mysteriously expanding VM

[CABF]

Hey all, this may be a stupid question but as I'm an not yet deeply experienced in ESX I'd love some insight from you.

I have a VM which seems to be taking more and more storage and with my poor knowledge of ESX .vmdks I can't understand what's happening.

The VM folder contains the following files;

total 38983360

-rw------- 1 root root 7902068736 Aug 7 10:14 xyz-000001-delta.vmdk

-rw------- 1 root root 259 Aug 6 23:29 xyz-000001.vmdk

-rw------- 1 root root 9462349824 Aug 7 00:01 xyz_1-000001-delta.vmdk

-rw------- 1 root root 263 Aug 7 00:00 xyz_1-000001.vmdk

-rw------- 1 root root 10737418240 Jun 4 14:06 xyz_1-flat.vmdk

-rw------- 1 root root 346 Jun 12 02:22 xyz_1.vmdk

-rw------- 1 root root 1073741824 Jun 2 14:55 xyz-9f8827c7.vswp

-rw------- 1 root root 10737418240 Jun 20 15:12 xyz-flat.vmdk

-rw------- 1 root root 8664 Jun 2 14:22 xyz.nvram

-rw------- 1 root root 18814 Jun 20 15:12 xyz-Snapshot77.vmsn

-rw------- 1 root root 344 Jun 12 02:22 xyz.vmdk

-rw------- 1 root root 1043 Aug 6 23:29 xyz.vmsd

-rwxr-xr-x 1 root root 1850 Aug 7 09:40 xyz.vmx

-rw------- 1 root root 256 Aug 7 09:40 xyz.vmxf

-rw-rr 1 root root 26833 Apr 14 12:36 vmware-1.log

-rw-rr 1 root root 97092 Apr 14 12:36 vmware-2.log

-rw-rr 1 root root 22762 Apr 14 12:36 vmware-3.log

-rw-rr 1 root root 1654418 Jun 2 14:01 vmware-4.log

-rw-rr 1 root root 1960776 Aug 7 09:40 vmware.log

The VM has two disks in it's properties; Disk 1 xyz-000001.vmdk (10GB) and Disk 2 xyz_1-000001.vmdk (10GB). It also has a single snapshot in Snapshot Manager, taken on 20 June 08. The whole folder is about 38GB and I think it should be closer to 30GB.

Do I have an extra snapshot file in there that is not appearing in Snapshot Manager? Do I have the corrent number of .vmdks, deltas and flats?

Thanks for you help.

[Dave_Mishchenko]

Your post has been moved to the VI: Virtual Machine and Guest OS forum.

[kjb007]

Totaling up the sizes of the files, I get ~ 38 G. The sizes look correct.

7902068736

9462349824

10737418240

1073741824

10737418240

39912996864

-KjB

[CABF]

Yes, the total is correct. But I guess I'm not sure that all the files are correct.

I see two .vmdks, two -flat.vmdks and two -delta.vmdks. Does that reconcile with two virtual disks and a single snapshot?

Sorry for the weird question but I'm not completely au fait with the snapshot behaviour.

[weinstein5]

the delta represent a snapshot of each disk - the -delta.vmdk is where the block level changes are stored for the snapshots -

[TomHowarth]

the reason the your VM directory size is growing is due to the delta. a Delta is a VMwae snapshot file. as some point in time either your self or another admin has created a Snapshot. This action effectively freezes the orginal VMDK file and creates a new one of approximately 1.6m. what then happens is that all furture changes are done to the delta, so it grows. for example you have a Win2K3 disk and a new SP comes out. for safety you create a Snapshot. you then install the Service pack. you will just have created a vmware delta file of say 250MB, later your app team say that they have a new version of software. so you either create another snap or install the upgrade. this now either creates a new delta (00002) with a size of 100MB or increase the size of the first delta by 100MB to 350MB.

Every subsequent change to that servers VMDK that is saved to the guest is stored in the delta and not the flat.

if you are worried about the size of the delta note that the maximum size of a delta is 100% of the original VMDK and and previous Deltas. this is one of the reasons that VMware do not recommend the willy-nilly use of snapshost but recommend the are used only for small amounts of time.

If you are certain that there is no requirement of the Snap then I recommend that you "DELETE" it via the snapshot manager in VirtualCenter. note "DELETE actually means consodidate is commit the data in the Delta file to the original Delta (im my opinion this is a very confusing nonlecture)

Tom Howarth

VMware Communities User Moderator

[Abukar]

You need to delete all the snapshot and consolidate. That should get rid off the disk expanding. Make sure to delete snapshots as early as possible.