I recently had this error ” This OVF package uses features that are not supported when deploying directly to an ESX host. The OVF package requires support for OVF Properties. Detils: Line 614: Unsupported element: ‘Property’ ” when trying to deploy NetApp’s Data ONTAP Edge 8.1.1 Evaluation to my ESXi 5.1 host.
The fix is easy and is described in the error message: deployment is not supported directly to an ESXi host – you must deploy through vCenter. A pain if you don’t have vCenter installed, but unfortunately this is the only fix.