VM snapshot age exceeded threshold

[felyjos]

Hello,

I am getting an alert:
Alert: nworks VMware: VM snapshot age exceeded threshold
Resolution state: New
Source: voforefrontcs1
Path:
Last modified by: System
Last modified time: 6/9/2011 8:45:33 AM
Alert description: VMGuest 'voforefrontcs1' (on mbesx9.ad) has exceeded threshold for snapshot age over 114 samples. Current snapshot age is 135 hours
Alert view link "http://OPMGRRMS1.ad:51908/default.aspx?DisplayMode=Pivot&AlertID=%7b0fc7c5cc-f17e-46db-8556-94ced6c30c00%7d"

but when I go to the vSphereClient Home > Directory > Datastore > VMEVAStor7 > voforefrontcs1 I find a date of today's date ...

Where is the real last snapshot date on VEEAM?

Thanks,
Dom

[felyjos]

and the snapshot runs between 45 minutes and 90 minutes each time!!! 120 Gb VM???
is it normal?
Thanks,
Dom

[Alec King]

Hi Dominique,

Apologies for the delay in replying! We moved this forum into "Veeam nworks" recently, and it seems I did not get a notification of this post...I only found it by chance when browsing.

Anyway, the Snapshot Age monitor in nworks does not scan the datastore (this would have a big performance impact) - we get the age from the VMware API on vCenter. But the age should match the oldest 'snapshot' (*.vmsn) file in the VM folder on the datastore.

To your other question, if it takes 45 - 90 minutes for you to take a snapshot of this VM - then I think you could have a performance issue...perhaps a storage I/O bottleneck? I'd review what kind of storage you have, and how many VMs you are running there.

Cheers,
Alec

[felyjos]

Hello,

Could I get the path to see the date of the last snapshot for a VM?
Thanks,
Dom

[Alec King]

Hi Dom,

If you open your Datastore Browser (from the vCenter client), then you can find the snapshot file(s) for any VM in the folder where you store the VM disks (vmdk).
In the VM folder are .vmsn files, type = 'snapshot file'
The timestamp of the oldest of these files will be where nworks gets Snapshot Age (in hours).

Cheers,
Alec

[felyjos]

Hello,

Sorry to jump in this thread but the root is the one I was looking for
I saw the informtion but how to chnage how long the vmdk snapshots are kept in the vCenter, I could noyt find the setting? in nWorks it is 48 hours apparently so I need to have a match !!!

Thanks,
Dom

[Alec King]

Hi Dom,
I don't think there is any policy in vCenter on 'how long to keep a snapshot'...snapshots in vCenter will just stay, and grow, and eventually cause problems! That's the whole reason I implemented a Monitor in SCOM for this
Cheers
Alec

[felyjos]

Hi Alec,
The idea is excellent... but in our environment I will have to disbale it as we have snapshots for months!!! or may be years !!!

Thanks,
Dom

[felyjos]

Hello,

Sorry to jump back on this thread but I found a machine with a vmsn file type "Snapshot File" old which explains the SCOM alert but most of the machines do not have a they have vmsd type "file", is it correct? I think so as the snapshot should not stays it should be removed at one point?

Thanks,
DOm

[chrisdearden]

the vmsd does contain snapshot metadata , however it might not always fully get cleaned up. I would look for vmdk files with a <diskname>-00001.vmdk type format - also not the size of any delta files. The longer a snapshot remains open the larger that delta will be, up to the size of the original vmdk.