Automatic virtual machine startup and shutdown option is disabled/greyed out

[air-wolf]

I upgraded to the latest vCenter and esxi5 update and now I cannot set automatic virtual machine startup and shutdown within the configuration in VC. The option is disabled and greyed out. I checked my cluster and all 3 host within the vcenter are greyed out. I can however logon the host directly and the option is enabled and not greyed out.  how can I fix this issue? it is not the permission issue as I logon with the highest permission in vCenter.

[RanjnaAggarwal]

Try to reconnect the esxi servers in the vCenter.

[john23]

Are you using 5.0 u1 build.

Release notes says ,it has been  fixed in this release

Automatic virtual machine  startup and shutdown option is  disabled when host is part of a HA (High  Availability) cluster
In vCenter Server the ESX host setting  Allow virtual machines to start  and stop automatically with the system  should be disabled when the host  is added to a HA cluster, as this  feature is not supported with HA. The  option to re-enable the setting  should be greyed out when the host is in  the HA cluster.
This issue  is resolved in this release.

http://www.vmware.com/support/vsphere5/doc/vsp_vc50_u1_rel_notes.htmla

[air-wolf]

yes, I am using the latest version to rebuild my infrastructure.

vCenter Server 5.0 Update 1 | Build 623373

reconnect does not help either.

[john23]

Your end to end setup is 5.0 u1 (means esxi and vCenter server)?

Just got this blog link...

http://longwhiteclouds.com/2012/03/28/auto-start-breaks-in-5-0-update-1-not-just-free-vsphere-hyperv...

[air-wolf]

yes, vcenter and host are both withe the latest version that I downloaded from vmware 2 weeks ago. both are 5.0 with update 1 Build 623373.

[a_p_]

As mentioned by john23 this is not an issue, this is by design. For ESXi hosts in a HA cluster, automatic startup and shutdown is not supported.

André

[air-wolf]

ok, so if it is by designed then how I set specific vm to start and specific vm not to start when hosts are down. obviously I do not to have all my test and development vms up and running as it should only be up by manually start it.

[a_p_]

In a cluster environment your options are basically to start the VMs manually as needled or by running a script. You may find some samples in the VMware vSphere™ PowerCLI forum.

André

[air-wolf]

"by running a script" what running a script??? now i have to write a dam script to start the vm that i want in case host went down? that i ridiculous. if they take that feature away, should they replace with something else similiar or better instead of going backward?

[a_p_]

Just to make sure we are talking about the same thing. A script may be an option to power on the desired VMs in case all the hosts were powered off. When you say "...to start the vm that i want in case host went down" this looks more like you are asking for HA functionality!? With HA configured properly a VM which was running on the failed host, will be powered back on on another host in the cluster automatically.

André

[UmeshAhuja]

Hi,

VMware has posted a blog article about this issue:

http://blogs.vmware.com/vsphere/2012/03/free-esxi-hypervisor-auto-start-breaks-with-50-update-1.html

In short : This is a bug and not intentional,  It effects the free license exsi. The only fix at this time is to boot a pre-update 1 hypervisor. It will be corrected in a future patch

[air-wolf]

HA function is to keep the vm guest running if the host went down but does not address the auto power on of vm guest if for some reason I need to bring all esx hosts down. Previous version of esx I can specific with vm to power on or leave off after the hosts are power up if I bring them all down for any reason so that I don't have to manually start each vm guest after all hosts back online. So with this version by design, how would they address the vm power up if I power down all the hosts then start up all the hosts? I dont see how the vm get start up it I cannot set up the power up option. Start up Manually by me? Obviously HA only addresss vm on the host went down.

So if I have vm A, B and C running all in a cluster HA of e esx. I vm on each esx and for some reason I want to bring all the hosts and vm down at the same time. I then power down all 3 vms the 3 esx hosts. Do whatever I need to do the power all 3 esx hosts up at the same time. All hosts are now up running the what about my vm A,B and C. Will they get startup auto or do I need to manually start them up?

[a_p_]

Will they get startup auto or do I need to manually start them up?

Unfortunately the answer is "manually". The Startup/Shutdown is a host based feature. When running a cluster, the VM's could run on any host, so on which one of the hosts would you configure the automatic startup? Powering on VMs on any host without the control of HA/DRS could result in violations of HA/DRS rules.

André

[ChristophHerdeg]

A.P.,

really: having to do that manually is pure crap. The obvious answer to the question which VM should be started on which Host must be "on the host they run last". Obeying rules just to obey rules was, is and will ever be the poorest way to manage things...just to have said that once again.

I have a similar but at the same completely different problem: I'd like our HA-enabled ESXi Hosts to shutdown all VMs automagically when they themselves get the shutdown order from the vMA over the APC PowerChute Network Shutdown installation there. And, with a feature like automatically starting / stopping VMs existing, I would really not like having to manually shutdown VMs or be forced to write shellscripts to do that. Especially not then if the only and single reason for all that effort is to force the user not to violate HA/DRS rules.

Regards,

Chris

[frenchyaz]

Good question.... and indeed startup/restart of the VMs with hosts are hosts based policies.

You can still disable HA and DRS in a cluster to manage your VMs. HA is making sure that your VMs will restart on another host if the current host is offline however you can manually restart any VMs from your host down if needed on any other host as they are in  cluster and they share storage. DRS allows load balancing but in your case seems like it doesn't matter for what you want to accomplish.

What you could try:

create some anti-affinity rules between VMs or/and hosts and see if it suits you

create a vAPP (or multiple for instance: Critical / low / test VMs) which will allow you to regroup VMs that need to restart all together, following an order, having to click only one start/stop button

The vAPP might do what you're looking for coupled with some other settings (affinity rules for the vAPP if possible, ...).

Just throwing stuff out there, every environment is different.

Good luck!

[air-wolf]

I opened a case with vmware and below is there responded.

Quote:

"

According to both the 4.1 and 5.0 documentation, virtual machine startup and shutdown is not supported in an HA cluster:

http://pubs.vmware.com/vsphere-50/topic/com.vmware.ICbase/PDF/vsphere-esxi-vcenter-server-501-virtua... page 203

The Virtual Machine Startup and Shutdown (automatic startup) feature is disabled for all virtual machines residing on hosts that are in (or moved into) a vSphere HA cluster. Automatic startup is not supported when used with vSphere HA.

https://www.vmware.com/pdf/vsphere4/r41/vsp_41_availability.pdf page 22

NOTE The Virtual Machine Startup and Shutdown (automatic startup) feature is disabled for all virtual machines residing on hosts that are in (or moved into) a VMware HA cluster. Automatic startup is not

This feature has never worked in an HA cluster.  The reasoning is that High Availability is a clustered feature.  Virtual machine startup/shutdown is a host feature.  Since the virtual machines are in a cluster, there is no guarantee they will stay on that host.  In the past if you enabled this feature in a HA cluster, then you experienced a product defect.  This should not happen.

Currently, VMware does not offer any feature that provides the capabilities you are asking for.  I'd suggest that you consider using a scripting method to accomplish what you are looking for.  The vSphere PowerCLI is one such tool that you could utilize to create a custom script.  It is available here:

https://www.vmware.com/support/developer/PowerCLI/ .  Assistance for our SDK tools can be found on our communities here:  http://communities.vmware.com/community/vmtn/developer .

"

[ChristophHerdeg]

An answer that sounds like coming from Microsoft. Hey VMware: That's really poor.

[air-wolf]

yup, that is really poor answer. I have asked them to escalte the case and see what the escalate  have to say.

[ChristophHerdeg]

Hi air-wolf,

there is another thread about this sorry topic...http://communities.vmware.com/message/2047035#2047035...maybe its contents help illustrating to the escalation team that VMwares denial of VM-Autostart/-stop in HA/DRS-Clusters is a real problem for not to few customers.

Regards,

Chris