Hello,
We have been searching for hours and following steps on how to reclaim space on a thin provisioned VM with no luck.
Nothing seems to be working.
We have tried - https://community.webcore.cloud/tutorials/how_to_reclaim_disk_space_from_a_thin_provisioned_/
Nothing changed afterwards.
And UNMAP command is not supported.
These are some outputs
VAAI Plugin Name:
ATS Status: unsupported
Clone Status: unsupported
Zero Status: unsupported
Delete Status: unsupported
Revision: 3.45
SCSI Level: 5
Is Pseudo: false
Status: on
Is RDM Capable: true
Is Local: true
Is Removable: false
Is SSD: false
Is VVOL PE: false
Is Offline: false
Is Perennially Reserved: false
Queue Full Sample Size: 0
Queue Full Threshold: 0
Thin Provisioning Status: unknown
Attached Filters:
VAAI Status: unsupported
To clarify. The VM is thin provisioned for 200GB and current used space is only at 30GB but the VMDK is 199GB.
Can you provide more information about the underlaying hardware?
Supermicro
Super Server
8 CPUs x Intel(R) Xeon(R) CPU D-1540 @ 2.00GHz
127.9 GB
What about disk configuration, VMFS etc?
Datastores are Non SSD - VMFS5
Looks like your underlaying storage does not support VAAI. What kind of storage do you use?
What guest operating system is the vm running?
Typically, the unmap command that generates from the guest operation system on VMFS5 cannot be passed directly to the array. You must run the esxcli storage vmfs unmap command to trigger unmaps for the array.
However, for a limited number of the guest operating systems, VMFS5 supports the automatic space reclamation requests.
To send the unmap requests from the guest operating system to the array, the virtual machine must meet the following prerequisites:
1. The virtual disk must be thin-provisioned.
2. Virtual machine hardware must be of version 11 (ESXi 6.0) or later.
3. The advanced setting EnableBlockDelete must be set to 1.
4. The guest operating system must be able to identify the virtual disk as thin.
Not sure how to check this, would it be Local Storage?
Running Windows Server 2012 R2.
We have tried to follow the UNMAP command through SSH to the host but it states it is not supported.
Here is a screenshot - Awesome Screenshot
It states 163.13GB free but Used is 200GB? so the VMDF is 199GB~
Hi
The Automatic UNMAP/Storage space reclamation may not be supported on your storage array. You can determine whether the storage array supports automatic unmap/storage space reclamation by referring to the VMware HCL. The blog https://cormachogan.com/2016/12/05/determining-array-supports-automated-unmap-vsphere-6-5/ provides detailed procedure to determine if the storage array supports automated UNMAP of unused storage space.
I'm sorry, but it looks like your setup doesn't fulfill the requirements to support UNMAP/ Space Reclamation. You can try to zero-out the guest filesystem with sdelete.exe and move the VM onto an NFS datastore and back to your local storage. Otherwise you can shutdown the VM after the zeorout operation and use vmkfstools --punchzero to reclaim the space.
Thank you again for trying to assist everyone.
We have tried to zero-out the guest filesystem with sdelete.exe and then shut it down then vmkfstools -K [disk].vmdk.
We assume because VAAI Status is unsupported and Delete Status is unsupported it didn't work. Nothing was changed.
What are our options to reduce this vmdk?
When you say moving the VM onto a NFS datastore and back to local storage could you confirm the exact steps for this. Also, would it work? Is there any other way?
Could we simply unregister the VM then register it?
How does moving the folder to NFS then moving it back and registering it be different to unregister it then just simply register it again?
Hello,
Could anyone please assist?