Hang when creating virtual disk

[sstoppel]

I am using VMWare GSX on a SUSE linux box. The hardware is an HP DL360 G4 Proliant.

I have installed and patched the OS. When I try to create a virtual machine the progress bar freezes during the creation of the 4 GB virtual disk file. I then cannot exit VMWare cleanly.

I used the Proliant smartstart disk to check ram and disk, all came out OK. I am not using the SMP kernel. What could be wrong? Any suggestions?

 

[comtec17]

Can you give a high level overview of the complete VM Setup you are attempting?

 

[sstoppel]

I am fairly new to VMWare so I am not sure what you are asking.

Right now I am creating the first virtual machine. Eventually I will have a GroupWise mail server, a mail gateway, an antivirus/antispam server, and possibly a honeypot on it. I have 4 GB of RAM, eventually I may upgrade to 8 GB. All machines are using bridged networking.

I just found out late yesterday that the RAM I bought may actually be spec'ed for the G3 proliant, so that may be the issue.

In truth, this really feels like a hardware problem. I just thought I would post it here in case there was something obvious I was missing. Thanks for the interest.

 

[comtec17]

I was wanting to know more about your hardware and the process you were using to create the VM.

I am hoping that all the servers you plan on using on VMware are very lightly loaded. Due to the nature of applications you are wanting to use, these can actually suck up all your resources and may not be worth putting on as a VM.

 

[SgtBeavis]

sstoppel,

Are you creating a monolithic disk or are you dividing your vm into 2GB segments? I'm not sure of file size limitations on ext3 (if that is the filesystem you are using) but splitting the vmdk files up might help.

If you are already splitting it up into sections, try going monolithic (everything on one file)





Microsoft Certified Nut.

 

[sstoppel]

SgtBeavis, I will give the disk size a try on Monday, and let you all know how it works out. Thanks for the suggestions.

 

[sstoppel]

Neither monolithic nor 2 GB chunks worked - this is getting wierd. I am going to try a rebuild with each drive of the mirrored pair individually.

 

[Chacalinc]

you can create the virtual disk manually (by CLI) and then create the new virtual machine using the existing virtua disk.

[tt]vmware-vdiskmanager -c -a <option_a> -s <size>[GB|MB] -t [0|1|2|3] virtual_disk_file.vmdk[/tt]

Where:

<option_a> could be:
* ide — for an IDE adapter.
* buslogic — for a BusLogic SCSI adapter.
* lsilogic — for an LSI Logic SCSI adapter.

<size> can be expressed in GB or MB (you must specify it)

-t opcions must be:

0 — to create a single, growable virtual disk.
1 — to create a growable virtual disk split into 2GB files.
2 — to create a preallocated virtual disk contained in a single virtual disk file.
3 — to create a preallocated virtual disk split into 2GB files.

man vmware-vdiskmanager

-or visit:

http://www.vmware.com/support/gsx3/doc/disks_vdiskmanager_run_gsx.html

Chacal, Inc.

 

[sstoppel]

I'll give it a go, Chacalinc. Thanks for the post

 

[sstoppel]

Appears to have been a problem with the hardware. Thanks everyone for the input.