VMware, CPU VT Features and Asus Motherboards

I recently built a machine to run as a lab/training box for VMware ESXi at home, and have it running quite nicely with Virtual Center and a few VMs.  I ran into a bit of trouble before Christmas though when I tried to run up a 64-bit Ubuntu Server.  

The VM wouldn't power on due to an error with a mismatch in CPU capabilities and those required by the VM.  

"cpu on host is incompatible with cpu feature requirements of virtual machine. problem detected at cpuID level 0x80000001 register 'edx'."

It turned out to be the 'VT' (Virtualization Technology for x86 (VT-x), previously codenamed "Vanderpool", referred to in the BIOS setup as 'Vanderpool Technology') feature that ESX was complaining was missing.  I was totally confused though as both my motherboard (an Asus P5QL-EM) and CPU (an Intel E8400) support the VT feature and it was indeed enabled in the Motherboard BIOS.  

I found the very useful tool VMware CPU Host Info and ran it up against my Virtual Center server.  Sure enough, it showed that although my ESXi Hardware supported VT it was not actually enabled.  So I doubled checked the BIOS setting again, enabled (after shutting down all running VMs, of course).  

After establishing that I was running the latest version of the BIOS (0412) I decided to try and contact Asus, through their website, to log this as a support fault.  I received the following reply (on 19/12): 

Dear Clint Revell,
Thank you for contacting ASUS Customer Service.

My name is Lyn and it's my pleasure to help you with your problem.
The motherboard supports Vanderpool Technology.
And it seems that you have enabled it in BIOS.
But as I know, Intel Vanderpool Technology has special requirements for the OS and the softwares too. For detail, maybe you can try to contact Intel directly for some help.
http://mysearch.intel.com/corporate/default.aspx?culture=en_US&q=Vanderpool+Technology&category=all&adv=0&value=0
Welcome to refer Troubleshooting & FAQ for ASUS products in ASUS website:
http://support.asus.com/troubleshooting/troubleshooting.aspx?SLanguage=en-us
http://support.asus.com/faq/faq.aspx?SLanguage=en-us

If having any problems, please don't hesitate to let me know. Let's discuss this issue together.
Thank you for using ASUS products and enjoying ASUS services!

Lyn

ASUS Customer Service Center (Shanghai, China)

I'm sure you'll agree that the response was pretty much useless.  But it was a response, and a nice polite one at that.

In the New Year I decided to try again, with the same result, and checked again for a BIOS update.  What'dya know... Asus released the P5QL-EM BIOS version 0418 on 30/12/2008 with the following fixes:

1. Fix "Vanderpool Technology" item is invalid in setup.

So I installed the BIOS update, my 64-bit Ubuntu VM booted up straight away my VMware CPU Host Info tool of course shows 'VT Enabled'.  Hooray!  

So did Asus fix the issue after I contacted them?  Or did they just notice it themselves and remedy it as part of the ongoing improvement process.  I guess I'll never know, but I'm glad it's fixed none-the-less.