Virtual Machine disappeared

[oconshaw]

I'm evaluating this software on our Server. This morning I came in to find that one of the virtual machines on the server (there are 2 -- Windows Server 2003 and Server 2008) was gone. Just disappeared. How do I get it back? I don't see any reference to it in the VMware Infrastructure Client. If I look at creating a new virtual machine I can see that the virtual disks for the missing machine are still present, but the machine definition is gone. How could this happen and how to get things back on track? Thanks.

[Troy_Clavell · Accepted solution]

using your VIC, hightlight a host, then look to the right and double click on your datastores. You should see the VM in there. Find the .vmx file, right click and choose add to inventory. Follow the prompts. Once it's added back into inventory, you can power it on.

hope this helps

[weinstein5]

Welcome to the forum - have you looked to see if you vm is in a compressed section of the inventory? Can you ping the VMs fomr another machine to confirm they are still running? What software are you testing? If you are sure the VMs are not running try usings your datastore browser and re-add the vm tot he inventory by right clicking on the VMX file in the vm directory and sellect add to the inventory

[oconshaw]

Thanks for the quick response. That is the problem -- it doens't show up in the VIC when I highlight the host -- there is only one machine that shows up to the right when there should be two. It was working perfectly all last week. I don't understand what could have happened. The remaining VM was in a "stopped" state this morning. It shouldn't have been -- I left it running over the weekend so possibly the Server rebooted itself. Perhaps a file is corrupt?

[Troy_Clavell]

did you check the datastore? can you ping the VM in question? More than likely if you use the steps mentioned to re-inventory, that may resolve you issue

[oconshaw]

Thanks again for the help. I reread the post and realized you meant to select the Summary page and double click on the datastore where the missing VM was located. Once I did this I did see the vmx file and was able to add it back once more. Whew! It was a lot of work getting that particular VM setup. I wasn't looking forward to doing that again.

So why did this happen? Any ideas?

[Troy_Clavell]

I can't tell you exactly why it happened, but I have seen it happen in the past. Was your hostd process restarted for any reason? Someone could have powered of the VM and removed it from inventory inadvertantly.

also, please consider awarding points for helpful/correct answers.