There is a known issue when running vSphere Client
4.1 and accessing the console of a VM running on an
ESX/ESXi 3.x host:
VMWare KB: vSphere Client displays a white screen when accessing
the virtual machine console
"Symptoms
You may observe these after
installing vSphere Client 4.1:
You see a blank white screen when opening the
virtual machine console for a virtual machine running on an
ESX/ESXi 3.x host
No errors are reported on the vSphere client Virtual machine
consoles to ESX/ESXi 4.0 or 4.1 virtual machines open without any
issues"
The resolutions to this are just a little bit
tedious, and after putting it off for a couple of months, I thought
I'd see if I could find another solution. And I
did.
In the VMWare forums, there is a comment which mentions that
running bcdedit to disable DEP (Data Execution Prevention) resolved
the issue.
DEP is a security
feature switched on by default in most modern OS's, and I'm not
comfortable switching it off entirely, so I tried to just exclude
the VpxClient.exe.
The 4.1 vSphere client was compiled with the NXCOMPAT flag
enabled, which forces DEP to be enabled, and stops you from adding
the application to the exclusions list. I've not been able to find
the exact reason, but whatever it is, it's DEP that causes the
white screen to display.
The NXCOMPAT flag can be removed from an application using the
editbin utility, which comes with most versions of Visual Studio
(including the Express editions).
editbin.exe /NXCOMPAT:NO
[FileName]
Running the command above will allow you to add the application
to the exclusions list.
If you do not have editbin available, I have wrapped the
required files up in a zip file, and added a PowerShell PS1 script
to perform all the required actions.
Download it here.
Just extract the files to a folder, open
PowerShell as Administrator, and run the included
.ps1 script.
Hope it helps!
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