Error some other host uses IP address

[Prof_Church]

When I assign an IP address out of 5 ips I have been assigned to my server to my VM I get a message saying that : Error some other host uses IP address xxxx.

How can disable the use of the IP address on the main server, so that the VM can use it?

[esiebert7625]

Well you first need to determine what device is using the duplicate IP address. It might not necessarily be a VM on the ESX server, depending on you network config it could some other physical server on that VLAN. The easiest way is to check with your network group, they can trace it to a MAC address and from there to a physical switch port. On the ESX server you can see what VM's are connected to the vSwitch in question and check them individually. You can also go to the service console and type ifconfig to see the network settings for the SC.

[Prof_Church]

I probably haven't explained myself well enough. The server in question is a dedicated server at an hosting provider which has been allocated a block of 5 IPs, so all the 5 IPs point to the same host after I added them to /etc/network/interfaces.

What I want to do is to deactivate one of the IPs on the host so that the VM can use it. I though deactivating one of the IP addresss in /etc/network/interfaces would fix the problem but unfortunately it doesn't.

[esiebert7625]

Did you also edit the file located in /etc/sysconfig/network-scripts, there is one for each NIC in the directory that is named ifcfg-, you'll need to remove the IP address there to make it permanent.