the attempted operation cannot be performed in the current state (powered o

[gregorybfell]

i get this error when trying to stop/start/reset a vm.

the attempted operation cannot be performed in the current state (powered on)

i've already done a

service mgmt-vmware restart

tia

[atdude]

Are you using VirtualCenter? Access the ESX Server via the VI client? Using the command prompt?

Message was edited by:

atdude

[gregorybfell]

it happens when i try to turn the machine on, reset it or turn it off.

i'm using VC

[atdude]

Have you tried rebooting the ESX host? That would be my next step.

[gregorybfell]

no, i'd rather not do that i have 10+ production machines on it.

[atdude]

I was afraid that you were going to say that...

Anything in the event logs?

If you run "esxtop", is there anything interesting in the output?

It may come to a point where the functionality is reduced to a point that have to reboot. But, hopefully I'm wrong abou this.

[gregorybfell]

esxtop

11:02:47am up 6 days, 19:57, 94 worlds; CPU load average: 0.28, 0.28, 0.28

PCPU(%): 62.60, 16.42, 17.46, 4.14 ; used total: 25.15

LCPU(%): 62.58, 0.01, 10.25, 6.16, 12.65, 4.81, 2.14, 1.99

CCPU(%): 13 us, 88 sy, 0 id, 0 wa ; cs/sec: 579

ID GID NAME NMEM %USED %SYS %OVRLP %RUN %WAIT %BWAIT %TWAIT %

1 1 idle 8 143.31 0.00 0.01 54.78 0.00 0.00 0.00

2 2 system 5 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00 323.66 0.00 323.66

6 6 console 1 62.18 0.00 0.02 62.43 0.21 0.05 0.26

7 7 helper 13 0.36 0.00 0.00 0.71 837.39 0.00 837.39

8 8 drivers 7 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00 452.06 0.00 452.06

9 9 vmotion 1 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00 64.44 0.00 64.44

12 12 vmware-vmkauthd 1 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00 64.36 0.00 64.36

13 13 LIBAPP01 5 10.81 0.03 0.04 11.19 265.22 42.35 307.56

15 15 PIA-FELLGB 5 22.53 0.00 0.05 23.98 231.93 59.38 291.31

17 17 Siebel DB 7.8 5 0.89 0.00 0.01 1.11 311.37 8.31 319.68

18 18 SiebelApp 7.8 5 1.79 0.00 0.03 2.16 256.47 59.69 316.16

19 19 RHDVMTESTAPP 5 2.10 0.00 0.02 2.20 285.85 32.96 318.81

21 21 TechArch Sandbo 5 8.73 0.11 0.22 5.30 249.66 65.67 315.33

24 24 LIBTS03 7 1.65 0.00 0.01 1.85 440.15 6.51 446.66

27 27 LIBWSUS 5 1.02 0.00 0.00 1.39 302.99 16.02 319.01

29 29 LIBAPP07 5 1.45 0.00 0.01 1.46 299.59 21.20 320.79

30 30 SIEBELREPORTING 5 0.31 0.00 0.01 0.63 290.79 29.04 319.83

33 33 LIBIISMNL 5 0.98 0.00 0.02 0.80 310.12 10.11 320.23

34 34 vmware-vmx.1194 1 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00 64.15 0.00 64.15

any other idea's? where can i find the event logs?

Message was edited by:

gregorybfell

[RParker]

Yeah you configured the VM for memory that it doesn't have enough to allocate to the VM. Did you reserve CPU or Memory for that VM?

If you did, and the ESX doesn't have enough to reserve ON that VM, then it won't power on, so the resources aren't enough to facilitate that VM request. I would make sure the settings on the VM have ample resources, or turn off the reservation.

Either that or you have a VM that didn't shut down (automatically power off the machine when shut down) and the ESX host still thinks its running.

[gregorybfell]

I cannot edit any settings either. It must have been

...Either that or you have a VM that didn't shut down (automatically power off the machine when shut down) and the ESX host still thinks its running.

How to fix? Reboot?

[Faustina]

set your DRS setting to something "partially automated" and observe for a while.

I think this would help.

[cocoy0228]

Virtual center didn't update itself together with the virtual machine in terms with state of the machine.

Try to unregister then register the machine from virtual center. To unregister go to Inventory > virtual Machine > Remove from Inventory.

To register/add it back click on Inventory then the summary tab. Select a host and start the New Virtual Machine wizard.

[Tecnics]

Hi, I got same problem.

Does anyone know what is actually causing this problem?

Thanx

[its_vmware]

Potentially, your VC client on esx server is having issue. I would restart both vmware-vpxa and mgmt-vmware service. If status of the VM would not still sync with VC then, I would think VM itself has an issue. If this is the case, kill VMPID by performing following;

#this would return all running VMs vmid#

cat /proc/vmware/vm/*/names/

#lookup actual group id

less -S /proc/vmware/vm/(your vmid)/cpu/status

#kill vm with group id you got from above

/usr/lib/vmware/bin/vmkload_app -k 9 (yourgroupID)

done!

[Teiva]

Hi gregory,

I have had this issue and currently working out what it can be. I am using Virtual Infrastructure Client connecting to VirtualCenter on my Windows Server. Now there are 2 things I noted:

1. if I try to delete snapshots, shutdown/reboot/suspend, in fact, just about anything to interact with the Virtual Machines, i get the same error as you, as well as the occasional "Operation timed out." Now if you will find that if you connect to that esx server directly, meaning open Virtual Infrastructure Client, and NOT connect to the Virtual Center Server. I find that using this method I can still manage my VMs.

2. This thing I can do, and to me it tells me that it is more an issue with VirtualCenter than vmware on the esx node, which is, I remove the ESX host Node from my DataCenter (in VC) and readd it, and all the information is again correct. Then if I make another change, we are back to square one.

I have restarted the windows servers on virtualcenter, checked the database to make there was nothing there.

The next thing I am going to try is to explore the database to see what flags are set in the database, purhaps it is a database accessibility issue, who knows, but it should not becuase after I remove and readd the host into VC, everything is correct. It could be a permission issue on the vpxuser acccount which VC uses to communicate with the esx hosts..who knows.

If I get it resovled I will post it here.

Good luck,

Teiva

[waldorfo2]

Are you using HA Clustering?

I saw similiar issue when we tried to use both local and shared storage while HA was enabled. As long as all RUNNING VMs were located on shared storage everything was fine. However whenever we tried to power on VM from local disk - timeouts and message about improper power state of VM began.

As you mentioned, we could manage ESX host directely but not through Virtual Center.

I can understand why local storage should not be used with HA, however...

[Teiva]

Hi Gregory, It seems that my issue has resolved itself after I have done the following.

1. Disconnected my esx server from virtualcenter

2. Closed VI Client

3. Restarted VirtualCenter (windows service)

4. Open VI Client and re-added my host.

It's been almost 1 week without issues. It think it just too easy to be a permanent work arround so I won't hold my breath.

Could it be an issue if we manage hosts directly via VI client and via VirtualCenter ?

Take care.

[quarentine]

I just encountered this issue this morning for the first, and unfortunately our Sys Admin who normally takes care of these problems is away.

The problem in a nutshell for us was the VMHost kept reporting as "Not Responding". As such out of the 10 or so VM clients hosted by this host, only a few were in a state were we could not power them on,off or restart. The error message kept reading "The attempted operation cannot be performed in the current state (Power Off)". But these VM clients were indicated as "Powered On" in Virtual Infrastructure Client. What I did to resolve the issue is as follows:

1. Shutdown all VM's on the Host that could be contacted

2. Restart VM Host which resolved the "Not Responding" issue of the Host

3. Once VM host was restarted, I started up each one of the VM Clients.

4. Unfortunately there were still some VM's that had the issue of "The Attempted operation cannot be performed in the current state (Powered Off)". But after taking a snapshot of these VM's the issue was resolved and I was able to start them up.

[whack]

I had the exact same error once but it turned out to be because the virtual machine's CD drive was still "connected" to an .iso on the datastore that wasn't there anymore.

[bkrall]

I ran into this same issue tonight... Turned out that by logging in to the ESX host using VI Client I was able to see much more information. When I clicked on the troubled VM there was a big yellow dialog box that said "There is no more space for the redo log on ... So I was able to clean up some space on the datastore, clicked Retry on the error, and the VM came right back online...

[Oakie]

Had the same issue. Our connection to the SAN dropped and after it got restored there was one VM with this error. Couldn't do anything (i thought) with it, no reset, remove from inventory was grayed out etc...

Turned out I had to "answer question" a couple of times, just choose continue/disconnect (cdrom). After that it was accessible again.