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UbuntuMan
Contributor
Contributor

Guest Server Loses Network Connection After Reboot

Hello!

We have a guest Windows 2003 server that has Windows SharePoint Services (WSS 3.0) running on it.  The server was orginally built on the ESXi 3.5 platform but was moved and upgraded again on an ESXi 3.5 platform.  The C: partition got 20GB extra added and more memory.

About 5 months later we ran updates on the OS and then rebooted the server.  When the server came back up it lost its network connection!  I don't recal if we rebooted the server prior to this time.  The NIC card showed that it was connected but we could not ping the server or ping out.  We finally end up restoring a snapshot we took before the updates.

We then removed the NIC, added another one and reboot but same thing.  We then moved the server to an ESXi 4.0 platform but same behavior.

At this point we don't know what else to do.  The server needs to be rebooted but we can't do it because we will lose WSS entirely and it hosts our Intranet.

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

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DSTAVERT
Immortal
Immortal

Welcome to the Communities

I would try removing the nic from inside the Windows guest and in the vSphere client settings for the guest. Add them back in from the vSphere Client settings and in the guest. Rescan hardware in device manager and set up networking. I would clone the VM if you can and test the procedure to see if it helps.

What NIC have you used in settings and guest?

VMware tools installed?

What hardware version?

What have you done to get network connectivity when it was lost?

-- David -- VMware Communities Moderator
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idle-jam
Immortal
Immortal

can you add 2 NIC and ensure that either one is working well?

can you have diff nic type.

and also is there any problem with the vswitch's uplink cable? it could be that also. one way to find out is by ensuring another VM is using that vswitch and has no problem with it.

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UbuntuMan
Contributor
Contributor

Hello and thank you for the quick response!

I am working with another system admin on this issue, so I had to get some of the info from him.

I believe, we removed the NIC from the guest server and put it back but no change.

The NIC used on guest is VMware Accelerated AMD PCNet Adapter

VMWare tools installed and running.

Hardware is:

HP Proliant DL360

2 x XEON E5540 @ 2.52 GHz

24 GB RAM

Before rebooting the server, we make a snapshot of it.  After reboot, when the server loses network connection, we just restore the snapshot in its running stage so as if it never was rebooted.

No other server is connected to the same vswitch.  We added another NIC and connected to that but same result.  We haven't tried using a different type.

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UbuntuMan
Contributor
Contributor

It actually turned out to be a problem with the guest OS, Windows 2003.  The IPSec got corrupt.  Here is the fix to it: http://support.microsoft.com/kb/870910

Thank you for all your feedback.

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