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Unable to take a quiesced VMware snapshot of a virtual machine

Details

  • During quiesced backup operations (VMware snapshots) on a virtual machine with Microsoft iSCSI LUNs attached within the guest operating system, virtual machines may become unresponsive
  • VMware snapshot operations may fail
  • You may see the error:

    Creating a quiesced snapshot failed because the created snapshot operation exceeded the time limit for holding     off I/O in the frozen virtual machine.
  • Using the snapshot manager through VMware Infrastructure (VI) Client to take a VMware snapshot of the virtual machine works without error.

Solution

When using the VSS or SYNC driver within a virtual machine, the tools attempt to quiesce all I/O (storage, memory, etc) within the virtual machine. 

If you are using Volume Shadow Copy service to perform the quiescing operation, see Troubleshooting Volume Shadow Copy quiesce related issues (1007696).

If you are using the SYNC driver to perform the quiescing operation, see A virtual machine can freeze under load when you take quiesced snapshots or use custom quiescing scripts (5962168).

If you are using Microsoft's iSCSI initiator within the virtual machine, you cannot perform snapshot operations on the virtual machine because it is not supported. For more information, see Running a Third-Party iSCSI initiator in the Virtual Machine in the SAN System Design and Deployment Guide for your version of ESX. 

Keywords

VCB, EMC Avamar, EMC Legato Networker, IBM Tivoli Storage Manager (TSM), Symantec BackupExec, Veritas NetBackup, CommVault Galaxy, Vizioncore vRanger/esxRanger/vRanger pro, CA Brightstor Arcserve, SyncSort Backup Express, vmbk.pl, esxPress, BakBone NetVault, Veeam Backup 3.0, NetApp SMVI, NetApp SnapDrive, EMC, IBM, NetApp, Compellent, LeftHand, Dell, EQLogic, 3PAR, AC&NC, Adaptec, Agami Sysmtems, AMI, BlueArc, Celeros, Cybernetics, DataCore, Dot Hill Systems, Enhance Technology, FalconStor, Fujitsu, H3C Technologies, HDS, Hifn, Hitachi, HP, Infortrend, Intransa, iQstor, iStor, NEC, Newtech, Nexsan, Open-E, Overland Storage, Pillar Data Systems, Promise, RELDATA, Sanrad, Stonefly, StorMagic, Sun, Wasabi, Xiotech

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Actions
  • KB Article: 1009073
  • Updated: Dec 8, 2009
  • Products:
    VMware Consolidated Backup
    VMware ESX
    VMware ESXi
    VMware Infrastructure Management Assistant
    VMware Infrastructure SDK
    VMware VirtualCenter
    VMware vCenter Server
    VMware vCenter Site Recovery Manager
  • Product Versions:
    VMware Consolidated Backup 1.0.x
    VMware Consolidated Backup 1.1.x
    VMware Consolidated Backup 1.5.x
    VMware ESX 3.0.x
    VMware ESX 3.5.x
    VMware ESXi 3.5.x Embedded
    VMware ESXi 3.5.x Installable
    VMware Infrastructure SDK 2.0.x
    VMware VirtualCenter 2.0.x
    VMware VirtualCenter 2.5.x