Import OVF Template – Unsupported hardware family ‘vmx-10’ error ESXi 5.5
I spent hours exporting a virtual machine (vm) to an OVF format only to discover that VMware vSphere ESXi 5.5 gives me an error when I tried to deploy it.
Error message: Unsupported hardware family ‘vmx-10’ error
Cause: You created the VM using Workstation 11 and didn’t set the vm version to 10 or below before creating the OVF.
- Solution 1: Edit the .ovf file. Look for “VMX-XX” (most likely VMX-11) and change it to “VMX-10:.vm file. You’re not done. The hash has to be changed in the .vm file or the ESXi will notice you messed with it. Run a HashTool creation tool (see tools below). Create a Hash using SHA-1. Copy that back into the .vm and the server will let you deploy it without errors. I hate to state the obvious, but if you had selected a higher version because you were past the previous version’s limits then this won’t solve your issue. Here are alternate fixes.
- Solution 2: You could go back to your original VM and change the version number and re-export it to an OVF file. This takes time.
- Solution 3: Use the OVF Tool to convert the OVF back to a .vmd. The command looks like this (without the quotes): “ovftool e:\myovfimage.ovf e:\myvmimage.vmx”. You can then fix the version and re-export it. Takes even more time!
Tools I use:
HASH TOOL: http://www.digitalvolcano.co.uk/hash.html
OVF Tool: Download the latest version from www.vmware.com (version 4.x)
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-Bob