Black Screen when accessing server console

[iQTom]

We are currently experiencing the following intermittent issue...

When accessing a server through the vcenter console it will suddenly lock up (the console not the server).

At this point existing remote desktop connections continue to work but no new connections can be established.

this leaves us in the position where the server is running but we no longer have anyway of managing it. In the past the only way to get control back has been to restart the server which resolves the issue. However this is currently effecting our domain controller/mailserver so I'm reluctant to do a hard reset and will at least have to wait until out of office hours to do so. Which means I can't do any of the management/maintenance tasks I need to do today.

We currently have 2 x hosts Running ESX 4.0.0, 164009.

Using vSphere 4 to manage them

The effected servers all seem to be Windows Server 2008 R2 or Windows Small Business Server 2008

is there a particular service(s) that I can restart to resolve this?

[AndreTheGiant]

Try to upgrade to U1 that will support Windows Server 2008 R2.

See also this KB:

http://kb.vmware.com/kb/10233

Andre

[iQTom]

Hi, thanks Andre

Just to update, last night I managed to get onto the server by accessing the host directly through a browser (previously I was trying through vCenter or RDP). When I sent it a controlaltdel the logon screen popped up.

The server was running insanely slow despite everything (CPU, RAM, Disk Access, Network) being well below 100% usage.

Following a reboot it is now responding a little better.

Having looked into running VMware updates on the hosts there seem to be about 100 updates it is missing, you mentioned there is an update to aid compatibility with Server 2008 R2, I would imagine this would improve overall performance.

Our vSphere installation is fairly new and as I said I've not run any updates yet, is there anything in particular I need to be aware of? like always do out of hours? Does it require the VM's to be down? a host restart?

I noticed a number of the updates said 'Maintenance Mode, Reboot Required', maintenance mode requires all the VMs to reboot and move off the Host doesn't it? (we don't have vMotion) I would imagine this would take a few hours? could it be done in an evening or is this a weekend job?

cheers,

[AndreTheGiant · Accepted solution]

For the vSphere update I suggest this steps:

• first update the vCenter Server (you have to download new install file, run the install, say I have a DB, use the existing ODBC name, and it will perform the update to U1)

• then install the new VUM (there is the U1P1 version)

• then use VUM to install the ESX update (if you have a VMotion license, it will work in an automatic way, otherwise you have to manually free each host to put in maintenance mode).

Andre

[iQTom]

looks like I closed this thread prematurely. right after I closed it one of the servers I was accessing through the vmWare console locked up, I then couldn't access it using remote desktop. If I launched a second console window though, from webAccess, I could logon as a different user to shutdown the server to regain control of it.

It always seems to happen when viewing the Server Manager console in Window Server 2008.

[AndreTheGiant]

Have you check firewall configuration of your Windows 2008?

I haven't tried to use it to open the VM console.

Check also if it is supported: http://www.vmware.com/pdf/vsphere4/r40/vsp_compatibility_matrix.pdf

Andre

[MarkStrong]

Change VM's display adapter driver to "Standard VGA" or "VMware SVGA" NOT "VMware SVGA II", reboot the server.

[mdwasim]

I am also having silimar problem with windows 2008 R2, in adapter properties I cant fine vmware SVGA.. I have only SVGA II version.. if I un-install that after reboot server takes stnd VGA.. which is somewhat sluggiesh.

How can i get vmware SVGA? or stnd VGA and vmware SVGA is same?

I am not sure if this is the right option to troubleshoot this problem..

[thakala]

I am also having problems with Console, http://communities.vmware.com/message/1575802#1575802

Please check VM vmware.log during Console lock up, do you see same "destroying VNC backend on VNC error: Out of memory" messages?