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Wind89
Contributor
Contributor

Decreasing memory on VM did not increase memory on ESXi host

I lowered the assigned memory on a Windows Server by 4GB because I want to assign this to another Windows Server.

When I check the available memory on the host, nothing has changed.

6 Replies
CERKYR
Enthusiast
Enthusiast

Hello,

I have the same problem.

The VM VCSA (vcenter) go from 10 Gb to 9 Gb, after restart. (VCSA use around 7,5 Gb)
But the ESXi 6.5 U2 use the same size of memory : 11 Gb of 12 Gb

What happen ?

Regards,

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Wind89
Contributor
Contributor

I read a comment somewhere on a refresh of the host. This was however not on the memory but on the datastore.

I tried it but it didn't work.

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MikeStoica
Expert
Expert

Are you using reservations?

Wind89
Contributor
Contributor

No, not that I know off.

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MikeStoica
Expert
Expert

You can go on the machine > settings > resources tab and check there.

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compwizpro
Enthusiast
Enthusiast

Do you have other VMs running on the host that might have consumed additional memory while you removed the memory allocation from you VCSA VM?  Unless you are reserving memory on all VMs, I believe ESX will only allocate what's active and try to use memory sharing to reduce used memory so there might be a good chance you are not consuming all memory that's allocated and the other VMs consume more memory over time.

Also, try checking ESXtop to see exactly what memory is being used to get a more accurate counter and try adjusting the memory allocation again to see the difference.

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