VMware Communities : Thread List - VI: VMware ESX® 3.0

IP conflict

Rohail2004 — Thu, 19 Nov 2009 13:01:42 GMT

Is there a way to check if the IP is somehow defined in the VM environment... I am using an old Ip address for my new VM but it is not taking it, I can't ping it outside the subnet, get ip conflict error, all other IP's are working fine, just the one, since it was used in the past so I am thinking it is defined somewhere in the VM, but we have over 200 VM's so I can't check one at a time.... is there a better way to check? thanks.

Networking issue

Rohail2004 — Wed, 18 Nov 2009 13:13:00 GMT

ONe of my SQL VM is keep throwing the below error, and the SQL guy said it is a VM issue. Did anyone see this error before?

PowerCenter_Production_Integration_Service ERROR Tue Nov 17 07:00:00 2009 13884 REP_12400 Repository Error (Microsoft OLE DB Provider for SQL Server: DBNETLIB http://ConnectionWrite (send()).General network error. Check your network documentation.
SQL State: 08S01 Native Error: 11State: 1 Severity: 16
SQL Server Message: DBNETLIB http://ConnectionWrite (send()).General network error. Check your network documentation.

Thanks.

Templates greyed out after upgrade to ESX 3.5 / VC 2.5

AndyShine — Mon, 21 Jan 2008 15:28:48 GMT

I have recently upgraded my environment from ESX 3.0.2 to 3.5 and VC 2.02 to V 2.5. My vm's are running fine in the new environment. Unfortunately when I went to clone a machine template I found, on right clicking the template, that all but the the "Add Permission" option where grey'ed out. Indeed the template names are displayed with a light grey, italacised font. I attach to the ESX server as root (via VC) so I don't think this is a permissions problem(?). Also my templates are stored on a local datastore rather than a shared one (though I doubt this matters)

I assume this has been caused by the upgrades: the templates were ok before I started.

Any suggestions?

Thanks

Andrew

how to expand vmdk disk to larger size

vmwareluverz — Fri, 08 Aug 2008 22:14:29 GMT

anyone know how to extend larger size for vmdk file in esx 3.5 thank you.

High CPU usage after adding RDM

VirtuallyTaken — Thu, 08 Oct 2009 05:34:58 GMT

Hi,

We have added 2 RDMs from one VM (call this VM1) to an existing VM (call this VM2). Since then, we are experiencing high CPU usage for VM2. We are running Win2K for the guest OS. The CPU is running at 100 percent pretty much all the time.But when you check perfomance monitor or task manager from the guest OS, its quite normal. No high CPU. Has anyone experienced this before? If so, any resolution or why its doing this? Is this completely unrelated to RDMs?

Cheers

VM naming question

Rohail2004 — Tue, 17 Nov 2009 16:29:11 GMT

Suppose I created a new VM and name ABC while ago, but change the NT name to CDE, but then I created another VM and name ABC. Since the ABC name already exist, so why did it let me create the new VM with the same name? can someone shed some light on it? the reason I am asking becuase the NT name was changed, but the VM was created with a different name, and accidnetly the same name was used to create a new VM... Sinc all the VM's are on the SAN, so wont be any conflict?

thanks.

SVMotion with RDM's

sidanat — Thu, 01 May 2008 21:21:47 GMT

When using Svmotion what happens to the RDM lun that is attached to the Vmdk file. I understand that the RDM is mapped by a Lun mapping file but I used SVMotion to move a vmx file and selected all vmdk files to be re located. When this had finshed there was a 12gb RDM lun attached to the vmdk file and it used the total space out of that datastore for the vmdk file and RDM file of 42GB 30 for OS and 12 for RDM file?

I want to SV motion OS disks tomorrow with 500GB rdm luns attached what will happen??.

I have looked in the datastore before moving the said vmdk files and the rdm luns if highlighted show a size of 1,000 MB but the lun is only 250GB i am a little confused.

bascially what should i select just to relocate the OS vmdk file or all files?

SCP .vmdk file from ESX 2.5 to ESX 3.5

ygao — Tue, 03 Feb 2009 19:40:29 GMT

Hi, I have to SCP a .vmdk file from Esx 2.5 to a ESX 3.5 machine and use it as a storage for a new VM on the 3.5 ESX host. I can't use VI to copy it.

Now when I try to attach the .vmdk to the 3.5 VM, it prompt a Error " A vlaue exceeded the acceptable range"

How can I upgrade the 2.5 .vmdk to 3.5 without VC? Any ideas?

Thanks

HOWTO: Installing ESX Server from a USB flash drive

Paul Lalonde — Sun, 11 Mar 2007 04:15:03 GMT

After Mike Laverick posted his experience with ESX Server and USB flash disks in another thread, I decided to figure out how to make it work.

Here's a quick rundown on setting up a USB flash disk (ie. pen drive, flash key, etc.) to install ESX Server.

Requirements:

- You'll need SYSLINUX, a Linux boot loader for removable media. Get it here:

http://www.kernel.org/pub/linux/utils/boot/syslinux/syslinux-3.36.zip

- These instructions are based on a Windows PC for simplicity. If you're a Linux guru, then you can obviously do this under Linux. You'd need to know how to mount .ISO images in order to extract files, etc.

Steps Required:

1. Plug in your USB flash disk and format it under Windows. Use the FAT filesystem (not FAT32, although it would probably work).

2. From Windows Explorer, find the boot.iso file in the /images directory on the ESX 3.x CD-ROM. Copy boot.iso into a temporary directory on your hard drive.

3. Using your ISO extraction program of choice, extract the contents of the boot.iso file to your USB flash drive. On my PC, it's the E: drive.

4. Delete the isolinux.bin and updatecd.cfg files from the USB flash disk.

5. Rename the isolinux.cfg file on the USB flash disk to syslinux.cfg

6. Using WordPad (not Notepad), open the syslinux.cfg file and add the keyword usb to the end of every line that begins with append. Here's what the file should look like when you're done:

default esx
prompt 1
timeout 600
display boot.msg
F1 boot.msg
F7 snake.msg
label debug
kernel vmlinuz
append initrd=initrd.img noapic nomediacheck debug usb
label esx
kernel vmlinuz
append initrd=initrd.img usb
label text
kernel vmlinuz
append initrd=initrd.img text usb
label expert
kernel vmlinuz
append expert initrd=initrd.img usb
label ks
kernel vmlinuz
append ks initrd=initrd.img usb
label lowres
kernel vmlinuz
append initrd=initrd.img lowres usb

7. Now, extract the syslinux .zip file into another temporary directory on your hard drive.

8. Open up a command prompt and use the cd command to navigate into the win32 directory. For example:

cd C:\temp\syslinux-3.36\win32

9. Now, run the syslinux program to apply the boot loader and boot sector to the USB flash drive:

syslinux -s e:

( On my PC, my USB flash drive is mounted as drive E: )

10. Finally, copy the ESX 3.x ISO image onto the flash drive:

copy c:\iso\esx-3.0.1-32039.iso e:\

11. Confirm that your USB flash drive contains the following files:

boot.cat
boot.msg
initrd.img
snake.msg
splash.lss
vmlinuz
syslinux.cfg
esx-3.0.1-32039.iso

12. You're all set! Unplug the USB flash drive, configure the BIOS on your server to boot from USB accordingly, and boot 'er up!

13. The ESX installer will detect the USB device and whatever SCSI / disk controllers you have. When the installer asks you what the installation source will be, choose Hard Disk.

14. You will need to choose the right disk device (ie. /dev/sda, /dev/sdb) that corresponds to your USB flash disk. Chances are it will be /dev/sdb.

15. Finally, the installer will ask you what directory to find the ESX installation CD image in. Just use / and it will find the .ISO image for you.

16. The rest is history!

Please let me know how this works for you and if you run into any glitches. This is going to save me a lot of time since I don't have CD-ROM drives in all of my servers!!

Paul

Unable to install 64 client on esx 3

monkeyboyz — Mon, 16 Nov 2009 09:42:56 GMT

Hi, I have a HP Dl380 G4 server and I have installed Esx 3 on it. For some reason when I try to install a 64 bit guest os, it fails. It says that the CPU does not support long mode and I need to install 32 bit os. Has anyone seen this before?

VMotion between Opteron 275 and Opteron 2435

Siegwerk — Fri, 13 Nov 2009 13:01:06 GMT

Dear all,

we learned that VMotion between Opteron processors and Xeon processors in ESX 3.0 does not work. Do you have experience, if VMotion between AMD Opteron 275 (Quad Core) and Opteron 2435 (Six Core) works?

Best regards

Peter

Unable to open SCSI device '/vmfs/devices/generic/vmhba1:5:0:0' (scsi0:1):@&!@@(msg.fileio.generic)Generic error. Failed to configure scsi0

Savanes — Thu, 12 Nov 2009 09:34:10 GMT

Hello,

I'm using ESX 3.0.2, and one VM which is under Windows Server 2003 can't start.

This server is attach to a tape device IBM Total Storage 3581-2U.

I have the following error: Unable to open SCSI device '/vmfs/devices/generic/vmhba1:5:0:0' (scsi0:1):@&!*@*@(msg.fileio.generic)Generic error. Failed to configure scsi0

I have apply the ESX Server 3.0.2 patch ESX-1003179, anyway there is no change.

And i have an other VM under Windows Server 2003 without any tape device which is works fine.

Please help, it's very urgent. I use this VM for backup.

Regards,

LUN Space

Rohail2004 — Wed, 11 Nov 2009 14:07:14 GMT

I have couple of LUNs which has over 100GB available space and some of them VM's are already running in them as well, but my question is If I put a new VM in existing LUN which has 100GB space available, so will I run into any issue? I am sure I wouldnt, but I wanted to check with you to make sure it will not cause any problem with my existing VM's which are located in that LUN.

We are running high space in our SAN and trying to compress LUN's as much as we can.

Thanks.

“Raw Device Mappings” option not available when adding a hard disk to an existing VM.

Anto1le — Wed, 11 Nov 2009 09:00:12 GMT

Dear all,

When I try to add a new hard drive to an existing VM the "Raw Device Mappings" option is greyed and not available.
I have created a LUN on the SAN, the LUN is displaying under “Storage Adapters” but I think I am missing a step to convert this LUN into a raw device and a vmdk. I am a newbie and I have spent hours looking for documentation about that.
Does anyone could help me find that information ?

I am running ESX3.0 and VMWare Infrastructure 2.5

Thank you in advance,

Antoine

Any one tried esx3 on an intel modular server system?

biekee — Tue, 22 Jan 2008 15:46:05 GMT

Hi All,

I try to figure out, if there is anyone out there, who has been able to install ESX 3.x on an intel modular server system

Anyone? I need that information for a customer.

Thanks,

(Q) Understanding Real Terms of CPU virtualization?

alalit — Mon, 09 Nov 2009 10:44:15 GMT

Hi Team.
I need to understand the real terms of CPU virtualization in ESX / ESXi solution. In clear text:
1. If a virual machine runs on 2 or 4 logical CPUs, how many of physical CPUs it utilizes on physical host.
2. How the concept of logical CPU works.
3. How to measure the real time CPU virtualization performance and a single state CPU performance monitoring on a VM.

P.S. Just to update it say, host physical machine has 8 CPUs total (Xeon) and VM has 4 virtual processors.

I would appreciate if someone can reply with answers in "clear text" terms. Thanks a ton.

Warm regards,
Anshul

Port Group physical vs. virtual ?

Nicodemus — Tue, 19 Feb 2008 00:33:30 GMT

Schduled to take VCP in two days... and I really need so help understanding the maximum number of port groups as described in the Configuration Maximum pdf...

What is the difference between the advanced traits port groups = 512 and the virtual NICs port groups = 4069 ? Is the physical refering to the ESX Host or what? What does this 'advanced physical traits' mean? ( See blue high-lighted or the attached screen cap jpg)*
Advanced, physical traits

*

Number of port groups 512

Virtual NICs/switches/VLANs

Number of virtual switches 127 <<< 248 ?!

Number of port groups (VLANs) 4069

Help please, - Nicodemus

Solaris 10 New Install hanging on Configuring Devices

ericni — Thu, 12 Jun 2008 05:40:53 GMT

Hi,

I have ESX running with a few virtual machines on a Sun 4100 X86 server. The OS's I'm running include Solaris 10X86, Redhad, Win2K. I am trying to install a new version of Solaris, and I'm getting stuck at a Configuring Devices prompt.

I have seen a few message threads on the Sun forums indicating that there are some BIOS issues that might be causing this. But I'm not sure how to reset the BIOS values, or if I should. I'm trying to load the OS using a remote mount of my MAC dvd drive which contains the Solaris dvd. It boots and gets to loading the OS and configuring the devices and then just hangs.

Wondered if anyone had seen this or knows what to do here.

Eric

what is Vmkernel swap file

vmwaredude1 — Wed, 16 Jan 2008 17:24:19 GMT

Folks,

Can you please tell me, what is vmkernel swap file. This file gets created when the VM is powered on and its size equals the VM max memory size ?

Thanks

Hard Disk Failure

kbegg — Thu, 08 Oct 2009 09:38:02 GMT

Hello,

We have a HP DL380 G5 with ESX 3.0.2 installed (soon to be upgraded). We have 4 VM's running that include AD, Exchange.

The server has hardware raid configured. It has 7 disks plus an online spare. It also has an HP MSL4080 Tape Library connected via scsi.

A couple of days back we had a disk failure. The disk has been replaced and all seemed well until we run a backup.

The backup fails at exactly the same byte count and causes the VM to slow down to a poiint where no services are available. Our only way around this is to Power down the VM and restart. The VM then works perfectly until the next back where we run into the same problem.

Has anyone seen this before?

Also in hindsight.....should we have shutdown all the VM's on the host before plugging in the replacement hard drive?

Cheers,

Keith

sysprep with VC 2.5

sidanat — Tue, 18 Mar 2008 11:16:59 GMT

Hi I want to be able to deploy windows 2008 server from VC server what files do i need as there is no deploy.cab file that i can find

Ethernet frames dropped - NP2 hardware - ESX Server 3.0.2

BedBB — Sat, 02 Aug 2008 21:03:15 GMT

Hi, In my environment have four hosts with the ESX Server 3.0.2, building July 2007. My infrastructure support HBA, SAN, fiber optic network and Gigabit. When saw the exchange of Firewall and implemented the function of the accelerator TCP / IP network is now out packages (size). At the site of VMware identified a patch for the ESX Server version 2.5 - http://www.vmware.com/support/esx25/doc/esx-253-200606-patch.htmI suppose that the ESX Server version 3.0.2 had already been incorporated into the correction made in version 2.5. I correct? Any additional patch to be applied? Not found in patches download version 3.0.2 ESX Server description of the problem of network - discard packages ethernet frames.
Help is welcome. Thank you / Bed

- - - - - - - -

"MAC0 IP" Error on NP2 hardware

Some or all network interfaces appear to drop certain packets from specific applications, such as VMWare ESX

clusters and Nortel Alteon application switches.

The "MAC0 IP Error" counter for the network interface may also increment, which you can view using the following

diagnostic CLI command:

diag hardware deviceinfo nic AMC-SW1\/1

Driver Name: NP2
Version: 0.92
.
.
.
MAC0 IP Error: 231

This issue only affects Fortinet products with NP2 hardware accelerated network interfaces.

Components

* FortiGate-3016B, FortiGate-310B
* FortiGate-ASM-FB4, FortiGate-ADM-FB8 and FortiGate-ADM-XB2 AMC modules

Steps or Commands

This issue occurs when network applications produce frames not conforming to the IEEE 802.3 3.2.7 specification.

According to that specification, if padding has been applied in an Ethernet frame, the length of the frame should

be exactly 64 bytes, the minimum frame length for Ethernet. Frames that both are longer than the minimum frame

length and contain padding are not conforming to the specification, and are therefore dropped by NP2 interfaces.

Typically, you might observe this issue with TCP SYN or SYN-ACK signals, where frames require padding. UDP packets

are generally not affected, as the packet is greater or equal to minimum frame length, and therefore does not

require padding to meet the minimum frame length.

Network applications known to produce non-conforming frames include:

* VMware ESX clusters running 3.01, 3.02

There is a patch available on VMware's web site for older code versions:

http://www.vmware.com/support/esx25/doc/esx-253-200606-patch.html

Summary :
...

This patch refines runt-packet padding behavior in order to accommodate relatively rare circumstances where

Ethernet frames are dropped and/or flagged as suspicious by a network security appliance.
...

http://kc.forticare.com/default.asp?SID=&Lang=1&id=3659

vmhba and vmnic error messages

paviadmin — Tue, 03 Nov 2009 23:50:23 GMT

Hello,

I am getting following warning message in vmware esx sever 3.0

vmhba 0:6 doesnot exist and vm nic1 doesnot exits.

i am also getting critical error iso: /soft doesnot exists..

i am new to VMWare please help..

Thanks,

vCPU scheduling

timbo475 — Wed, 04 Nov 2009 00:11:42 GMT

I've read a bit around this subject but would benefit from a bit of help from people who really know this stuff because I'm a bit confused.

I was on an ESX3.x course and the instructor mentioned something about it not being a good idea to over resource VMs with vCPUs due to scheduling gotachas. Reading around the subject the strict co-scheduling that ESX .2x used would definitely have created problems with some VMs using multiple vCPUs under certain conditions but I've read that the co-scheduler is relaxed and this means that this problem is a bit less apparent.

We are running an ESX 3.0 server with 3 VMs and 4 vCPUs. One VM is has 1 vCPU assigned, 1 has 2 and the other has 4. I suspect the VM with 4vCPUs is having major performance issues (effectively, it's wanting to use all available vCPUs which is probably bound to cause scheduling issues) but I'm unsure how to troubleshoot CPU scheduling issues.

How strict is cosheduling in ESX 3 and what's the best way to troubleshoot vCPU scheduling issues?

Cheers,

Tim

Upgrading from 3.0.0

Yunthor — Tue, 03 Nov 2009 22:47:05 GMT

Good morning,

I have ESX 3.0.0 right now and have looked on the patch page for how to get it to 3.0.3. I cannot find anything. When I search for how to upgrade 3.0.0, I see things like "It is easy. It is just a patch." Where can I obtain the patch to get to 3.0.3? Do I need to go 3.0.0>1>2>3 and apply all patches as I go?

Thanks.

Different ESX builds in the same host

romierome — Tue, 03 Nov 2009 19:23:18 GMT

I will be adding 2 ESX 3.5 U4 hosts to a cluster that is currently running ESX 3.5 U2. All hardware is identical. The plan is to update all to the same level soon therafter. Will this cause any major issues regarding vmware tools, drs, vmotion etc...........

(hpmgmt) hp-OpenIPMI will not uninstall

sgstuart — Fri, 30 Oct 2009 00:53:58 GMT

Hi All,

I am hitting my head against the wall way too long now, and I am asking for help. 1 and only 1 of our many ESX boxes is having this problem. It (they all are) a 3.5.0 update 4 server. I have not been able to install hpmgmt 8.2, because it says there are some already installed. rpm and --uninstalls show that there are 2 installed a 7.8 version and a 7.9 version. When trying to uninstall using rpm -e hp-OpenIPMI-7.9.0-110.vmware30 it says that

Upgrades are not permitted for the hp-OpenIPMI package.

Please remove the package using the command: rpm -e hp-OpenIPMI

error: %prerun(hp-OpenIPMI-7.9.0-110.vmware30) scriptlet failed, exit status 1

when I run rpm -e hp-OpenIPMI by it self it has the same 3 lines after this 1 line error: "hp-OpenIPMI" specifies multiple packages so it is stuck in a recursive logic (at least not programatically )

I have stopped pegasus and I do not have an hpasm to stop. I have not found anything else helpful.

Thanks,
Steven Stuart

High Performance computing on ESX 3.5 U3

rabih_00 — Fri, 30 Oct 2009 00:02:41 GMT

Hello,

I am looking to build a compute farm that consist of 75 VMs. those VMs will be running mostly on Windows 2003 Std. 2 vcpu. 2 GB RAm and 150GB HDD.

The customer has been very specific that the CPUs on those 75 Vms will all spike at the same time, and will take 80% of the CPU.(which I am a little skeptical about), but nevertheless, I am creating the VMs now for his testing, so I'd like to know if anybody has done any high performance computing like that before or if anybody has any idea what are the best practises in this case.

I am running ESX 3.5 U4 with 4 x opteron Quad core 2.9 GHz with 128 GB each, on NFS for Netapp 6070. the networking is currently going through a 2 GB trunked pipe, eventually going up to 10 Gb.

Thanks for any advices or ideas.

NFS disk growth

seangar — Thu, 29 Oct 2009 19:26:10 GMT

I have 1 cluster of 4 servers (dell 1950's) running 3.0.2 and a NFS central VOL. We run our own script which quieces the VM's and SNAPs them via NetApp. We disabled the script last week because it was generating delta files for the VM thus causing rapid disk growth. Sometimes this happens and we just roll the deltas back in and reboot the offending guest (or host). Sometimes just restarting the mgmt and VPXA services fixes the issue.

I have deleted all the Delta files and some zdump files that were present. I also took the opportunity to clean up the VOL from a few unregistered VMs and empty folders from other admin's in the system.

Issue is I am still seeing disk growth of 10 GB a day min.

Question 1... once you allocate a disk to a guest does allocate the entire amount so you will not see growth ? Or will it grow as the disk fills up ?

I am wondering if this is what I am seeing.

The server could not interpret the client's request

vinoji2005 — Fri, 05 Jun 2009 12:40:00 GMT

My VI Client cannot connect to virtual centre , even all VM services is running and pingable .it just pop up with error message " The server could not interpret the client's request"

I have using Antivirus McAFee 8.5 and McAfee services are also not stopped. Restart the VI Client services and SQL services but same error.

Thanks,

Vinoth.S

VMotion IP address settings question

Maelito77 — Mon, 26 Oct 2009 11:29:10 GMT

Hello

When setting up a VMNic for VMotion, can I use another IP Address Class instead of the one used on the Service Console?

For example I use 10.0.1.1 for the Service Console can I use 192.168.1.1 for the VMotion VMNic

I am using ESX 3.5 U4

Thanks, maelito

License Server using wrong IP address

matt_uog — Tue, 13 Mar 2007 15:09:02 GMT

Hi,

I've installed the License Server (from the Virtual Infrastructure v3.0 installation media) on a server that has 3 network interfaces. How can I specify which ethernet address and ip address that the license server starts up on? I've gone into the VMware License Server Tools and it lists the hostid settings, but I cannot change any of them...

Thanks,
Matt

VMOTION error

blvsupport — Wed, 28 Oct 2009 20:32:10 GMT

Hi im having problem with vmotion and i can't find anything on that error

First my host don't support Vmware EVC

ESX2 = Intel (R) Xeon (TM) CPU 2.80GHz - IBM HS20 8832L1X

ESX3 = Intel (R) Xeon (TM) CPU 3.80GHz - IBM HS20 8843E9U

ESX4 = Intel (R) Xeon (TM) CPU 2.80GHz - IBM HS20 8832L1X

I applied that mask to my vm

x000:0x00:00x0:0x00:xxx0:0x0x:xxxx:xx01
When i tried to vmotion from esx 2 to esx 3 its working fine. But if i tried to vmotion from esx2 to esx4 i have this error

A general system error occured: The product version of the destination host does not support one or more cpu feature currently in use by the virtual machine. Such features from CPUID level 0x1 register 'ecx' are indicated with a '1' bit: x000:0000:x00x:x000:01x0:01x0:000x:000x

Can anyone please help me

Thanks !

Adding Additional RDM's to MSCS Cluster

MikePoe — Thu, 22 Oct 2009 00:22:52 GMT

Evening all,

Not sure if anyone seen's this issue but....Trying to add some additional RDM's to a two node Active/Passive Windows W2K3 Cluster spread across two ESX 3.02 hosts, each using local storage for VM's except for the RDM's. Once the RDM is added to the first VM, it is no longer able to be added from the second. LUN's are properly visible to both hosts, Clariion FC attached storage, two Qlogic 2432 HBA's in each. For example, there are 7 LUN's visible to both hosts; after adding the first RDM, the second VM then only sees six. If there's a different way to have the Windows cluster nodes see the same volume, then please advise, as I have found no documentation other than the initial VM Clustering stuff, which deals with initial setup only.

For troubleshooting, tried shutting down the second VM and adding, no luck. Adding the RDM with the usual physical compatibility mode for MSCS shared volumes. This is all without going any further than the initial VM configuration, so no logging into the first Windows node to configure disks, etc had taken place. Thanks much for any ideas.

VM shutdown timeout when out of network

xybal — Wed, 28 Oct 2009 08:35:57 GMT

Hi,

We have an ESX 3.02 cluster. Last week our router crashed and after several minutes all our VM shutdowned (all physical nodes are linked on this router).

What I would like to know is if we can parameter a timeout to shutdown our VM (after 1 hour we repaired our router).

Applying a greater timeout we could avoid to restart all our VM (we don't have HA on because of policies of the company).

Is anyone know how and where is configured a such timeout ?

Thx very much

ESX 3.02 upgrade to 3.5 with RDM

Rohail2004 — Fri, 23 Oct 2009 18:10:42 GMT

I m in the process of upgrading from 3.02 to 3.5, but I have some VM's which has physical RDM attached to it.. am I going to run into any issue with RDM if I upgrade to 3.5? thanks.

RDM VMotion

Rohail2004 — Mon, 26 Oct 2009 15:08:32 GMT

I have a physical RDM attached to couple of VM's. Can I VMotion them to a diff host while upgrade the other w/o breaking anything? I just wanted to check before I start VMotion a VM which has RDM attached to it.

cpqacuxe & SUN disk Web access.

mfj11107 — Mon, 26 Oct 2009 11:37:31 GMT

Hello!,

I try to explicate this with my poor english....(patience friends :))

I have a trouble.

When my operating system "running" with ESX Server 3.0.0....and "cpqacuxe" installed, I can see the SUN disk with IE (Web, port 2301).

But my problem start with upgrade ESX Server to 3.5.0....then, i can,t see the disk on Web, but i can operate with it on terminal sesion.

The conexion is with two fibre targets (qlogic).

Everybody Knows how can i do? (concrete version of cpqacuxe¿?....i don´t know)

Infinite thanks!

Reuse of RDM drive in another VM

Ramji — Mon, 26 Oct 2009 07:49:59 GMT

hai

Can a RDM drive maped to one VM be used in another VM as a seperate drive(along with data ) if the first machine crashes.

Regards

R.Ramji

BIOS and Firmware Upgrades

msemon1 — Fri, 23 Oct 2009 13:47:02 GMT

Am I wrong to assume that no firmware and BIOS updates are needed for my blade servers since this is part of the ESX updates?

Mike

ESX 3.02 to 3.5 upgrade question

Rohail2004 — Thu, 22 Oct 2009 17:58:24 GMT

I am going to upgrade from ESX 3.02 to ESX 3.5, will shut down all the vms, but my question is should i put the host in "maintenance mode" before shutting down for an upgrade?

DNS question

Rohail2004 — Fri, 23 Oct 2009 13:23:09 GMT

One of the DNS address is changing. I am going to update those changes on the ESX servers, but will I need to update them on VM's as well?

Converter - How does it work?

Maelito77 — Fri, 23 Oct 2009 17:22:37 GMT

Hello

I have only used the Converter for P2V before so this is my question:

I am planning to use the Converter to expand the drives on a server (SQL box) and at the same time to move this server from ESX 3.0.1 to ESX 3.5 U4

Now will the virtual machine be copied from ESX 3.0.1 to ESX 3.5 U4 and have the new disk sizes on the new ESX 3.5U4 server and leave the original virtual machine on the ESX 3.0.1 server or will the Converter delete the virtual machine on the ESX 3.0.1 server and then move it to the new host ESX3.5U4 with the new disk sizes?

Thanks, Maelito

SCCM in VMware

Andy Welcomer — Fri, 23 Oct 2009 19:54:12 GMT

Hello everyeone,

Anyone running SCCM in VMware? How does it perform?

Thanks

VLAN question

Rohail2004 — Fri, 23 Oct 2009 15:07:06 GMT

how can I check which VLAN is accessible for a particluar ESX host? is there any command which will give me a list of all the VLAN's a host can access?

ESX 3.0.2 ftPerl high cpu usage

tomk3534 — Fri, 18 Jul 2008 14:18:45 GMT

Had a problem yesterday where one cpu (cpu 0) on an ESX Host was piked at 95 - 100%. Ran top and found that ftPerl was using 79-80% cpu. Thought it was something on a VM but all the VMs were using average cpu. Found something on the internet indicating it was HA. Ran a "Reconfigure HA" on the problem host and the process ended. The host then returned to normal. Is this a known issue?

Need documentation on registering a vm to a host

enigma26 — Fri, 23 Oct 2009 00:22:10 GMT

We are testing our Disaster Recovery site and part of it is restoring a vm to a ESX 3.5 host.

The restore completed but when connecting to the host via a vi-client we see that the vm is not recognized.

Can anyone tell me how a vm is registered to a Host?

Extend ESX OS partition size ?

JB_Montreal — Mon, 03 Mar 2008 21:08:13 GMT

Hello,

I need to increase the partition size of an ESX installation, unfortunately the rest of the space available on this partition has been used to create a datastore.
Ex: ESX os : 5 GB, Datastore : 120GB

I guess I will have to delete the datastore ? but I am still wondering if it's possible to increase the ESX os partition size ?

Thanks for your help

Cannot see lun from iscsi target on nas

uilli — Thu, 22 Oct 2009 16:48:40 GMT

Hi,
I have 2 thecus n5200pro, one currently has 2 iscsi volumes that I can see in esx.
I'm trying to add another iSCSI volume that I created on the other nas. I can see the target in storage adapters, but when I try to add the lun in the add storage menu, nothing comes up.
could the problem be that the path of the new iscsi target is the same one as the other target (as shown in the picture)
http://i439.photobucket.com/albums/qq115/uilli/iscsi.jpg

Download ESX Server 3.0.1?

mfj11107 — Thu, 22 Oct 2009 08:37:14 GMT

Hello,

I don,t find the complete software to download (ISO).

Everybody knows where is it? (link)

Thanks!

Slow network copy between P2V'd VMs on same host

jpreou — Thu, 11 Sep 2008 01:30:05 GMT

We've recently installed an HP C3000 chassis with three BL460c blades each running ESX 3.5 (Foundation, updated to just prior to 'Update2') and backending to an HP MSA2012fc SAN. The blade chassis has Gb2E ethernet switches which connect to a Cisco 3750 core switch. What we have noted is that CPU utilization on the File/Printer server (which was P2V'd using VMware Converter) is pegged during network activity and network file transfer performance is slower than expected. Looking at historical logs we can easily see the CPU peaks from 8am to 6pm when users access the server. It did not exhibit this same behaviour when it was a physical server. We're seeing 90%+ CPU during business hours and virtually nothing outside of hours. Even after a full cold-reset of the entire environment while we re-racked the server room post initial install we still saw high CPU, though not quite up to the 90% levels (around 45%-60% now). Performing some simple 'real world' diagnostics using file copy tests we noted the following:-

Copying a 370MB file between freshly built VMs is just fine, regardless of which host they are on.
Copying the same file between P2V'd VMs on seperate hosts is also just fine.
Copying the same file between P2V'd VMs on the same host (i.e. not even touching the external network) is slow and pegs the CPU.
I rolled out two new servers from template (fresh builts) and copied the same file between them (for each host, using an "Internal Only" network with no uplinks). All good.

By slow, I mean that normally the 370MB file takes around 10-15 seconds to copy between VMs, but in scenario 3 it takes around 3½ minutes. It only seems to be between P2V'd machines, and only when the machines are on the same ESX host. In each case the CPU pegs to 100% during the file copy. We have checked this on other ESX servers at other customers and don't see the same behaviour there.

When doing the P2V we went through all the 'normal' post-cleanup tasks. Took the HAL back to single proc (for 1vCPU), removed hidden and non-present devices, uninstalled all software, utilities, drivers that were not required (like all the HP stuff), installed VMware Tools, etc. All the network cards, switches, interfaces, etc are all set to auto-negotiate and are Gbit and I have confirmed that everything is running at full speed and full duplex. Network cards in VMs are using the Flex driver installed with Tools. In theory, though, network copies between VMs on the same host shouldn't even touch the physical network.

Anyone got any ideas for me before I call VMware?

HeartbeatStatus contantly being updated and guest crashing

Stu_McHugh — Wed, 21 Oct 2009 09:35:14 GMT

I have had a vm crash a few times now and trying to look into why it happens. It could be a simple Windows error but I'm thinking it more to do with ESX.

I'm running ESX 3.0.2 with two guests and the troublesome one being a Windows 2003 server running SQL 2005. I've looked at the hostd logs and there are nurmerous errors complaining about the heartbeatstatus. The Vmware tools are up to date.

It states 'Updating current heartbeatStaus: 3" and then "oldHeartbeatStatus = 1 newHeartbeatStatus = 3"

Does anyone know what this means or can anyone offer any adivise?

system configuration not saved during last shut down error on service console

Ravi1987 — Fri, 07 Aug 2009 14:14:45 GMT

hi ,

i m getting this error msg on service console

system configuration not saved during last shut down error on service console

but when i tried to run certain command s on troubleshoot mode as per the vmware document esxcfg-boot -b, esxcfg-boot -p i got an error message like

/usr/bin/perl bad interprator permission denied

VMware ESX DRS cluster Question ?

naveenvm — Mon, 12 Oct 2009 15:54:47 GMT

Hi,

Just got a new Question being asked to me about VMware DRS. Need answers from you guys.

What will happen in VMware ESX DRS cluster if all the nodes ESX servers are running on full utilization of resources. Will VMware DRS will migrate a VM (which is not getting amount of resources it needs/ configured) to another base ESX?

According to doc - http://www.vmware.com/pdf/vi3_35/esx_3/r35u2/vi3_35_25_u2_resource_mgmt.pdf, DRS vmotion a VM on the basis of migration threshold setting being configured and considers a vm for migrating if it is not getting required resources.

NUTZ
VCP 3.5
(Preparing for VCP 4)

VM failure - how can we view the VM log and troubleshoot this

jcck20007 — Mon, 19 Oct 2009 15:59:26 GMT

We are using ESX 3.01 build 32039

we have a particular VM rebooted itself twice in the last three days and left a message in the Events

(date and time), Message on (the VM name) on (host IP) in (Data center name) *** Vmware ESX Server internal monitor error***

vcpu-0: ASSERT Vmcore/vmm32/plaform/common/platform,c:34 bugNr=17332

Please report this problem by selecting menu item Help > VMware on the web > Request Support or by Going to the web page (follow by a LONG URL)

if the problem is repeatable, please set 'Use Debug Monitor' to Yes in the 'Misc' of the Configure Virtual Machine web page, Then reproduce the incident and file it according to the instructions

We will responsed on the basis of your support entitlement

we appreciated your feedback

---the Vmware ESX server team

can you help on this ?

vmnic question

Rohail2004 — Mon, 19 Oct 2009 17:37:49 GMT

I have 6 vmnics assigned to my vswitch1 which is basically has 30 VMs running. When I go to performance tab under network, so couple of nics are not being in used. but some of them do have Network Data Receive Rate, and some of them not. Why is that? how ESX determines to use vmnics? thanks.

"Cannot create temporary redo log directory" when performing VCB operation with BackupExec

PhilMarsden — Fri, 14 Mar 2008 13:56:27 GMT

I'm using VCB with BackupExec but when I run the pre-backup job, it fails.

The logs it produces contains the following

~~2008-03-14 13:43:45.482 'vcbMounter' 3792 warning~~ Could not update cache.
~~2008-03-14 13:43:49.607 'vcbMounter' 3792 error~~ Error: Error while opening disk vpxa-nfc://47cffc9b-20495446-13de-001e4f25621d Live_VCoyote/Live_VCoyote.vmdk@esx2.zoo.lan:902!52 f8 d5 a8 95 c7 d7 b8-63 a4 33 86 76 9e 56 43: A virtual disk could not be opened. -- Cannot open disk file: Error : Cannot create temporary redo log directory.
Unable to check for the existence of an old redo log or failure to choose a filename for a new redo log for disk 'vpxa-nfc://47cffc9b-20495446-13de-001e4f25621d Live_VCoyote/Live_VCoyote.vmdk@esx2.zoo.lan:902!52 f8 d5 a8 95 c7 d7 b8-63 a4 33 86 76 9e 56 43'.
Failed to configure disk scsi0:0.
~~2008-03-14 13:43:49.607 'vcbMounter' 3792 error~~ An error occurred, cleaning up...

We're running VI with ESX 3.5 Servers having SAS drives i.e. no SANs here

When I run "vcbMounter.exe -h <server> -u root -p <pw> -a name:<name> -r e:\vcb -t fullvm -m nbd" it all works fine so before delving into the BackupExec scripts thought I'd see if anyone knows what a "temporary redo log directory" is or has had a similar problem

Thanks in advance for any replies
Phil

upgrade question

Rohail2004 — Mon, 19 Oct 2009 15:01:21 GMT

I am in the process of upgrading ESX 3.0.2 to ESX 3.5 update 3. My VM's are on the SAN. Do I need to unplug the fibers? or Can I just go ahead and upgrade it while the cables attached? if I do that so will I run into any issue? thanks.

Using VCB to backup mapped drives and iSCSI drives

jojo2000 — Mon, 19 Oct 2009 13:49:16 GMT

We're wanting to use VCB to backup drives that are mapped to a server and drives presented via iSCSI. So far we've been successful in backing up the actual VM itself with VCB and any drives presented as VMDKs but we can't seem to get it to recognize the mapped drives or iSCSI drives.

unable to remove orphaned and inaccessible vm from inventory.

jwnchoate — Tue, 12 May 2009 02:20:51 GMT

Had a crash during an svmotion, vm orphaned and tried to readd to inventory but no luck. I have since restored the vm from a san snapshot and deleted all the original files and it now sits in a whole new folder but I cannot remove the 2 infentory items I tried to readd it after the intial failure.

I have rebooted the server, I have restarted mgmt-vmware, vmware-vmkauthd, and vmware-vpxa. -- several times now.

vmware-cmd -l on host does not list any references to the ghosted vm. cannot remove from vclient

vitoolkit (powershell) will list the 2 vms,

get-vm -Name vmname ---- produces the name of the vm object.

but I cannot:

get-vm -Name vmname | remove-vm -- doesnt work because I get this error message..."Remove-VM : 5/11/2009 9:05:02 PM Remove-VM A general system error occurred: You must power off the virtual machine and complete the migration before invoking this operation."

nothing I have been trying gets me to remove the orphan.

Stop: 0x0000007B Inaccessible_boot_device Error

microproc — Sun, 19 Jul 2009 11:41:52 GMT

I have converted a server having windows 2000 adv server with sp4 (Dell 8450 series with 4 processors). I used Vmware converter 4.0 to convert in to VM. Earlier it failed so many times when i choose preservce & SCSI options. It worked it successfully converted into VM when i choose IDE. but ran only in vmware server 2.0. As IDE is not supported in ESX 4.0. Now we are buying license for Vsphere and want this physical machien (dell 8450) into ESX 4.0. I tried converted the machine many times but when it reaches to 97%, it fails on reconfiguration all the time. so I removed the reconfiguration option before converting & converted the files in three different ways. preserve, scsi & IDE. Now when i moved in the datastore and configured with VM one by one. (IDE Didnt work since start). the other two Files, failes at the below error all the time.

Stop: 0x0000007B Inaccessible_boot_device Error

It starts well windows 2000 page appears after the bar comes in the middle this error appears. I have tried all the methods to run this VM like converting it Bus & LSI controllers . ESX 4 gives four option BSU, LSI , Para and the fourth i dont remember right now. I tried all 4 ways chaning to make it run but all the time same error appears. I also tried converted the Vmdk files with vmkfstools -i option. But still things didnt work. I dont know what should i do. Can anyone help. For your reference, I am pasting vmx for one of the vmx files below. Appreciate if somebody tells me step by step or atleast guide new way to make this file work.

vmx file :

#!/usr/bin/vmware
.encoding = "UTF-8"
config.version = "8"
virtualHW.version = "7"
pciBridge0.present = "TRUE"
pciBridge4.present = "TRUE"
pciBridge4.virtualDev = "pcieRootPort"
pciBridge4.functions = "8"
pciBridge5.present = "TRUE"
pciBridge5.virtualDev = "pcieRootPort"
pciBridge5.functions = "8"
pciBridge6.present = "TRUE"
pciBridge6.virtualDev = "pcieRootPort"
pciBridge6.functions = "8"
pciBridge7.present = "TRUE"
pciBridge7.virtualDev = "pcieRootPort"
pciBridge7.functions = "8"
vmci0.present = "TRUE"
nvram = "Buslogic.nvram"
deploymentPlatform = "windows"
virtualHW.productCompatibility = "hosted"
unity.customColor = "|23C0C0C0"
tools.upgrade.policy = "useGlobal"
powerType.powerOff = "soft"
powerType.powerOn = "default"
powerType.suspend = "hard"
powerType.reset = "soft"

displayName = "Buslogic"
extendedConfigFile = "Buslogic.vmxf"
floppy0.present = "TRUE"

numvcpus = "2"
scsi0.present = "TRUE"

scsi0.sharedBus = "none"
memsize = "1024"
scsi0:0.present = "TRUE"
scsi0:0.fileName = "Buslogic.vmdk"
scsi0:0.deviceType = "scsi-hardDisk"
scsi0:1.present = "TRUE"
scsi0:1.fileName = "Buslogic_1.vmdk"
scsi0:1.deviceType = "scsi-hardDisk"
ide0:0.present = "TRUE"
ide0:0.clientDevice = "TRUE"
ide0:0.deviceType = "cdrom-raw"
ide0:0.startConnected = "FALSE"
floppy0.startConnected = "FALSE"
floppy0.clientDevice = "TRUE"
ethernet0.present = "TRUE"
ethernet0.wakeOnPcktRcv = "FALSE"
ethernet0.networkName = "VM Network"
ethernet0.addressType = "generated"
serial0.present = "TRUE"
serial0.yieldOnMsrRead = "TRUE"
serial0.fileName = "/dev/ttyS0"
serial1.present = "TRUE"
serial1.yieldOnMsrRead = "TRUE"
serial1.fileName = "/dev/ttyS1"
guestOS = "win2000advserv"
uuid.location = "56 4d 70 3b a9 4a a4 58-30 b1 2e 46 87 30 6c d4"
uuid.bios = "56 4d 70 3b a9 4a a4 58-30 b1 2e 46 87 30 6c d4"
vc.uuid = "52 2e 02 4b ca fc e0 b9-13 17 bf 77 6d 59 f6 ed"
sched.cpu.affinity = "all"
sched.mem.affinity = "all"

ethernet0.generatedAddress = "00:0c:29:30:6c:d4"
cleanShutdown = "FALSE"
replay.supported = "FALSE"
sched.swap.derivedName = "/vmfs/volumes/4a4c71d8-3013156c-1d94-001b7802d5f6/Buslogic/Buslogic-fe45f1d4.vswp"
scsi0:0.redo = ""
scsi0:1.redo = ""
vmotion.checkpointFBSize = "4194304"
pciBridge0.pciSlotNumber = "17"
pciBridge4.pciSlotNumber = "21"
pciBridge5.pciSlotNumber = "22"
pciBridge6.pciSlotNumber = "23"
pciBridge7.pciSlotNumber = "24"
scsi0.pciSlotNumber = "16"
ethernet0.pciSlotNumber = "32"
vmci0.pciSlotNumber = "33"
ethernet0.generatedAddressOffset = "0"
vmci0.id = "-2026869548"
hostCPUID.0 = "0000000a756e65476c65746e49656e69"
guestCPUID.0 = "0000000a756e65476c65746e49656e69"
userCPUID.0 = "0000000a756e65476c65746e49656e69"
hostCPUID.1 = "000006f6000208000004e3bdbfebfbff"
guestCPUID.1 = "000006f600010800800002010febfbff"
userCPUID.1 = "000006f6000208000004e3bdbfebfbff"
hostCPUID.80000001 = "00000000000000000000000120000800"
guestCPUID.80000001 = "00000000000000000000000000000800"
userCPUID.80000001 = "00000000000000000000000120000800"
evcCompatibilityMode = "FALSE"

problems opening a port in the firewall in ESX Server 3.0.2

SercombeC — Wed, 14 Oct 2009 18:28:50 GMT

Hello all...

I´m having problems opening a port in the esx Server 3.0.2

I want to install the CA ARCserve Backup agent that works on ports 6050 and 6051.

Port 6051 works fine. I can do a telnet to this ports and it work, but not the 6050.

I did this...

~~root@localhost root~~# esxcfg-firewall --openPort 5060,tcp,in,"BAB"

~~root@localhost root~~# esxcfg-firewall --openPort 5060,tcp,out,"BAB" (to open the port)

~~root@localhost root~~# /etc/init.d/firewall restart (To restart the firewall)

And the status is:

Opened ports:
BAB : port 6050 tcp.in tcp.out
BAB : port 6051 tcp.in tcp.out

But when I want to do a telnet to the port 6050....

C:\>telnet 10.128.24.101 6050
Conectándose a 10.128.24.101...No se puede abrir la conexión al host, en puerto 6050: Error en la conexión

Could you please help me??

Thanks

Workaround for "Unable to get Console path for Mount"

Svedja — Mon, 15 Sep 2008 09:54:48 GMT

Error message:
Error during the configuration of the host: Unable to get Console path for Mount

Envirovment : ESX 3.5 u2 with NFS datastore
We are in the process of moving data between datastores.
I noticed that ESX doesn't behave as expected.

Scenario:
We have a NFS mount called ISO on storage "NFS1"
I rename the storage to ISO_old
I try to create a new storage on "NFS2"
The ESX refuses with the error above.

Workaround:
Instead of creating new storage "ISO" create it with name "ISO_NEW".
In ESX rename "ISO_NEW" to "ISO".

As you see, it isn't exactly what you would expect.

esx 3.0 : web-ui or not web-ui

zack2k9 — Thu, 15 Oct 2009 11:11:08 GMT

Hi,

I need to manage a pool of virtual machines provided via "VMware esx server 3"
but I'm quite confuse about the way should I choose to connect to the ESX server.

I read that I have to download and install the "VMware Infrastructure Client" but
I'm running a linux system and the VMIC is built in a windows-only version ..

Surfing via https the web-interface offered by the ESX server, I found this:

VMware Infrastructure Web Access

VMware Infrastructure Web Access streamlines remote desktop deployment by
allowing you to organize and share virtual machines using ordinary web
browser URLs.
* Log in to Web Access

Is it an alternative way to access my virtual machine's pool?
I remember that I already used this way accessing to VMware-server-2.0, the url
to point to also looks like the same : "https://ip/ui".

I really don't want to install an xp-vm on my machine just only to run the VMware
esx console :-\...

any ideas?

Thank you in advance,
Zack

Copy image to replicate existing image

vignesh4 — Thu, 15 Oct 2009 06:30:29 GMT

i have taken a image of a system, now i want to replicate the same image several times.

i could not find any option on VI client to do so...

Please help me on this.

VMNIX: Warning: VMDev: 755: Access denied repeated error in vmkwarning log

phowarth — Thu, 15 Oct 2009 15:14:38 GMT

I'm getting this message over and over in the vmkwarning log. Anybody seen this?

Pete

Oracle / Windows 200x best configuration

Mac506 — Thu, 15 Oct 2009 14:43:27 GMT

I have been asked to look into updating a Oracle instance on a VM.

What are some best configurations for the Oracle.

The host is a 16GB RAM with a 3.8 Duel CPU system with a SAN Storage.

What would the recommendations for Maximum Guests sharing the host to keep the optimal configuration.

Thanks

Move VC database, SQL Express to SQL 2005?

HendersonD — Tue, 04 Mar 2008 20:24:02 GMT

We have Virtual Center 2.5 using a SQL Express 2005 database installed on the same machine. I now have a separate SQL 2005 server so I would like to move the Virtual Center database to it. Are these the basic steps:

1. Stop Virtual Center service.
2. Backup current SQL Express 2005 database. This can be done using Microsoft SQL Server Management Studio Express which I have installed on the Virtual Center server
3. Restore the database on my SQL 2005 server using Microsoft SQL Server Management Studio
4. Update ODBC connection on VC server with new SQL server name
5. Start Virtual Center service

Am I missing anythng? How is the authentication handled between the Virtual Center server and SQL? Do I need the SQL Native Client installed on the Virtual Center server?

When I look at the databases being stored in SQL Server Express 2005 I see two, VIM_UMDB and VIM_VCDB, do I move them both? This same server is also our license server

HP MSA 20

Ritmo2k — Fri, 07 Mar 2008 21:01:20 GMT

Anyone using this in production that can shed any light on what type of real world capacity/load this chassis can handle? Given it is only SATA 150, I wonder about how far that scale.

Thanks for any insight!

vCpu on DELL R900

Rohail2004 — Wed, 14 Oct 2009 18:10:43 GMT

I have two DELL R900 servers with 24CPU, 6 cores, 128GB RAM.. my quesiton is the max vCpus I can have per host is 128? correct? ESX 3.5...

Extending a non-boot volume on VI3/VM Guest Windows 2003 SP2 Enterprise

r.engel — Wed, 14 Oct 2009 02:57:42 GMT

Guys

We have a requirement to extend a non-boot volume of a VM from 100GB to 200GB (D:)

The easiest method for doing this would be to run the VM through Vmware Converter (latest version) and extend the D: volume from 100GB to 200GB, and place it onto a different Datastore with more space.

Ultimately, we would be creating a clone of the source with the new VM having the extended disk space we need and then blow away the original once the clone target is confirmed.

Interested to hear what other methods you guys have used & that is rock-solid.

(Environment is VI 3.0.3, VM Guest is Windows 2003 SP2 Enterprise, with two volumes C: 18GB, D: 100GB, to be extended to 200GB).

Export all the host, VM and LUN info

Rohail2004 — Wed, 14 Oct 2009 14:27:55 GMT

Is there a way to export all the Host, VM's and LUN location into spreadsheet? I thought to check with you guys, before I do it manually. thanks.

no network after adding third quad port ethernet card

ImmyM — Wed, 14 Oct 2009 09:39:57 GMT

Hi,

I have ESX 3.5 build 130756. I added a third Intel Quad port card to my server (Dell PE2950) last night. But the network didnt come up at all on the box, i thought it was maybe interrupts or something like that so i removed the card and rebooted. But still i'm getting the problem. Has anyone any ideas?

ta

Predefine Message Not Found

MALIK ADEEL IMTIAZ — Wed, 14 Oct 2009 08:24:07 GMT

Dear Sir / Madam,

I just need your expert opinion regarding, possibly a CITRIX connection issue when we connect with our application. Actually, in the morning there was no issue while connecting through CITRIX, but in noon, users were unable to connect and it was showing the attached message. Afterwards, again, users were connected successfully, but after 2-3 hrs, again the same issue occurred and till now its not yet resolved. Can you please share your thoughts with us in this regard.

My Citrix Server is on ESX 3.0

Screen shot is attached for your kind reference.

Your response would be of help in this regard.

Malik Adeel Imtiaz
Principle System Engineer
NetSol Financial Suite
NetSol Technologies
Lahore Cantt Pakistan
54792

FAILED: Unable to obtain the IP address of the helper virtual machine

xybal — Tue, 17 Mar 2009 10:00:22 GMT

Hi,

I've got this message when I use the converter V4. What does it means exactly ? and above all how to work around this ?

thx

VICenter V2P Suggestion?

enigma26 — Fri, 09 Oct 2009 22:20:21 GMT

Hello,

I am looking to move VICenter from a virtual to a physical server.

In your opinion, would it be easier to start over and install VICenter on a physical server or should I convert my VICenter already on a virtual to a physical?

Why?

Thanks in advance!

p2v to esx convert

panos83 — Tue, 13 Oct 2009 14:23:39 GMT

Hello.I have VMware Converter 3.0.0 build 39557 and Virtual Infrastructure Client version 2.0.1 build 33643 and when i try to import a physical server to esx cannot have that option.I can only import to stand alone vmware workstation.Am i doing something wrong?Any help appreciated.Thank you.My esx are 3.0.1

SNMP MIBS ESX Server

alexaaaaaaaa — Tue, 13 Oct 2009 10:14:09 GMT

Hi all!

I use ESX 3.02 and planned to upgrade to Vsphere.

I want to monitore ESX health with SNMP now in 3.02 and later in 4.0.

I can see that ESX has a MIB. I am not interested in traps SNMP sent buy alarms.

I want to query ESX or Vcenter MIB to know CPU/memory/network usage and I/O disk?

Is it possible in 3.02 and 4.0?

Thanks

Alexa

Networking in ESX

Guv — Mon, 12 Oct 2009 11:48:56 GMT

I am using the service console to setup a new vswitch and port group and then add an additional service console, we have one already on the ESX server. I am using the esxcfg command, and have setup a new vswitch and portgroup, but what command do you use to create a service console on this new vswitch. I have checked docs and links and cannot find a command that works, can anyone please assist:

Also if I change the IP address of the of the main service console vswif0, does that mean the IP address of the ESX server has changed to this IP, and we use this IP to ping th server and also in the ifcfg-eth0 in linux of the esx server has also changed. That means we only change the default gateway on the linux box, if the new IP is in a different subnet.

unable to NFS file system

virtuon — Thu, 08 Oct 2009 22:47:12 GMT

Hi All ,

i am facing a really weired problem , i am using ESX 3.5 server and i am trying to mount NAS file system on it . I have tried almost all possible solution 1

1. adding exception in security profile via VI

2. adding exception in Firewall of remote machine

3. Mapping group and passwd files with admins

4. i tried vmkping also it works infact if i will try it it shows

~~root@host1 root~~# esxcfg-nas -l
~~root@host1 root~~# esxcfg-nas -a -o 192.168.0.13 -s Test test
Connecting to NAS volume: test
test created and connected.
~~root@host1 root~~# esxcfg-nas -l
Error performing operation: Cannot open volume: /vmfs/volumes/8e3eaa08-9a4c1a26
~~root@host1 root~~# esxcfg-nas -l
test is Test from 192.168.0.13 mounted

But whenever i try to create NFS data store it fails showing message Error during configuration of host : cannot open volume /vmfs/XXx . also it does not show mounted in VI .

please help me

UMDS is redownloading all host updates

MUCHAJ — Thu, 07 May 2009 02:39:29 GMT

Hi there,

I am hoping someone might have experienced or knows why UMDS might be downloading all host updates every time I run "vmware-umds.exe -D"

Its a pain because it takes ages to download them and it keeps blowing my internet download limit!

The PC is a Dell workstation with Windows XP SP3. It is directly connected to the internet (no proxy etc) and I have installed the latest release of UMDS from the vCentre 2.5 update 4 download. I am using the local install of SQL Express 2005.

If anyone can offer some suggestions of what to look for it would be very much appreciated.

Thanks

Failed Snapshot removal

VirtualRed — Tue, 06 Oct 2009 13:08:11 GMT

I am experiencing issues attempting to remove snapshots from some of our virtual machines. All of the virtual machines involved are SQL servers.

I am trying to backup all of our VM's with a 3rd party product. The virtual machines in question back up okay but then the snapshot removal process fails. This leaves the VM in a completely unresponsive state and I am unable to shut down or remove the snapshot within the VI client. At this point I have been finding the process id and killing it from the console.

In addition I have tried to create a snapshot manually and remove it with the same result. The snapshot removal process gets to around 95% and then just remains there hanging.

We are running ESX 3.0.2 and VC 2.5.0

Any help or advice would be much appreciated

Workaround USB over IP

heynem — Thu, 17 Jan 2008 08:52:10 GMT

Hi everybody,

I hope somebody can help me here. We need to "install" an ISDN Modem via USB to an ESX Server. During the fact that ESX does not support USB we have

purchased an Hardware USB over IP an set it up in the network with an IP. Everything looks fine up to here. Unfortunaly I have no idea what the next steps

are . We want to use a Faxsoftware (Tobit) on a virtuell machine. Where do I need to install the Software (Tobit and Fritzcard) ??

thank you in advance for your help

cheers

Michael

Windows 2003 64bit version

Rohail2004 — Thu, 08 Oct 2009 15:46:59 GMT

ESX 3.02 does not support Windows 2003 64 bit version?

SNMP config

Rohail2004 — Wed, 07 Oct 2009 22:25:19 GMT

how can i setup a ESX 3.5 host with SNMP? where is the config info?

Boot configuration

backpedal — Thu, 08 Oct 2009 03:56:16 GMT

Hi, can someone tell me the kernel execution config that is executed during ESX4 booting. For example, Citrix uses :

title Citrix Xenserver 5.5.0

root (hd1,0)

kernel /boot/xen-3.3.1.gz

module /boot/vmlinuz-2.6-xen ro root=/dev/sdb1

module /boot/initrd-2.6-xen.img

Not worried if the disks might be wrong just need the generic config please.

IBM DS3400 and LUNs for ESX3.0

willymaykett — Fri, 20 Mar 2009 02:51:59 GMT

Hi all,

I will shortly be installing a DS3400 (FC front end and SAS 300GB drives in the enclosure), and I have a number of questions I hope somebody can help me with.

1. When I create the RAID 5 set, and specify the Stripe size, what shoudl I use, 16k,32K or as big as it can go?

2, I need to create a VM for a file server that will have around 1.5TB of data on it. Do I create a RAID group using 6 drives and then create 1 LUN on it, or do I create multiple LUNS on the one RAID group, and split my VMDK's across the LUNs?

3. Or do I create up to 2TB in the RAID 5 set, create one massive LUN, and then create this as a VMFS file system?

There appears to be various options, and I am not sure what is best, both from a "best practice" and from a performance issue. I am particulary interested in the backup performance of the final option.

Thanks!

Vmware Tools upgrade does not mount on Windows 2003 Guest VM

r.engel — Tue, 06 Oct 2009 23:30:13 GMT

Guys

I've been experiencing this issue for sometime now, and would like some input.

We are currently going through with upgrading our 3.0.2 update 1 ESX hosts to 3.0.3 and then to 3.5...

As we have upgraded some ESX hosts to 3.0.3 already, this requires the vmware tools to be upgraded on the Guests running on the 3.0.3 hosts..

Some of the Guests have no issues with VC -> right click properties on VM -> Upgrade/Install Vmware Tools.

Some guests have the media mounted as a CD drive and off we go.

However, some of my other guests won't display the Cd drive, I've tried to add it manually using disk manager in windows 2003, still no avail.

The Guests do not have any CD-ROM drives configured, only floppy & HDD.

Is there a way to manually install the package on the Guest? Or has anyone else experienced this issue? Do I need to configure a cd-rom first on the guest and then start the install/upgrade vmware tools process?

Also, I've noticed some guests that cannot log onto our active directory domain after the guest has been vmotioned to a host running 3.0.3 (with an older version of vmware tools, where it says 'out of date' under Vmware tools in Virtual Centre)... I've run the w32time net stop and start on the Guest which has resolved the issue with the VM not 'seeing' the domain..

Cheers

vCPU charts versus perfmon (yet...)

Padone — Wed, 07 Oct 2009 16:53:52 GMT

Hi all,

I'm in charge of administration of a dozen of Windows hosted by an ESX. Windows perf are monitored by System Center Operation Manager. Those machines were P2V, dual proc, and host an business application. I have no idea of the process used for the P2V (I'm new in the company). Those Windows used ~25% (average) for the counter % Processor Time _Total (SCOM and Perfmon).
I have no problem with those computers but my VM team came this morning and they told me I have a serious CPU issue on my VMs. They show my their vCPU graph from VI3 of my poor computers and... It shows an average utilization of 60% and sometimes up to 90%. What's wrong ? My computers seems to be ok, perfmon agrees, and application users don't encounter trouble neither.

I search some tips over the Internet and I found similar case for bad P2V (on multiprocess) process. But my VM team said, "no no newbee we follow the right process, downgrade to one process then P2V then migrate etc...". So, who is right?

Should I believe perfmon? What about the vCPU charts?

Is it a known case on ESX? If yes, is there a KB or something like that I can use to repair my Windows or show to the VM team? How can I be sure ... and not fired if I said "hey guys today Windows is right you screwed up!" Please advice...

Thanks

VMotion failed -- Failed to start migration pre-copy. Help!

Trnty — Tue, 02 Jun 2009 18:25:43 GMT

ESX v4, vCenter v4 Vmotion failed with error says: A general system error occurred: Failed to start migration pre-copy. Error 0xbad003f. Connection closed by remote host, possibly due to time out.

Have anyone see this error before? Help!

transferring install image to hard drive failure

DBofTLP — Tue, 17 Apr 2007 16:30:50 GMT

When I'm installing ESX 3.0.1 to my Dell PE 1955 blade server via gui, after having formatted the partitions the installation fails when trying to copy the install image to the hdd. I'm wondering which partition it is trying to save to and why I'm getting this error. I've partitioned my disk as such:

swap: 544MB forced primary
/ : 10GB forced primary
/boot : 100MB forced primary
/var : 4GB
vmkcore : 102MB
VMFS3 : remaining ~ 53 GB

More over, I've reburned the iso to a new CD to ensure its not the disc and it hangs at the same place.

Exact Error:
"An error occurred transferring install image to your hard drive. You are probably out of disc space."

High CPU on ESX 3.5 Host

pearlyshells — Tue, 06 Oct 2009 16:56:48 GMT

We recently discovered a faulty memory module in our ESX3.5 server (Dell PE r900/ 128gb RAM, quad-quad core). We replaced the memory and once the host was powered back up and we began to motion VMs back across, the host CPU pegged at 100% and VM CPU was likewise high.

Additionally, as the VMs migrated, one of the vNICs (have 2 vNics assigned to the vSwitch that is associated with the Service Console and vMotion), went RedX. Unfortunately, have limited physical NIC card available so had to share vmotion/SC on same switch.

The host is part of a HA/DRS cluster (3 host). I removed the bad nic and disabled the DRS to allow the vMotion to go faster (was painfully slow with it enabled). Once removed all the VMs, the host CPU dropped. So, the issue only occurs when I motion across VMs...doesn't matter if I motion 1 or many. CPU max's to 100%.

Error concerning hard disk capacity during install of ESX3.0.1

brucecmc — Tue, 24 Apr 2007 15:55:40 GMT

Hey folks...

I'm having a bit of a problem...I've successfully installed ESX 3.0.1 on Clariion Storage Array with SATA drives in a raid 5 configuration several times. As I am installing it this time, I get the following error:

"An error occurred transferring install image to your hard drive. You are probably out of disc space."

Regardless of the size of the LUN that I present, I get the same error.

Obviously, the install set knows there is a LUN available for the installation as it allows me to select the LUN that I want to use for my install drive.

I saw a post concerning creating a /tmp and /var, but neither corrected the problem (albeit, I didnt add them both, just /tmp one time, then /var another)..

Any thoughts on this would be greatful.

Bruce

Sending mail from ESX

xybal — Tue, 06 Oct 2009 11:42:16 GMT

Hi,

All is in the subject, Is it possible to send a mail from an ESX node, and if yes, how can I do that ?

Thx

flaggin kicksstart post section executable

mpverr — Fri, 02 Oct 2009 12:23:25 GMT

Hi folks -

I know there is a ton of infromation about kickstart files out there. I've spent the last +hour researching and trying various examples. The only thing I haven't been able to reproduce is flagging the file executable so it runs upon the first boot after the binaries are installed.

Excerpt from my kickstart file:

%packages
@base

%post
cat > /etc/rc.d/rc3.d/S11servercfg << EOF
#!/bin/bash
/usr/sbin/esxcfg-firewall -o 22,tcp,out,scp
/usr/sbin/esxcfg-firewall -o 22,tcp,in,scp

EOF
/bin/chmod a+x /etc/rc.d/rc3.d/S11servercfg

The file S11servercfg is successfully created, but the file does not get flagged executable. Any ideas? I'm using ESX 3.5U4 iso.
many thanks

Cmd line to show datastore left space

xybal — Tue, 06 Oct 2009 07:50:24 GMT

Hi,

Is there a simple command line to extract left space from datastore from the result of "esxcfg-info -s" ?

What I would like to have is the same thing that what we can see in VC's GUI => the left space for each datastore.

Thx very much for your help

Questions about SSH and "Last Login:" (noob)

Brian69 — Tue, 06 Oct 2009 00:23:19 GMT

Is there a trick to have the "Last login:" time display the correct time for a user that logged in last?

I just connected to my server via SSH and it presented me with this:

Last login: Mon Oct 5 20:40:11 2009 from ip68-109-x-x.ph.ph.cox.net

Translated that's 8:20PM. Actual time right now is 5:20PM. I'm fairly certain that my server is updating properly via NTP. The performance logs when using the VI3 client state the proper time.

Restore Physical server backup to VM at DR site

ddockter — Wed, 23 Sep 2009 21:46:11 GMT

I have a combo of physical Windows servers and Windows server VM's running on ESX 3. Instead of restoring the physical servers to physical servers at my DR hotsite, I'd like to restore them to VM's. I'm doing my server backups with Backup Exec. Is this possible?

Intermittent VI Client Connection Drops

blckgrffn — Thu, 01 Oct 2009 18:59:52 GMT

I have two ESX servers that unfortunately are frozen for the time being at ESX 3.02 U1 - they are brand new 2950's and are configured with an identical configuration straight from the CD installation. They each have three virtual servers and dedicated virtual switches and physical network ports split between the VM's and the service console. I just cutover to these servers late last week from some very ancient Dell servers running the same version of ESX.

On one of them, prd1, everything is just peachy. On the other, prd2, the VI client will randomly drop off with the message:"Connection to the server has been lost. The application will now exit." Immediate attempts to reconnect thorugh the client or putty will fail sometimes. The server remains pingable and the VM's appear to be unaffected. On the console, the mgmt-vmware service is running fine and restarting will not solve the issue. If I am patient, however, I'll be able to reconnect sometime later.

This happens every few minutes. Given that I am running Server 2000 VM's without TS enabled yet, this is a big issue and promises to be quite frustrating when attempting the in place upgrade to 2003. Further, reboots (of the ESX hosts) are extremely diffcult to schedule due to the nature of the application.

Any thoughts? I am using the version of VI client that comes with 3.02U1, but have considered using a newer version. What troubles me is that putty also appears to die...

Help would be appreciated!

update

Running a continuous ping, it appears the putty and VI client drop when the ping time jumps ever so briefly to 24MS... I am patched into the same physical switch the ESX servers are on, so this isn't a WAN latency thing, it is usually under 1 ms.

Power Point Presentation?

ejward — Tue, 01 May 2007 17:13:13 GMT

Does anybody know where I can get a VMware Power Point presentation with just the basics in it? SAN, with ESX hosts, HA, DR, etc? Kind of like the one VMware used to sell us the product.