VMware vSphere: Pass-through WiFi and "This device cannot start" error (Code 10)

To conduct new research, I needed a WiFi card in a virtual machine. I have the WiFi adapter (Intel Dual Band Wireless-AC 8265) in my Intel NUC5i5MYHE, VMware has VMDirectPath I/O pass-through feature, sounds easy. But it was not easy.

After simple configuration of pass-through the WiFi adapter (including embedded Bluetooth device) appeared in Windows but didn't work. Device status was like this:

This device cannot start. (Code 10)

{Operation Failed}

The requested operation was unsuccessful.

At the same time embedded Bluetooth adapter works properly.

Some logs from Windows Event Viewer:

Error 5006

Intel(R) Dual Band Wireless-AC 8265 : The version number is incorrect for this driver.

Error 411, Kernel-PnP

Device PCI\VEN_8086&DEV_24FD&SUBSYS_01308086&REV_50\3413E8FFFF6254DA00 had a problem starting.

Driver Name: oem19.inf

Class Guid: {4d36e972-e325-11ce-bfc1-08002be10318}

Service: Netwtw06

Lower Filters: 

Upper Filters: vwifibus

Problem: 0xA

Problem Status: 0xC0000001

Some logs from VM's "vmware.log":

2020-11-28T19:05:14.688Z| vmx| I125: PCIPassthru: Device 0000:00:1d.0 barIndex 0 type 2 realaddr 0xaa13a000 size 1024 flags 0

2020-11-28T19:05:14.688Z| vmx| I125: PCIPassthru: PCI device 0000:00:1d.0 is marked wrong PCIe

2020-11-28T19:05:14.688Z| vmx| I125: PCIPassthru: Registered a PCI device for 0000:00:1d.0 vIRQ 0x10, physical MSI = Disabled (vmmInt = Disabled), IntrPin = 1

2020-11-28T19:05:14.790Z| vmx| I125: PCIPassthru: Device 0000:02:00.0 barIndex 0 type 3 realaddr 0xaa000000 size 8192 flags 4

2020-11-28T19:05:14.790Z| vmx| I125: PCIPassthru: Device has PCI Express Cap Version 2(size 60)

2020-11-28T19:05:14.790Z| vmx| I125: PCIPassthru: Registered a PCI device for 0000:02:00.0 vIRQ 0x11, physical MSI = Enabled (vmmInt = Enabled), IntrPin = 1

...

2020-11-28T19:05:19.835Z| vcpu-0| I125: PCIPassthru: 0000:00:1d.0 : barSize: 1024 is not pgsize multiple

2020-11-28T19:05:19.841Z| vcpu-0| I125: PCIPassthru: 0000:00:1d.0 : barSize: 1024 is not pgsize multiple

...

2020-11-28T19:05:14.805Z| vmx| I125: Automatically adjusting PCI hole to 2604 MB for passthrough RMRR

...

2020-11-28T19:05:19.916Z| vcpu-0| I125: PCIPassthru: Attempted to program PCI cacheline size 0 not a power of 2 factor of original physical 0 for device 0000:00:1d.0

2020-11-28T19:05:19.923Z| vcpu-0| I125: PCIPassthru: Attempted to program PCI cacheline size 0 not a power of 2 factor of original physical 0 for device 0000:02:00.0

Nothing helped solve the problem:

• Update/reset drivers of WiFi adapter.
• Swith Windows from BIOS to UEFI boot. Article.
• Set pciPassthru.use64bitMMIO="TRUE", pciPassthru1.virtualDev = "pci", pciPassthru1.msiEnabled = "FALSE" in VM. Article.

After test pass-through of this WiFi adapter on Ubuntu machine I realized that this is not a guest OS issue.

At that moment my host works on ESXi 6.0 Patch 3 that runs from USB (article). This could be the source of the problem.

After fresh installation of ESXi 6.7 U3 it finally works!

May be it was the issue of my ESXi image/installation option or ESXi bug, but on 6.7 U3 it works good without any deep configuration.