Firstboot Failed during Install, Deployment, Upgrade, or Migration in vCenter Server and vCenter Server Appliance 6.7

Products

VMware vCenter Server

Issue/Introduction

Symptoms:

Firstboot fails during Install/Deployment, Upgrade or Migration.
In the firstbootStatus.json file, you see that one of these services failed to configure or start during firstboot:
- "failedSteps": "cmfirstboot"
- "failedSteps": "analytics_firstboot"
- "failedSteps": "vpxd_firstboot"
- "failedSteps": "pschealth-firstboot”
- "failedSteps": "sms_spbm_firstboot"
- "failedSteps": "vmafd-firstboot"
- "failedSteps": "vapi_firstboot"
- "failedSteps": "mgmt-firstboot"
- "failedSteps": "scafirstboot"
- "failedSteps": "updatemgr-firstboot"
- "failedSteps": "ngc_firstboot"
- "failedSteps": "vmidentity-firstboot"

Environment

VMware vCenter Server 6.7.x
VMware vCenter Server Appliance 6.0.x
VMware vCenter Server 6.5.x
VMware vCenter Server Appliance 6.5.x
VMware vCenter Server 6.0.x
VMware vCenter Server Appliance 6.7.x

Cause

The vCenter Server firstboot framework was introduced in vSphere 6.0 and is responsible for configuring services after a vCenter Server install, upgrade, or migration. The firstboot framework is common to both vCenter Server on Windows and the vCenter Server Appliance. The firstboot process occurs during stage 2 of a vCenter Server Appliance deployment. If a single service fails to configure or start during the firstboot process, vCenter Server will fail to install, upgrade, or migrate.

This issue may occur due to these issues:

Time Synchronization Issues

Time inconsistencies in vSphere can cause firstboot to fail at different services depending on where time is not accurate and when the time is synchronized. Issues most commonly happen when the target ESXi host for the destination vCenter Server Appliance is not synchronized with NTP. Issue can also happen if the destination vCenter Server Appliance migrates to an ESXi host with different time due to fully automated DRS.

DNS Issues

Incorrect or missing DNS configurations will cause services in firstboot to fail.

Authentication/Password or Permissions Issues

Certain passwords may cause vSphere upgrade failures, as can unexpected permissions in the vCenter database.

Certificate Issues

Some certificate configurations may cause issues due to certificate standards, key requirements, etc.

Resolution

To resolve this issue:

Issue	Resolution
Time Synchronization Issues	Firstboot fails when upgrading vCenter Server Appliance 6.7 due to time synchronization issue (57085)
DNS Issues	Firstboot fails when upgrading vCenter Server Appliance 6.7 with no DNS records (57126)
Authentication/Password or Permissions Issues	Firstboot fails due to Authentication/Password or Permissions when installing or upgrading or migrating in vCenter Server and vCenter Server Appliance 6.7 (55891)
Certificate Issues	The SSL certificate of STS service cannot be verified', 'KeyUsage does not allow key encipherment' error during vCenter Server Appliance 6.7 Upgrade (56352) Analytics Service registration with Component Manager failed''SSL CERTIFICATE_VERIFY_FAILED' while upgrading vCenter server from 6.x to 6.7 firstboot fails (67198)
Other Issues	vCenter Server Appliance 6.7 Migration Fails During Firstboot - vCenter Authentication Proxy Firstboot Failed - "Exception: Could not register as vCenter extension" (55864) vCenter Server 6.7 on Windows Upgrade Fails During Firstboot - VMware HTTP Reverse Proxy Firstboot Failed - "Failed to register VMware HTTP Reverse Proxy service with SCA" (56490) vCenter Server 6.7 Upgrade Fails During Firstboot - VMware Service Control Agent Firstboot Failed - "Entry with name serviceId: xxxxxxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxxxxxxxxxx not found" (58534) Upgrade of Windows vCenter Server 6.5 to 6.7 fails with the error "Failed to register Auto Deploy" (55076) vCenter Server 6.7 upgrade fails with the error: "Failed to check the status of VMware Directory Service" (54724) Windows vCenter Server upgrade from 6.5 to 6.7 fails if RSA is configured, with VMIdentity firstboot error "VMware Identity Service bootstrap failed" (55627) Detect and update duplicate names of Distributed Virtual Switches and Distributed Virtual Portgroups before upgrading vCenter Server (2147547) vCenter Server 6.x Installation on Windows fails with Error: "Failed to generate VirtualCenter symmetric encryption key" (55781)

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Additional Information

It is also possible to determine which error message was sent to the UI from the /var/log/firstboot/fbInstall.json file.

For example:
In the /var/log/firstboot/fbInstall.json file, you see entries:

"problemId": null, --> This will show up as the "Error" in the UI
"detail": [
{
"translatable": "The installation of vCenter Server failed due to an internal error.",
"resolution": { --> This will show up as the "Resolution" in the UI
"translatable": "This is an unrecoverable error, please retry install. If you encounter this error again, please search for these symptoms in the VMware Knowledge Base for any known issues and possible resolutions. If none can be found, collect a support bundle and open a support request.",