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zeekblack
Contributor
Contributor

HELP: ESXi 3.5 U4 (158874) "cannot fork process" , cant ssh into machine, cant login with VIclient, cant login via unsupported console.

Hi All,

I have a an ESXi 3.5 host on a Sun x4100 machine. I have SSH enabled -- and over the course of a few weeks this problem appears.

1. Cant login via SSH as any user, the system comes back with "ssh_exchange_identification: Connection closed by remote host"

2. Cant login with VIclient, it comes back with "invalid user/pass"

3. I can login via the "unsupported" console as root, but when I try to execute any shell command, I get " cannot fork "

4. In the standard configuration console, "Enable root lockdown mode" has an 'X', and I cant disable it.

I searched the forum and another user had the same issue and apparently VMware responded saying this was a known bug that was fixed with ESXi 3.5 U2 ( I'm running Update 4) !. It's supposedly due to some hidden backup partition that is becoming corrupt or inaccessable?

Its running some production VM's, they seem to be responding fine, but i'm nervous -- the only way I know of to get around this issue is to reboot the hypervisor, which is really invasive!! Any thoughts??????

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9 Replies
DSTAVERT
Immortal
Immortal

Lockdown mode is for when you have a vCenter server. It prevents any local access. Do you have vCenter?

I do remember having something similar although I didn't have lockdown enabled. It was a corrupted configuration file. I eventually had to reinstall.

-- David -- VMware Communities Moderator
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zeekblack
Contributor
Contributor

Hi, thanks for responding....

nope, I dont have Vcenter, all the esxi's I have are standalones.

I can login localy via local VGA console, I just cant execute any commands. So maybe its false positive with lockdown X being checked .....

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DSTAVERT
Immortal
Immortal

How many VM's on the host in question? Are they on local storage?

-- David -- VMware Communities Moderator
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zeekblack
Contributor
Contributor

8 VM's (only 5 running)

All local storage, but we do have some iscsi luns attached to the hypervisor, however nothing is using them.

quad core CPU, 16gb ram, raid controller....

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dominic7
Virtuoso
Virtuoso

Unless you've gone out of your way to install software into the unsupported linux console, this has to be a bug that's causeing you to run out of resources to the point that you can no longer fork() a process. Open an SR with VMware, I'm sure they'd like to see this.

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zeekblack
Contributor
Contributor

I would love to open an SR, but dont think I can... I have no support contract.

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DSTAVERT
Immortal
Immortal

It's hard to know what to say at this point but you may be faced with a restart.

Use whatever means to protect your running VMs. Use your iSCSI attached to one or more of your other hosts. Use converter to basically clone the machines to other hosts just in case you have problems. Shutdown the guests and restart?????

-- David -- VMware Communities Moderator
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dominic7
Virtuoso
Virtuoso

ItIts running some production VM's, they seem to be responding fine, but i'm nervous -- the only way I know of to get around this issue is to reboot the hypervisor, which is really invasive!! Any thoughts??????

If you can't afford to have the machines go down, you should probably buy support. At this point I'm guessing there is 0% chance this can be fixed without rebooting the system. If there are no processes left available, you couldn't even spawn one for a shutdown command. Your best bet is to verify that you have current backups and then you're going to have to power that system off hard.

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DSTAVERT
Immortal
Immortal

I think the sigh should have been louder. :smileylaugh:

-- David -- VMware Communities Moderator
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