While attempting to setup vCenter HA for my 6.7 Lab environment, I was met with a very strange error. “The object ManagedObjectectReference has already been deleted or has not been completely created”. I was unable to find much in the way of logs, other than the failure message itself. Time for a VMware support ticket!

The engineer I spoke to seemed very knowledgeable. However, he too seemed stumped at the error. He requested a regroup while he reviewed the log files.

The engineer got back to me the next day, and indicated that the error may be related to the Distributed Virtual Switch. He suggested creating a new portgroup with the same properties that the vCenter is using, moving the vCenter to the new port group, and then trying again.

New portgroup created, and BAM! The “Setup vCenter HA” button now correctly enters the configuration workflow!

The explanation from the VMware support engineer was that when the Distributed Virtual Switch was upgraded to a newer version it may not have fully migrated over all the settings.