backup failed impossible to remove snapshot

[avtis]

Case # 00508342

hello,

i hope you can help me please

i don't known why and how but since last week, i have got an error on one VM in a job : another task is already in progress

i try a lot of tips/KB but whithout success (restart managemennt services, remove snapshot in vsphere client)

when a start a ssh's connection to the esxi and i launch "vim-cmd vmsvc/snapshot.remveall" i have got this error : "remove all asnapshots failed"

can you help please?

the snapshots continue to grow up since last week !

thanks

[Vitaliy S.]

Hello,

What vSphere version are you at? I see that you've tried to remove the snapshot, however did you try to create a snapshot and then delete the entire snapshot tree? Also what about consolidation operation? Does it work? One more thing I would take a look at is VM log files that can be found in the VM home directory.

P.S. what kind of VM is it? Can you temporary power it down and try to remove the snapshot? BTW, did you add remove disks to this VM while it was running on the snapshot?

Thank you!

[avtis]

hello,

vSphere version : 4.1
i try tio create a snapshot for delete but i got the same error : another task is already in progress
i try to consolidate and i got again the error : another task is already in progress
there a lot of VMware files log, VMware.log, vmware3.log, vmware5.log, ....
the VM is a exchange server 2010/Windows server 2008 in production so not possible to shutdown, i do not add/remove disk on this VM while snapshot

[Vitaliy S.]

Do you see any related error messages in the latest VM log file (VMware.log)? Also according to this KB article powering this VM off and then committing the snapshot might help.

[avtis]

i can power the vm right now, because in production and it is a exchange server

in the vm log file there are a lot of information but i do not see a lot of things that can help us

Jan 22 06:29:52.744: vmx| VmdbPipeStreamsOvlError Couldn't read: OVL_STATUS_EOF

Jan 22 06:29:54.924: vmx| Vix: [41954732 mainDispatch.c:2610]: VMAutomation: Connection Error (4) on connection 0

[Vitaliy S.]

Did you have a chance to consult with VMware team on the reason why snapshot cannot be removed?

[tsightler]

If your backup was using hotadd you might want to make sure that the disk is not still attached to the proxy server. I'm not sure your error messages really match this issue, but that's one of the most common issues that I see that prevents snapshot removal.

[avtis]

do you have an idea to be sure that there are disk attached or not ?

i do not again consult the VMware team

[Vitaliy S.]

You can take a look at your backup proxy VM configuration via vSphere Client to verify if there any disks still attached to it.

[Marten_med_e]

I have seen this behavior twice, another task already in progress

First time it was an ongoing snapshot commitment on a I/O intensive virtual server and the management agent on the Vmware host had crashed, that's why we didn't see any ongoing task in vCenter console, luckily I could not turn off the virtual server because it didn't respond to any commands from the vCenter console.

-Did restart the management agent on the ESXi host, had to reconnect to the host in vCenter console, I did this during production and it did not affect the running VM's on that host. Then it was just to wait the snapshot commitment to be done, took almost two days to compleat.

Second time was when I tried to start a virtual server that I had shut down, for some reason that I has forgot now, but when I clicked on the start icon, all I got was "Another task in progress" and the server didn't start. It was a production server.

-This one was also fixed by restarting the management agent on the ESXi host.

Easiest way to restart the management agent is from the ESXi host console, login, navigate to " Restart the management agent" option. Both times I had to reconnect the host in the vCenter console, I did a test some time ago when I after restarting the management agent didn't reconnect manually and after a while the server did reconnect it self, but for every minute it's not connected my pulse raised, and then this was on a ESXi host in a Vmware cluster without any guest running but still.

\\Mårten
<'(((><

[avtis]

thanks for yours answers

in the backup proxy vm configuration, no disk is attach

i will try to restart management agent (again) then i will come back to you for the result

[avtis]

it's ok ! after restart management agent, no task did in work, so i have delete all snapshot

thanks all