Automatically power on VMs

[dya]

The "Automatically power on VMs" check box is available for both cloud and cluster.

What exactly is this setting?

Also, if the cloud and cluster settings are different, which one will be effective?

*This is a machine translation, so I apologize if it is difficult to understand.

[juli70ken]

When an individual physical host (like an ESXi server in VMware, or a hypervisor host in other platforms) powers on, this setting dictates if the VMs registered on that specific host should also power on automatically.  

[dya]

Just like with ESXi, if you stop the VM, stop ESXi, and then start ESXi, the VM will not start automatically.
Is this a feature that can only be used with Enterprise?

[dya]

Does anyone know?

[Arnout_Verbeken · Accepted solution]

Ths setting will start vms if they are powered off for a reason outside of a user choosing stop in the Morpheus UI. 
Without a heartbeat datastore, this only occurs at cluster sync. 
With heartbeat datastores, this will occur even if Morpheus sees the VM offline with the agent communication between the hosts (preferred).

From: https://support.hpe.com/hpesc/public/docDisplay?docId=sd00006453en_us&docLocale=en_US&page=GUID-DF2E9770-41E5-4B45-BF8C-5021CBABF4C6.html
When enabled, HPE Morpheus Enterprise will maintain the expected power state of managed VMs. HPE Morpheus Enterprise will power on any managed VMs in the Cloud that have been shut down for unknown reasons (not powered off by HPE Morpheus Enterprise) to ensure availability of services.
When “AUTOMATICALLY POWER ON VMS” is enabled, the power state of managed VMs should be maintained in HPE Morpheus Enterprise. This setting is not applicable to discovered/unmanaged resources.

You can set this setting on Cloud level and on Cluster level.
For Vmware Clouds, this means that VME will automatically power on a MANAGED VM if the "Shutdown command" has not been given from within VME (but e.g. from the host itself or from vCenter).
For Morpheus Clouds (and Clusters), this means that VME will automatically power on a VM in case VME detects that the power state is not as expected (due to e.g. a host failure).

This setting works somewhat together with the Placement Strategy of your VM (not instance). 
If the Strategy is "Auto" or  "Failover", the VM will be powered on again on the same host (if available) or on another host.
If the Strategy is "Pinned", the VM will only be powered on if the host it is pinned on is available.

In general, you can compare "Automatically power on VMs" with Vmware HA and "Placement Strategy" with Vmware DRS. 
Note that they are of course not exactly the same, but they have the same intent.

I personally disable this setting for Vmware Clouds, but enable it for VME Clouds.  But it all depends on your use cases.

[dya]

Why is it disabled in VMware Clouds?

[Arnout_Verbeken]

I think it is disable by default.  But you can enable it if you want.

Just know that you need to powerdown all VM's from VME UI and not from Vmware UI or directly in the OS.  If you powerdown in Vmware UI or in the OS, VME will power it on again, like I explained above.