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gmichaud
Contributor
Contributor

excessive v16.x memory usage

Has anyone noticed excessive VM memory usage with workstation v16.x? My host shows working set memory for v16.x VMs WAY more that the VMs are configured for. I never saw this on workstation v15. A VM configured for 6GB should not use more than 6GB on the host. ALL of my VMs are config'd for either 4GB or 6GB but have working sets up to TWICE that amount. I can't run as many VMs simultaneously as i used to. 

 

v16 VMs - excessive mem usage

gmichaud_1-1605886172485.png

gmichaud_2-1605886325649.png

v15 VMs - normal mem usage

gmichaud_3-1605886579486.png

 

 

19 Replies
xishengzhang
VMware Employee
VMware Employee

Hello, Gmichaud

Thanks for your posting.

Could you please let us know any special application running in your VM? 

Thanks

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gmichaud
Contributor
Contributor

Nothing special runs on these VMs, certainly nothing that consumes a lot of memory. I use them for application install script testing. Most common apps are sccm, sometime an office app, various security apps. Nothing that didn't run on v15.

 

I can boot a VM and login and watch the working set slowly increase to the levels you see in my screen snip. This particular VM has been used only for vpn access to work and RDP into various servers. 

Screenshot - 11_24_2020 , 8_13_13 AM.png

 

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xishengzhang
VMware Employee
VMware Employee

Hello, Gmichaud

Appreciated your quick response. let me see whether I could reproduce this issue internally. Thanks.

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gmichaud
Contributor
Contributor

Thanks for taking the time. I appreciate it!

In case you need these:

 

config.ini:

.encoding = "windows-1252"

isolation.tools.unity.disable="TRUE"
prefvmx.minVmMemPct = "100"
prefvmx.useRecommendedLockedMemSize = "TRUE"

MemTrimRate = "0"

mainMem.partialLazySave = "FALSE"
mainMem.partialLazyRestore = "FALSE"
mainMem.useNamedFile = "FALSE"


authd.client.port = "903"
authd.proxy.nfc = "vmware-hostd:ha-nfc"
installerDefaults.autoSoftwareUpdateEnabled = "yes"
installerDefaults.autoSoftwareUpdateEnabled.epoch = "16963"
installerDefaults.componentDownloadEnabled = "yes"
installerDefaults.dataCollectionEnabled = "yes"
installerDefaults.dataCollectionEnabled.epoch = "16963"

 

settings.ini:


printers.enabled = "FALSE"

 

 

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xishengzhang
VMware Employee
VMware Employee

Hello, Gmichaud

One thing to confirm with you that whether hyper-v or VBS has been enabled on your host? If possible, could you please upload vmware.log when you reproduce this problem? Thanks a lot.

Best Regards

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xizhang
Contributor
Contributor

Hi, gmichaud

I think the displayed working set should not be the root cause of blocking you run many vms. Your error should be something related with .mem file. when you power on the VM, there will be .mem generated as well under the VM location. Please make sure you have enough space for it on your disk.  

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gmichaud
Contributor
Contributor

i DID enable hyper-v on the host to see if it would help, but it didn't hyper-v is still enabled.

VBS is NOT enabled on any of my VMs.

 

vmware.log (zip) is attached.

 

Thanks for assisting with this. I appreciate it.

 

Gerry

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gmichaud
Contributor
Contributor

Thanks for the suggestion, but I have vmware configured to not use .MEM files.

 

mainMem.useNamedFile = "FALSE"

 

This is how I have run vmware for years. These VMs were created as v15 or even v14 VMs in years past. I've never seen this problems until v16.

 

Thanks for your help. I appreciate it.

 

Gerry

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wila
Immortal
Immortal

Hi,

A bit late, but just to indicate that another part of a VM's RAM usage is the virtual graphics adapter.

With Workstation 16.x this now apparently defaults to 8GB / VM.
--
Wil

| Author of Vimalin. The virtual machine Backup app for VMware Fusion, VMware Workstation and Player |
| More info at vimalin.com | Twitter @wilva
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xizhang
Contributor
Contributor

Hello, gmichaud

Since you have disabled .mem file, could yo please check your page file setting on your host to see whether it support the required page files for vm? 

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gmichaud
Contributor
Contributor

Thanks, but all my vms are set to 1GB video memory.

gmichaud_0-1607955325912.png

 

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gmichaud
Contributor
Contributor

No paging. I have lots of RAM and I use it.

gmichaud_0-1607955502030.png

Again, on v15 all these VMs with the same settings used only the RAM they were configured to use. I routinely set to 4 or 6GB.

gmichaud_1-1607955616916.png

 

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xizhang
Contributor
Contributor

I think that per your preference setting(using reserved host RAM), when VM is failed to power on, the error should be something like "No enough physical memory" instead of " could not create anonymous paging file ......" in your description. 

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gmichaud
Contributor
Contributor

I agree. none of this makes sense. too much memory in the working set and failure to start additional VMs for no 'apparent' reason. 

 

This is crazy. I might go back to v15.

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VWorker99
Contributor
Contributor

I have this problem too.

Workstation host has 32 GB memory.  Running 1 VM guest set to 4096 MB (4 GB).  Working memory in Process Explorer shows 7.9 GB.

Other guest machines typically also show double their allocated memory when I run them.

The guests were v15, migrated to v16 VMware Workstation machines.

The VMware host now has Windows 10 20H2 with Hyper-V/Device guard.  To allow the machines to work I:

 - turned off: Virtualize Intel VT-x/EPT or AMD-V/RVI

 - disabled: side channel mitigations for Hyper-V enabled hosts

The guest system runs normally, but takes twice as much working memory as it ever did on VMware Workstation 15.

 

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wila
Immortal
Immortal

Hi VWorker99,

You can go back to an older virtual hardware version (with the VM shut down, under menu manage -> Change Hardware Compatibility) to use less memory.
Alternatively, turn off the 3D acceleration feature.

--
Wil

| Author of Vimalin. The virtual machine Backup app for VMware Fusion, VMware Workstation and Player |
| More info at vimalin.com | Twitter @wilva
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VWorker99
Contributor
Contributor

Thank you, @wila.  I have two machines that are having the issue, that I use at the moment.  I shut them both down.

On one I pushed the machine back to hardware version 15 (but I still must run it under v16 host).

The other I turned off 3D Acceleration in the Display settings.

In both cases, they continue to use excessive working memory when operating.

 

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wila
Immortal
Immortal

Hmm.. ok, sorry then I don't know.

FWIW, on Fusion this does help, see also https://communities.vmware.com/t5/VMware-Fusion-Discussions/Memory-Usage-Doubled/m-p/2839970/highlig...

--
Wil

| Author of Vimalin. The virtual machine Backup app for VMware Fusion, VMware Workstation and Player |
| More info at vimalin.com | Twitter @wilva
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VWorker99
Contributor
Contributor

Thank you for your ideas, @wila,even if to help me demonstrate what is not working (in case VMware are listening?)

For the record, I have also tried taking the guest back to hardware level v14 (VMware Workstation for Windows) and turned off 3D acceleration on the same machine.

Still the problem persists.  The guest hardware capabilities below v14 will not support that system.

Win 10 20H2 Deviceguard host
VMware Workstation 16.1.2 host
VMware Tools 13.3.5 guest

 

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