- VMware Technology Network
- :
- Cloud & SDDC
- :
- Guest Operating Systems
- :
- Virtual Machine, Guest OS and VM Tools Discussions
- :
- Can't delete snapshots - even unmounted disks
- Subscribe to RSS Feed
- Mark Topic as New
- Mark Topic as Read
- Float this Topic for Current User
- Bookmark
- Subscribe
- Mute
- Printer Friendly Page
- Mark as New
- Bookmark
- Subscribe
- Mute
- Subscribe to RSS Feed
- Permalink
- Report Inappropriate Content
Can't delete snapshots - even unmounted disks
First of all thanks to you all for the help found in this site.
We are using Vsphere 4.1, 12 node cluster.
It's been 2 months since I started this problem, I've been following most threads of this issue and I found good answers, but I still have a problem.
We are using Veritas Netbackup 7.0.1, we were trying to backup some machines "vmware-way", so it takes a snapshot, backups it and deletes snapshots.
Some machines after time of use failed, backups couldn't be removed.
Vsphere said "Unable to access file <unspecified filename> since it is locked"
The backups can be seen on the snapshot manager as "Consolidated helper XX. XX"
I found this problem in 4 machines 2 nearly solved 2 still stucked.
What I first tried is, make a new snapshot, and then delete all : Snapshots didn't appear then in snapshot manager, nor even by commandline, but they were in the disk and when I do a backup they appear once again.
If I do delete in Snapshot manager
"vmware-cmd VMachine.vmx" hassnapshot
hassnapshot() = 0"
Some machines lost the CID in delta files, so I linked delta files onde again i love this command to check :
egrep -i "cid|parentcid|vmdk" VMachine.vmdk VMachine-0000{0,1,2}{0,1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9}.vmdk --color
I read this can happen in 4.0 when you have a snapshot and vmotion-storage machin.
Then I tried linking disks and creating a new one:
vmkfstools -i VMachine-000031.vmdk /vmfs/volumes/4bfbb494-33e7760f-d8d385e07428/VMachine_1/VMachine_2.vmdk
VMachine Worked!
But I had to stop VMachine, and delta files couldn't be deleted. Even after removing the disk from VMachine
[root@ borrar]# rm VMachine.vmdk
rm: remove regular file `VMachine.vmdk'? y
rm: cannot remove `VMachine.vmdk': Device or resource busy
[root@ borrar]# vmkfstools -D VMachine.vmdk
[root@ borrar]# tail /var/log/vmkernel
Jan 20 13:17:53 esxcem06 vmkernel: gen 903, mode 0, owner 00000000-00000000-0000-000000000000 mtime 23
owner 00000000-00000000-0000-000000000000 - Unknown machine locking my disk files
I tried lunreset for removing disk locks :
vmkfstools -L lunreset vmhbaX:X:X:X
It didn't work well.
Then we updated to 4.1 and all hosts in the cluster were restarted, I was able to delete those files at last !
So...
Has any of you found other way to delete unwanted snapshots?
I've read cloning Vmachine would work but I'm affraid not needed delta files get stucked once again and so I need to reboot 12 nodes to delete them, witch scares me !
I hope you find this thread usefull and some one can help.
Thanks in advance.
Used links
http://virtrix.blogspot.com/2007/06/vmware-dreadful-sticky-snapshot.html