VMware CBT Data Corruption Fix Questions

[TheKid7]

VMware KB 2090639

I have very limited VM Management experience.  However, I am in charge of a Dell VRTX Server (3 Blades)(ESXi 5.1.0 Update 1)(Currently 13 Windows Server 2012 R2 VM's).

Last year, after receiving a notice of the possibility of CBT Corruption, I went through some of the steps given in Veeam's KB 1940.  I guess that I did not realize that ESXi needed to be patched first.  I went through the steps involving patching Veeam and manually Resetting all of the VM's.

How serious is this CBT issue?

I do have many VM's/partitions which are past the 128 GB size.

I have no experience with patching ESXi and using the CLI Interface.

Is it possible to patch my current ESXi 5.1.0 Update 1 without having to do a full ESXi version upgrade on each Blade.  If yes, what is an easy to understand procedure for installing the patch?

Are there any good Tutorials on using the CLI Interface?

I want to be able to fix everything without shutting down any of the VM's.

Thanks in Advance.

[peetz]

Hello,

What type of vSphere license do you have?

Are these three servers managed by vCenter?

If yes: Can you use VMotion between the hosts? Have you installed and are able to use Update Manager to patch the hosts?

Andreas

[TheKid7]

vSphere Licensing:  Corporate License Key which covers all version 5.x.

Yes.  The three Blades and VM's are managed by vSphere which is installed on a dedicated VM Management VM.  I have vSphere Client installed on a non-VM Server.

How do you check to see if you can use vMotion between the Hosts?  I can migrate VM's from one Host to another without any trouble.

Update Manager is installed (version 5.1.019041) on the Management VM, but I have never used it.  This is an isolated network.  Does Update Manager require an Internet connection or can the Patch file be copied to the VM where Udpate Manager is installed and updated from there?

Thank you.

[TheKid7]

This morning I upgraded one Blade to ESXi 5.1.0 Update 3 which is stated to have already been patched to correct the CBT issue.  However, I now have the same problem that I encountered about a year ago when I upgraded from Update 1 to Update 2:  The DataStore is not detected.  At that time I downgraded from Update 2 to Update 1 so that the DataStore could be detected.

I figured out how to run the CLI command for a list of the storage detected for that Blade.  All that showed up were three vFat partitions which I assume are the Flash Card where ESXi is installed.

I don't want to downgrade again, since I want to have a ESXi version with the CBT fix.

How do I troubleshoot/correct the problem with no detection of the DataStore?

Thank you.

[peetz]

Have you used the Dell customized image to do the upgrade or the standard VMware patch/image?

Get the Dell 5.1 U3 ISO image here: http://www.dell.com/support/home/us/en/04/Drivers/DriversDetails?driverId=31W87‌

import it into Update Manager and update the hosts with it.

The standard VMware image probably does not contain all the drivers needed for the Dell hardware.

[TheKid7]

I had that ISO Image ready to go for the upgrade, but did not use it.

I wanted to make sure that the installation ISO had the CBT bug fix patch.  In response, Dell Support gave me a link for the later version (A1 rather than A0).  The version that I used for the upgrade was the same Build Number as the one in the link that you provided, but it has an "A1" instead of "A0".

The whole reason for the upgrade was to make sure that the CBT bug fix issue was resolved.

Thank you.

P.S.:  What does the Boot Option (Shift +R for Recovery Mode) actually do?  I have never used it, but I read somewhere that it is supposed to rollback to the version that existed prior to the upgrade.  If I cannot resolve this issue, would using the Update 1 ISO to update the current version be the best way to go?

[TheKid7 · Accepted solution]

SOLVED.

After several Dell Webex sessions, totally at least 4 hours, the solution was determined to be downgrading the MEGARAID SAS drivers to the exact version that was installed by Dell originally.

I am in the process of Resetting CBT in each VM, followed by a Full Backup.

Thank you.