vCenter 4.0 to 5.0 upgrade issue (database transaction logs)

[ChintanWaghmare]

HI,

I am trying to upgrade vCenter 4.0 to 5.0, but facing an issue for which I coundnt find a solution.

I know that, the process upgrades the existing database. But while the upgrade is in process, the database log file grows more than 50 GB in size that fills the free space on my harddisk partition.

Tried changing the recovery mode for the database to bulked and simple but with no luck.

Did anyone faced similar issues, or have any idea about it ?

[Sreejesh_D]

Welcome to communities!

When upgrading from vCenter 4.0 to vCenter 5 the recovery model for the vCenter database is changed to Bulk-logged as part of the upgrade process, this may be the reason for increase in transaction log size.

VMware is aware of this and the KB - http://kb.vmware.com/kb/7434572 says

Ensure that you have sufficient disk space before upgrading. Add 10% more disk space to the estimate shown in the Database Upgrade wizard to determine the amount of disk space needed.

Once upgrade is successfull you can change the recovery model to Simple.

[ChintanWaghmare]

well, yes I am aware of that.

But what I do not understand here is, my mdf file is around 12 GB.

Hence I guess, the log file should grow at the maximum twice the mdf file size (correct me if I am wrong) that is around 24 to 25 GB.

But in my case , when I start the database upgrades process, the log files grows more than 50 GB. unwillingliy I then have to cancel the process, delete the sql database, and restore my original 4.0 server.

[jimraina]

Hi ChintanWaghma…,

Welcome to the community. Have you follwed below steps .If not could you please do that .       Ensure that you have a good backup of the database. Do not skip this step.     Shutdown the VMware VirtualCenter Server service and any other services (such as VMware VDI or VMware Lab Manager) that use the database.      Note: Ensure that you have a recent backup of the vCenter database before continuing. Do not skip this step.      Truncate the table VPX_HIST_STAT1 table and corresponding VPX_SAMPLE_TIME1 table. Once the truncate has completed verify if the the rollup jobs are now completing successfully. See step 4 for further deatils..      Warning: The truncate function is destructive. VMware highly recommends that a Database Administrator perform this step.      truncate table VPX_HIST_STAT1;     truncate table VPX_SAMPLE_TIME1;      If the rollup jobs do not complete successfully you may need to truncate the next table VPX_HIST_STAT2 table and corresponding VPX_SAMPLE_TIME2 table      Continue truncating the VPX_HIST_STAT[1-4] tables and corresponding VPX_SAMPLE_TIME[1-4] tables until the rollup jobs are completing successfully.      Note: The following are additional tables in vCenter Server 4.1 and 5.0 which can also be truncated to further reduce the vCenter server Database size. These tables get populated with data from VPX_HIST_STAT1      truncate table VPX_TEMPTABLE0;     truncate table VPX_TEMPTABLE1;     truncate table VPX_TEMPTABLE2;      Run the rollup scripts, using the following steps.      (a)  Using SQL Management Studio, connect to the SQL database for vCenter Server.     (b)  Navigate to SQL Server Agent > Jobs     (c)  Select the individual rollup jobs > right-click and select Start Job at Step.      Start the VMware VirtualCenter Server service and any other service service that you stopped in step 2.       p>

"You are stronger than you think"

[KennyView]

I have the same issue. Took a backup op the vcenter 4.0 db (100GB), reinstalled vcenter with Win 2K8 R2 SP1, installed SQL server, created 64bit DSN and started vcenter upgrade.

Process is now hanging at "upgrading vcenter database"

LDF is meanwhile grown to 320 GB, MDF is 100GB.

If the process will need another 120GB, my data disk wil be full and all need to cancel the upgrade.

Any idea is welcome, SR already created waiting for VMWare Support

Kenny

[ChintanWaghmare]

Hi,

Thanks, I finally sorted this.

Found that the stats were using more space in the database around 10-11 GB.

Cleared that and database size reduced to 800 mb

I have wrttien the whole process on my blog here

[EXPRESS]

I found this out over the weekend myself the hardway as well. What a PITA that was, my DR site no problem upgraded without any issues. Primary site was a horror story still getting over it. I had same issue with database, tooks about 2 hours to truncate it.