-svc.log file, you see the entry:

DATA CORRUPTION
In the %ALLUSERSPROFILE%\VMWare\vCenterServer\logs\invsvc\invsvc.log file, you see entries similar to:

Caused by: com.xhive.error.XhiveException: IO_ERROR
at com.xhive.kernel.ay.a(xdb:341)
at com.xhive.kernel.at.(xdb:277)
at com.xhive.kernel.ci.a(xdb:88)

For other related information see:
How to file a Support Request in Customer Connect
Resetting the VMware vCenter Server 5.x Inventory Service database
Error when uploading files to vCenter Server Appliance using WinSCP
Resetting the VMware vCenter Server 6.0 Inventory Service's Individual Data Providers

Read this article in different language here:
vCenter Server 6.x で Inventory Service が開始に失敗する
Inventory Service 无法在 vCenter Server 6.x 中启动

Impact/Risks:
After resetting an Inventory database, you must recreate Storage Policies/Profiles with the same name. During next sync vCloud Director picks up the Policy/Profile and the associated datastores. A sync occurs every 5 minutes unless triggered. To trigger a sync from vCloud Cloud Director, right-click vCenter Server and click Reconnect.

Attachments

2119422_reset-isdb6.0-bundle.zip get_app

2119422_VCSA_reset-isdb6.0-bundle.zip get_app