I installed ESXi 6.5 from a 32GB SD card (inserted into hyper-visor motherboard usb port) and chose to install it on the same card during installation. I set the pass through on my LSI controller & USB controller, and applied a license. I rebooted and these changes retained.
However, I then added datastore1 (ssd) and uploaded backed up VMDK'/VMX's from prior EXSi 5.5 environment. All VM's were running fine....
I shutdown the VM's and rebooted the ESXi host.
To My surprise all the VM's unregistered themselves, but the license and pass-through settings retained.
I re-registered the VM's and rebooted ESXi host again, same result.
Any ideas?