Unable to connect to Windows 7 pool from View Client

[PotiPotato]

Environment:

View Connection server 4.5.0.293049 (on 2003 Std VM)

vCenter Server 4.1.0.14766 (on 2008 Std x64 VM)

View Clients 4.5.0 build 293049, 353760 and 4.6.0 build 366101

View Agent: 4.5.0.293049

VM Tools: 8.3.7.43358

ESX Hosts (x3): 4.1.0 build 433742

Protocol used: PCoIP

Issue:

After updating ESX hosts from 4.1 to 4.1U1 and upgrading Tools respectively on our Windows 7 Pool (new snapshot), the View Client, when logging into this newly provisioned VM, momentarily shows a black screen, then disconnects the client.  I am able to connect to any of these VMs directly via the vSphere Client.

Connecting to an XP pool (after the same tools upgrade) from View Client still works.  Provisioning a new pool with the same Windows 7 snapshot has same error.  Rolling back to a previous (working) snapshot works OK.

I've tried using various versions of View Client (noted above) from various sources (HP Thinclient, Windows 7 PC, Windows XP PC) with no change.  I've kept the Windows firewall off in all instances (after checking, of course) and have tested after disabling the Symantec SEP11.2 application (which is also on the XP VMs) without change.  The W7 image was up to date as far as patching was concerned.

No other changes to the pool/settings were made, except I did notice that the disposable disk was set to the user's H: drive (which is their home drive mapping), which I had to set in adsiedit on the Connection Server (I've had issues with this before reverting the setting of the attribute pae-SVIVmPersistentDiskSpec for the SystemDisposable disk from * to F (i.e. an otherwise unused drive letter).  This, however, made no difference to the connectivity issue.

I've logged the job with VMware support, but it's been 3 days without being able to contact the assigned engineer in Bangalore (I'm in Australia) - lots of telephone tag.....

Does anybody out there have any suggestions to try or any specific areas to look at (while I'm waiting)?  If I've missed any info, pls let me know.

[mittim12]

It's always best practice to repair or reinstall the view agent after doing a tools upgrade.  Have you tried this to see if it resolves your issue?

[WilliamReid]

Hi there,

As Mittim12 indicated a reinstallation of the agent should be done first, this is becase the video driver that ships with tools is replaced with the one that comes with the agent.

A black screen can also be caused by one of the following..

- firewall blocking PCoIP port 4172 TCP/UDP either to or from the VDI desktop.

Double check your firewall and ensure it's enabled when you reinstall the agent as the installer will essentially poke the required holes for you.

- Insufficient video ram.

Easiest way of doing this is to adjust the PCoIP pool settings from 2 to 4 monitors, then wait for the reconfigure event in vCenter followed be a power off then on of the affected VM.

That the aboive doesn't work you can try this as well.

Manually adjusting the vram for the master to 128 meg instead of the auto setting.  Again wait on the reconfigure, power on and test.  If that corrects the issue, do it on the master template, resnap and recompose.

In rare cases there may a 3rd party software installed inside the VDI desktop causing the issue, a "clean boot" of the VM and just leaving on tools and agent services can help track down the culprit application.

Instructions on performing a clean boot can be found here - http://support.microsoft.com/kb/331796

Hope that helps,

Wm

[PotiPotato]

Thank you Mitim12 and WilliamReid -

By uninstalling and reinstalling the View Agent, I was able to get it working again.

I'll be keeping these hints in mind for next time.

Kind Regards

PotiPotato.