VMware ESX and HBA raw access

[SnIphe]

Hi all,

Last Saturday I worked in a customer that have a rare issue.
They had 2 VM over two ESXs 3.0.1 W2003 Server with SQL Server.
This machines has two disks, one for data and one for logs, and the access is raw. This disk are not virtual disk.

Well, while the virtual machines are running, all is sucessfull, but if the cu do a shutdown and later power on the virtual machine, the disks are visibles by the VMs, but the data is lost!!!!.

In the event viewer appear messages like that:

The file system structure on the disk is corrupt and unusable. Please run the chkdsk utility on the volume BBDD.
Event ID: 55

Then, the cu executed chkdsk and.... The disk was usefull again. No data lost and the consistence it's ok.

We get the output of the vmsupport, and scalate the issue at the HP-VMware CC. The HP-VMware CC peolple's was doing various recommedation... The first and most important was isolates HBAs Emulex & Qlogic. The cu had machines with 2 kind of HBAs, Emulex & Qlogic.

The last Thursday a colleague isolate the HBAs, the Emulex with Emulex and Qlogic with Qlogic. Friday the problem disappear, and Saturday and Sunday the cu was doing databases restores and performance probes... All was ok, but the error appear in the event viewer... The only diference is that the FS was stable, but the error appear :(

Something else have a issue like this? What do you think about the problem? Is VMware problem, or Windows problem? The RAW access can be a problem? Geometry of disks?...

Any idea will be very esteemed.

Thank you very much in advanced.

NOTE: Is There any forum dedicated to VMware?

Pablo.

[Steven E. Protter]

Shalom Pablo,

At this time there is no vmware forum. It is certainly possible to suggest it.

http://forums1.itrc.hp.com/service/forums/questionanswer.do?threadId=1157828

http://www1.itrc.hp.com/service/help/askQuestion.do

Make sure the ESX server is patched. This is possible to accomplish. Windows 2003 Server must also be patched according to guidelines from vmware.

SEP