ESXi network/past day empty on vCenter 4.1

[piaroa]

Hello there,

I'm running ESXi 4.1 hosts and vCenter 4.1. I just noticed that the Network/Past Day/Week/Month are empty. If I select real-time I see data and the counters below the chart show correctly.

This happens for all hosts, but not for individual VMs. I checked to see if my lab setup had the same behaviour and it does.

Do you guys see anything under Host > Performance > Network / Past Day ?. Also, when customizing the chart to show Past Day, they only selectable counter shown is "Usage", is this normal ?

I don't see any DB related errors or anything out of order.

Thanks in advance,

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[idle-jam]

is the time in your vcenter server accurate?

iDLE-jAM | VCP 2, VCP 3 & VCP 4

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[piaroa]

Yeah, vCenter and all hosts are ntp synched.

I think this is a bug in vCenter:

http://communities.vmware.com/message/1629634;jsessionid=4E0E283DCB4FA2ACAA4AF261ED9C0A44

The actual issue is that the "Usage" counter for ANY network graph for a host is always 0. And since this is the only available counter for everything other than Real Time, I always get 0.

If I select the "Usage" counter and unselect everything else from the Real Time view, it will still show 0.

Just need to confirm this also happens to you guys.

Thanks,

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[piaroa]

This has to be a bug. I just connected to a host directly and selected only the "Usage" counter on the Real Time graphs, and I get 0 KBps (on an active host).

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[piaroa]

Confirmed by VMware Support, it's a bug. They say it will be resolved in Update 1, coming this same week!

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[allencrawford]

We seem to have the same or very similar problem that I just noticed today myself. Did they really say 4.1 U1 was coming out this week? I was told more like January. Are you sure it wasn't maybe patch 1? Not that they have release dates for these things, but they do seem overdue for U1 to me...

[piaroa]

I stand corrected. They say ESXi 4.1 Patch 1. So, since the 4.1 release date there have been zero patches?

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[RParker]

This has to be a bug. I just connected to a host directly and selected only the "Usage"

NO that's not a bug.. that's 2 DIFFERENT systems. vCenter reports on performance and the HOST does the same, vCenter is NOT merely reading the host statistics, it keeps its OWN related to that host...

There is an easy check, you look at vCenter system status, if it says "Performance statistics rollup from pastday (pastmonth) to past week (pastyear) is not occurring in the data", then the sciprts are not running. It's easy to fix.

[RParker]

Not that they have release dates for these things, but they do seem overdue for U1 to me...

I wouldn't think patches would come out this soon, since 4.1 came out a couple months ago.. 4.1 fixed MANY issues, but this is not one of them, it's a database script bug, and there is a known fix for it, search for the error message (administration / vCenter server status) and look for it on the KB.

[RParker]

So, since the 4.1 release date there have been zero patches?

you are obviously misinformed..

4.1 IS an update/patch. Since 4.0 there has been 3 patches.

[allencrawford]

I should probably clarify that maybe I skimmed this post too fast. My issue with the network performance charts (advanced) is this:

• Select a single host

• Click Performance tab

• Click Advanced

• Choose Network > Real-time

• Select one or more pNICs

• Select "Usage" as the counter you want (deselect the rest).

• Click OK

Results in a "No metrics specified" message.

If you repeat the above process, but choose the host as the only object (as opposed to the individual pNICs), then it works fine. The only way I can get individual pNIC usage seems to be if I choose said pNICs, then choose the "Data receive rate" and "Data transmit rate" counters and do the addition myself. If I select just one or more pNICs and then click ALL counters, it will work, but it'll remove "Usage" as one of my selections and not show it on the chart.

Maybe this is all by design and "Usage" is not a valid counter for a pNIC (only the host itself), but even if so, I don't understand why it doesn't error out when I click OK instead of telling me I selected no metrics when I did.

[allencrawford]

Meh, you're playing semantics now. Sure 4.1 fixed lots of 4.0 bugs, but it also generated its own list of bugs, which is what I was referring to when I said a patch/update for 4.1 seems overdue. It has many known issues, one of the worst releases from a quality control standpoint that I've seen from VMware. All sorts of backwards compatible things are broken. Try managing a 4.0 U1 vCenter when you have both the 4.0 and 4.1 vSphere Client installed on the same machine. Search is broken, can't adjust EVC settings on a cluster, broken storage monitoring plugin, etc. See http://communities.vmware.com/message/1644531. I have an SR open right now with some search issues, one of which (not the Tomcat-based one) is a known issue when you have ESXi 4.0 hosts in a 4.1 vCenter still.

In looking at the release dates for ESX 4.0, actually it did take about six months for the first update. But it only took about two months for the first patch. So far there have been no patches or anything for ESXi 4.1. Sure seems like one should be coming for ESXi or vCenter soon with the DST bug and other issues they have warnings about on the download page. But again, maybe what I'm experiencing is normal behavior. It certainly is the least of my current worries/issues.

[piaroa]

I didn't ask how many patches have been available since 4.0.

So yeah NO patches released so far since 4.1 has been available.

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[piaroa]

VMware Support seems to think different and they confirm it's a "known issue". Would you mind pointing to the KB you refer to?. My vCenter Server status page is all green.

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[ThompsG]

I'm with you on this one that it is a bug. We currently have a SR open with VMware as we are seeing the same thing.

We are part way through upgrading our hosts with ESX 4.1 and have noticed that all network stats for a host are reading zero. Even pointing a vSphere client directly at the host gives the same results. ESXTOP is fine so must be something with the retrieval of the data from the host. Yes I know these get rolled up in the vCenter DB for Daily/Weekly views but it needs realtime in order to roll these up.

I'm pretty sure this is not a vCenter DB issue because of the following:

- using vCenter to view the network performance charts of a ESX 4.0 host shows network information

- pointing a vSphere client directly at the host reports NO network usage

Will wait to see what VMware support says, but watching with interest.

Kind regards,

Glen

[ThompsG]

Hi,

Also had it confirmed by VMware support that this is a bug with ESX 4.1.

At this stage there is no work around (apart from rolling back to ESX 4.0) but will be fixed with Update 1. This is due for release in the next couple of weeks or so.

Recommend people check the Network Performance Charts of the ESX 4.1 hosts and see if the stats all read zero or close to it. Does not appear to effect the stats at a VM level - i.e. opening the Network Performance Charts for a guest still has figures.

Now if I can just get VMware to take these stats and roll them up to a host level for the week or so we are missing all would be good again in VMware land post Update 1

Kind regards.

[piaroa]

Looking forward to that Patch 1, Update 1 or whatever it is. Just fix this.

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[piaroa]

So the first patch bundle for ESXi 4.1 has been applied to our hosts, and the issue persists as it doesn't address the problem.

I opened a new SR, and this time I was told that I had been giving innacurate info, and that this will be resolved in Update 1, due for release on Q1 2011 (February they said)

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[ThompsG]

I opened a new SR, and this time I was told that I had been giving innacurate info, and that this will be resolved in Update 1, due for release on Q1 2011 (February they said)

I knew it was not fixed in patch 1, however VMware support assured me that around the end of November Update 1 would be released. When I rang VMware support they only had two calls logged for this issue and because of this VMware decided it wasn't a high priority fix so would not release the fix with patch 1 but would be waiting for Update 1. Hmmm, feel a follow up phone call with VMware support coming as we are not prepared to wait until some time in Q1 2011 for a fix.

[allencrawford]

So, 4.1 update 1 is now released.  Have you had a chance to upgrade anything yet?  So far in my lab it appears that vCenter 4.1 U1 alone does NOT fix the problem.  But once I upgrade the ESXi hosts to 4.1 U1, then the problem is resolved.  Not sure if it requires both ends to be upgraded to fix it or just ESXi (according to the compatibility matrix you can install ESXi 4.1 U1 on a vCenter 4.1 [non-U1] server).  Regardless, I'm getting non zeroes now in the lab, so it seems to be fixed now.