VMware Communities: Message List - Losing remote connectivity on assigning virtual harddisks

Re: Losing remote connectivity on assigning virtual harddisks

megha012 — Fri, 10 Jul 2009 04:44:37 GMT

@Chuck8773

I have used the following command to create the virtual disk.

vmkfstools -c 5120m -d eagerzeroedthick -a lsilogic /vmfs/volumes/storage1/shared/disk1.vmdk

Will try with just -d thick and see how that goes.

@wila

I have windows 2003 installed on the VM and I am trying to add additional disks.

Re: Losing remote connectivity on assigning virtual harddisks

wila — Thu, 09 Jul 2009 13:26:41 GMT

Hi,

But once I do this on VM1 and bring it up, the connectivity is lost. At this point I havent even assigned that disk to VM2.

You never said that the VM still boots, it's not that the new disk is now the disk the VM tries to boot from by any chance?

PS: VMs are not supposed to share disks unless you install an OS on there which can work with clustered filesystems and a quorum disk.

--
Wil
_____________________________________________________
VI-Toolkit & scripts wiki at http://www.vi-toolkit.com

Re: Losing remote connectivity on assigning virtual harddisks

Chuck8773 — Thu, 09 Jul 2009 13:16:47 GMT

I just tried it in our environment with a Win 2003 guest and it works fine. ESX 3.5 U4.

Did you create the vmdk file thik? I followed this post to get it working.

http://communities.vmware.com/thread/74088

Charles Killmer, VCP

If you found this or other information useful, please consider awarding points for "Correct" or "Helpful".

Re: Losing remote connectivity on assigning virtual harddisks

megha012 — Thu, 09 Jul 2009 12:47:20 GMT

I assign a virtual disk to a VM 1 by setting the new virtual scsi adaptor to "Virtual". Virtual scsi adaptor is set to "Virtual", so as to be able to assign the same disk to VM 2.

But once I do this on VM1 and bring it up, the connectivity is lost. At this point I havent even assigned that disk to VM2.

This happens only if the Virtual scsi adaptor is set to "Virtual", if it is set to "none" then the connectivity is fine.

Re: Losing remote connectivity on assigning virtual harddisks

Chuck8773 — Thu, 09 Jul 2009 12:36:29 GMT

In what cases does the VM fail?

Single disk

Multiple disks without sharing

Multiple disks with sharing

Is the other VM set ti virtual adapter?

If it is only when it is sharing the disk, we will look more closely at how that works.

Charles Killmer, VCP

If you found this or other information useful, please consider awarding points for "Correct" or "Helpful".

Re: Losing remote connectivity on assigning virtual harddisks

megha012 — Thu, 09 Jul 2009 12:26:42 GMT

Yes, I am assigning the Virtual disk to 2 VMs on the same ESX by setting the virtual scsi adaptor to "Virtual".

Re: Losing remote connectivity on assigning virtual harddisks

Chuck8773 — Thu, 09 Jul 2009 12:22:25 GMT

What do you mean when you say you can share virtual disks? Are you assigning one virtual disk to multiple VM's?

Charles Killmer, VCP

If you found this or other information useful, please consider awarding points for "Correct" or "Helpful".

Re: Losing remote connectivity on assigning virtual harddisks

megha012 — Thu, 09 Jul 2009 11:11:02 GMT

I updated my ESX 3.5 update 2 to update 4 and still no change.

I can share virtual disks on ESX 3.0 so dont know why its not working on ESX 3.5

Planning to try it on ESX4.0 which will be a lilttle inconvenient though. Will then update my findings here.

Till then if anybody has a solution it would be of great help.

Re: Losing remote connectivity on assigning virtual harddisks

Chuck8773 — Tue, 23 Jun 2009 12:58:46 GMT

That is update 2. Not sure if updating to U4 would fix it, but I would try it. Also, are there any snapshots on the VM?

If you found this or other information useful, please consider awarding points for "Correct" or "Helpful".

Re: Losing remote connectivity on assigning virtual harddisks

megha012 — Tue, 23 Jun 2009 12:55:42 GMT

Yeah, once I remove the virtual disk the remote connectivity is back.

Its a ESX 3.5.0 build 110268.

I have started installing the VMtools though as you mentioned it should not matter.

Re: Losing remote connectivity on assigning virtual harddisks

Chuck8773 — Tue, 23 Jun 2009 12:38:22 GMT

Unfortunately, I don't see anything either. It looks like the VMTools have not been installed yet? Kind of hard to install them now though. That should not be the cause of what you are seeing.

Does removing the disk that you added, let you manage it again? Is this ESX 3.5 U4?

If you found this or other information useful, please consider awarding points for "Correct" or "Helpful".

Re: Losing remote connectivity on assigning virtual harddisks

megha012 — Tue, 23 Jun 2009 12:24:42 GMT

I looked into the files but could not make anything of it

I have attached log files for you.

Re: Losing remote connectivity on assigning virtual harddisks

Chuck8773 — Tue, 23 Jun 2009 11:57:05 GMT

I would start to troubleshoot this by looking at the log files in the folder with the VM. If you post some of the log file, I can help figure out what is wrong.

You can get the log file by SSH into the host, or by browsing the datastore through the VIC.

If you found this or other information useful, please consider awarding points for "Correct" or "Helpful".

Losing remote connectivity on assigning virtual harddisks

megha012 — Tue, 23 Jun 2009 10:27:29 GMT

I have setup a windows 2003 guest OS on an ESX 3.5 server.

After the machine is up and running, I assigned a virtual harddisk with a virtual scsi adaptor set to "Virtual" for the harddisks.

Once i bring up the machine after this, the remote connectivity for the machine is lost.

Is this the expected behavior or have i missed something ?

Any help would be great.