Vmware ESX - can't stop or start VM!

[Red Squirrel]

I have a VM that seems to be between a shut down and a startup, so it wont let me shut it down because it says it's already shut down but it also wont let me start because it says it's already started.

I tried to post on vmware's forums but they keep changing them around making it harder and harder to figure out. I gave up after spending 10 minutes trying to figure out how to make a new post. They should really use a standard forum software that is familiar to most people...

We are running ESX4 in a vsphere environment. I was going to try to shut down the host but I can't migrate any VMs off it because that host has a special setting on the vswitch.

 

[yinan]

I think you are going to have to stop all the VMs on this host. What is the special setting on the vswitch?

 

[Red Squirrel]

We had to enable promiscuous(sp?) mode and imo we should of did it on all hosts if we were going to. I cannot migrate any of the VMs as we get an error about a network policy being different.

I decided to load the vmdk on another VM and I was able to boot into windows. I think that was a mistake, as I don't think it loaded it with the snapshot, so now the disk is probably inconsistent with the snapshot. I hope this is not the case...

 

[yinan]

Why didnt you just enable p-mode on the other switch temporarily? I believe the snapshot is tied to the vmdk not the machine so I think you wont be in bad shape. If you are running ESX4 you should use the dvswitch cause it makes life much easier.

 

[Red Squirrel]

Why didnt you just enable p-mode on the other switch temporarily? I believe the snapshot is tied to the vmdk not the machine so I think you wont be in bad shape. If you are running ESX4 you should use the dvswitch cause it makes life much easier.

yeah we should have just put that setting on more then one switch. I was not the one who did it so I'm not sure what's involved. Guessing I have to put a host in maintenance mode then migrate all the vms off it.

I'm checking to see if we have any backups at this point. Our backup solution is kinda half in place which is scary.

 

[Red Squirrel]

ok managed to do a host restart, no go. I am going to build a new VM and hopefully the backups work. Turns out the backup job ran right before we powered it off, so I'll try that job, if it fails then I'll try the one before. *crosses fingers*. I'm actually going to eat supper with the guys at work so we can probably bounce ideas off each other at the same time while there.