ESXi monitor performance cut off

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Calochortus

New Member
Feb 8, 2019
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Long-time lurker.

Recently installed ESXi 6.7u1 and the monitoring seems funky. The monitor tabs claim to show a max of a hour, but when I sign in they show between 5 and 15 minutes on the VMs and less on the host. The host monitor will grow up to ~15 minutes and then truncate to 0. I've never seen a hours history.

ESXi standalone, booting off USB, swap on (ssd) datastore, on evaluation license.

Service vpxa set as Start/Stop w Host but it looks like it isn't running on login but then starts.

/var/lib/vmware/hostd/stats/hostAgentStats-20.stats accumulation file is present (although as they don't use rrd who knows what the hell is in it)

Is this expected or because I haven't poked it with vCenter?
 

svtkobra7

Active Member
Jan 2, 2017
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I'm seen this before too (in 6.0 and 6.5, its not specific to 6.7).

I think ESXi has attempted to optimize one of the Manage > System > Advanced Settings for you and that reduction in log size / minutes / whatever it is => the cause.

Personally, I find all 60 minutes of the Performance Monitor to be relatively worthless, so I didn't put more than a couple minutes into trying to figure out the issue. A clean install eventually remedied it (if memory serves).
 

Calochortus

New Member
Feb 8, 2019
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Possibly fixed in 6.7 U3

You might intermittently stop seeing performance charts of ESXi hosts in the embedded VMware Host Client or any web-based application that connects to the vCenter Server system, including the vSphere Client and vSphere Web Client. An internal issue causes hostd to delete available performance counters information for some ESXi hosts.
 

Calochortus

New Member
Feb 8, 2019
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Confirmed fixed in 6.7u3: both host and vms now show an hour of monitor data.

Best of luck with your page allocation - crashed thumb drive?
 
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svtkobra7

Active Member
Jan 2, 2017
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Confirmed fixed in 6.7u3: both host and vms now show an hour of monitor data.
  • Thanks for the follow up - I'm still not sure this was a bug per se, I think that ESXi simply optimizes resource allocation for monitoring purposes - but that is just a guess.
  • I had encountered it myself previously, but it must have been 1 year+ ago and I don't recall it being persistent.
  • BTW - you mention vxpa in your original post, but I bet it is the vmsyslogd service and not vxpa as I killed that service and the monitor keep chugging along. (just wanted to add that)
Best of luck with your page allocation - crashed thumb drive?
  • I wish it was something so easily remedied and thanks for the kind words.
  • I added a link to the issue below - which to be honest I don't fully understand - but I do know that:
    • 6.7U2 + Optane 900p as boot drive & UEFI = no issue
    • 6.7U3 (clean install) + Optane 900p as boot drive & LEGACY or UEFI = no dice
    • 6.7U3 (clean install) + USB drive & LEGACY = no issue
  • But I refuse to boot off USB, if only because I haven't pulled the servers in many months to service anything and it is a complete PITA as they are mounted vertically, stacked against the wall. I'm OCD so I'd have to put the USB drive on the motherboard header LOL, so I'll flip back to 6.7U2.
  • Seems like there are always vmware gremlins out there to surprise you with upgrades and what not (personal experience = fail rate > success rate).
Ack by vmware, but not advertised as a known bug with release notes. OK fine, not like I would have checked anyway. ;) esxi cannot boot after updating to 6.7 u3! how ... |VMware Communities

We've found the bug and are testing a fix.
Booting in legacy BIOS mode is the easiest workaround. However I realize some of you have systems that won't boot in that mode for one reason or another.
You might consider reinstalling 6.7u2, using the option to preserve VMFS volumes on the disk. That's the next most straightforward solution for now, though obviously there is some pain in that...
 

pricklypunter

Well-Known Member
Nov 10, 2015
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I'm also in the "page allocation...out of resources" camp with 6.7u3 grrr :mad:
I only have UEFI boot on my home server, so can't do legacy boot even if I wanted to :(
 

svtkobra7

Active Member
Jan 2, 2017
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I'm also in the "page allocation...out of resources" camp with 6.7u3 grrr :mad:
I only have UEFI boot on my home server, so can't do legacy boot even if I wanted to :(
  • I hate it for you, but it isn't as lonely in this boat now.
    • If I read that workaround correctly part of it was to disable VT-d :confused:
    • I've never purported to know as much as the average STH member, but isn't that sort of like saying:

  • vmware: Here is your type 1 hypervisor, and it relies on various technologies to best balance virtualization workloads / performance, the most important being Intel VT-d, but by the way, you have to turn that off with our freshest release.
  • svtkobra7: I got your secure boot right here ... a miniature schnauzer and .300 AAC Blackout = all the security I need ... what's next ice cream made with no milk?
  • vmware: Also, we do hope that you had the intuition to search for this issue in advance, as we definitely made no note of the bug, but in our own words do acknowledge "some pain in that..."
  • svtkobra7: Sends vicious attack schnauzer to do his thing.
[ as frustrated as you ... to the point I'm creating hypothetical conversations LOL ]

If you happen to stubble on a resolution, would you be kind enough to post it here? I'll do the same of course.

NB: jk about .300
 

pricklypunter

Well-Known Member
Nov 10, 2015
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It may work, if you can get the damned thing to install in the first place without breaking anything else in the process, but it's a kludge at best, VMware need to do better than that and stop treating folks like their beta testers :)
 

BoredSysadmin

Not affiliated with Maxell
Mar 2, 2019
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Optane 900p as ESXi boot drive? :eek::eek::eek: Ooof, what a massive waste of good hardware. ESXi loads into memory and disk performance would only help with boot times, which should be irrelevant in 99.999% of cases. boot ESXi from the network, san, usb or even SD (ideally mirrored)