Virtualised Server 2003 locks up in a funny way. ESXi5

[AlexS75]

Hi All,

There is a story. Virtualised ( on Esxi 5) Server 2003 SBS Sp2 approx once a week or two locks up in a funny way... I can ping the server but cannot login via remote desktop.

when I use console from vSphere client I see only grey background and nothing else.

Clients computers are hanning when try to open my computer ( mapped network drives there)

The only choice I have is to force to power off VM. After a restart nothing really major in system log apart USB HDD was plugged out and ftdisk warning was logged.

We have 2 USB HDDs connected to the host computer one at the time for overnight backup purposes.The HDDs are being disconnected by end user without stopping the device. Could this cause an issue?

Any help is really appriciated.

Thanks

[dkraut]

Remove all unnecessary devices from the vm to test (USB, floppy).  Also, make sure vmware tools and the hardware version are current.  Is windows 2003 fully patched with updates?  Out of curiosity, what type of vNIC are you using, how much RAM and how many vCPU's?       

[AlexS75]

Thank you for your reply.

I have already disabled and unistalled everything I could trying to bring down to the minimum a number of possible culprits....

It is server 2003 sp2 fully patched.

What I noticed is that when drive is physically disconnected from host (without being stopped in guest OS)

i get in the VM event log

Warning message from sclatd420-1.hybridit.local:

USB device "Toshiba External USB 3.0" is no

longer connected to the virtual machine.

and after 2nd drive plugged in then it wouldn't pick it up automatically (connected to the same USB port) and my VM goes mad: able to ping but cannot access any network resources, cannot login from console or remotely.

had to power off VM and power it back on. after that:

Message from sclatd420-1.hybridit.local: A USB

device that was previously attached to this VM

could not be automatically reconnected. If the

device is still available but resides on a different

USB port, reconnect it manually.

info

09/10/2012 10:16:31

lcserver.lc.local

User

Was able to reconnect USB HDD manually...

This two harddrives were tested initially and everything was OK (I swapped them twice before)....

maybe I should suggest to the end user to stop it in guest OS before disconnecting?

vNIC is E1000 (is it wrong??). it comes up in safely remove device list. I do not want it there...

4gb of RAm allocated for Server 2003 (8gb on host computer)

no of vCPU 2, number of virtual sockets 2, number of cores per socket 1

thanks

[dkraut]

"maybe I should suggest to the end user to stop it in guest OS before disconnecting?"

Yep, that's what I'd try next. 

*Nothing wrong with the E1000.  It's not the highest performing vNIC, but it does provide good compatibility.  Not likely related to your issue...

http://kb.vmware.com/selfservice/microsites/search.do?language=en_US&cmd=displayKC&externalId=100180...