Enabling 64-bit VMs on nested ESXi 5.1

In my home lab, I have a 2-node cluster with two virtual ESXi 5.1. When I tried to boot a 64-bit on these hosts I received the following error:

"Longmode is unsupported. It is required for 64-bit guest OS support. On Intel systems, longmode requires VT-x to be enabled in the BIOS. On nested virtual ESX hosts, longmode requires the "Virtualized Hardware Virtualization" flag to be enabled on the outer VM."

I seem to remember that in version 5.0 you had to configure a given parameter in the ESXi console. For ESXi 5.1 this has changed according to this VMware KB.

It states the following:

"Virtualized HV is fully  supported for virtual hardware version 9 VMs on hosts that support  Intel VT-x and EPT or AMD-V and RVI. To enable virtualized HV, use the web client and navigate to the processor settings screen. Check the  box next to  "Expose hardware-assisted virtualization to the guest operating system."  This setting is not available under the traditional C# client."

So, access the web client, locate the VM, right click -> Edit settings, and check the box as mentioned (for the parent VM, not the virtual ESXi...). It works like a charm, see screendump below:

vSphere web client - failed to connect to VMware lookup service

Yesterday, I installed the vCenter 5.1 vCenter Virtual Appliance in my home lab. It went fairly smooth, however, I couldn't connect to the vSphere web client. I received the following error:

Failed to connect to VMware Lookup Service - https://localhost:7444/lookupservice/sdk

I found a VMware KB indicating that there could be something wrong with the SSL certificate - because I had changed the FQDN of the appliance after initial setup.

That seemed a little overkill as the appliance should work or at least you should be able to reconfigure it.

The solution was to log into the administration web interface, https://vcenter-server-name:5480, and re-run the  configuration wizard with default settings. That fixed the problem and it didn't delete the cluster and folder settings that I had already configured for this given vCenter server. The vSphere web client can be reached at the following address: https://vcenter-server-name:9443/vsphere-client/#

Btw: the deafult login for the vCenter 5.1 virtual appliance is user: root and password: vmware