vCenter 5.1 installation issues establishing ODBC connection

Problem: After successfully configuring SQL server 2008, installing vCenter single sign-on, I could not get thru installing vCenter server. I created the ODBC connection with the tests running successfully. Still during the vCenter install, I could not connect to a supporting database.

Realization: The SQL native client needed to be installed first...then recreate a new ODBC connection to the backend SQL database before proceeding with vCenter server installation.

Before you proceed with installing vCenter Server, you need to install SQL Native Client. This is located on the SQL ISO (the one you installed SQL Server on @ SQL VM). It can be found in folder 1033_enu_lp\x64\setup\x64and is called sqlncli.msi.

The installation is just a matter of Next, Next, Next, Finish

ODBC error when upgrading or installing vCenter 4 or later

Configured DSN is pointing to an unsupported ODBC driver error while upgrading to vCenter 4.0

One of the errors my customers repeatly complain about while upgrading to vCenter Server 4 or even when trying to install it from scratch is the following error:

“The DSN is pointing to an unsupported ODBC driver. Please re-configure your DSN to use one of the supported drivers.”

If you face this problem the first thing to do is to ensure that you are running a supported Database. Hint! Hint! SQL 2000 is no longer supported. If you are running SQL 2000 then you must upgrade to SQL 2005 or SQL 2008 before upgrading to vCenter Server 4.0

If you have a supported database & still got the error then you must download & install the Microsoft SQL Server Native Client for your particular platform. You can use this link to download Microsoft SQL Server Native Client. See the Image below to see what the download link look like:

After installing the required Microsoft SQL Server Native Client you will have to create a new ODBC connection using the just installed Microsoft SQL Server Native client as per the image below.

After following the above steps, you will have to restart the installation of vCenter Server 4 using the newly created ODBC connection.

The above steps should get the error out of the way & get you started. I hope this help, & please leave your feedbacks & other steps you needed to resolved the problem in the comments area.

Source: http://www.virtualizationteam.com/server-virtualization/configured-dsn-is-pointing-to-an-unsupported-odbc-driver-error-while-upgrading-to-vcenter-4-0.html