A general system error occured; failed to open swap file

[sbrousse]

Just added a 3rd esx 3.5 server to the cluster. Configurations match a far as i can tell. But when i try to migrate a vm from either of the other two to the third one the error A general system error occured; failed to open swap file shows up. We even tried rebuilding the esx server and readding it to the cluster but to no avail.

I read in some other threads that you should right click on the virtual machines that you can't migrate and update the virtual machine hardware. How is this done? As far as i know that capability is in vsphere but not 3.5. Any ideas that might help? Please help!

Thanks

SB

[sflanders · Accepted solution]

If you can, power off the VM and perform the migration or power off and then power on the VM and try the migration again. I have seen this several times before, usually after I performed a storage VMotion on the VM in question. Upgrading the VM hardware can only be done if the VM is powered off thus why you cannot currently see it as an option.

Update: Assuming you cannot reboot the VM, ensure the datastore the host you ar migrating to has the datastores added identical the host the VM is currently on. For example, esx1 has vm1 with a datastore added by FQDN, esx2 will be the new home for vm1 and has the same datastore has esx1, but the datastore was added by IP address. Though both datastores look identical (i.e. going to Configuration - Storage shows them both identical) they are because they were added different ways. This results in different UUIDs, which causes the error experienced. More information about this can be found here: http://kb.vmware.com/kb/1004906

[Rynardts]

I've come across a similiar issue. What are you using (NFS, iSCSI or FC) for your shared storage? Also, where is the swapfile configured to be? Stored with the VM?

P.S, In order to upgrade the VM hardware, you need to power off the VM, and then right click. You should then see and option to upgrade the Virtual Hardware. This option will only be available if your VMs hardware is not up to date.

Rynardt Spies

VCP | vExpert

[sbrousse]

Thanks! The readding storage worked! We realized that on the first two esx boxes we added in storage using FQDN and the third added storage using ip address. And yes they did appear identical when we looked at them. Thank you for your help, you are a life saver.

SB