It has been a long time since VMware
introduced the capability of Hot Add/Remove devices, like CPU and Memory, along
with them we could also Hot Add/Remove network cards and SCSI controllers.
It was a huge improvement and helped a lot
of System Administrators to reduce the server’s downtime when some upgrade was
required, (keep in mind that the Operational System must be able to recognized
the change that was made on its resources and adjusts itself accordingly.
But, with VMware Horizon View, we saw a
proliferation of VDI projects, and this amazing feature also allows end users,
with certain privileges, to remove the NIC of their own systems, intentionally or
not, causing and immediate disconnection and a break of the VDI service.
You
probably noted an increase of calls into support.
It’s so easy to remove the NIC by accident
that could happen even with the most Senior Technical guy.
The NIC is just there between your USB
devices and stuff.
Don’t worry about removing the SCSI
adapters, since it’s probably in use by the O.S., so it will not allow the removal
of it.
Yeah, I know, on the support side you will
need to prove the NIC was removed by someone and there's no problem on the
environment,
You can get the prove you need at the Virtual Machine's log file, look
for the following entry:
Mar 21 03:13:37.463: vmx| Hot removal done.
You are probably wondering… ok, but, how do
I prevent such thing from happening on my environment ?
Easy, disabling Hot Add/Remove on the
virtual machine.
- power off the Virtual Machine
- Edit the setting of it
- On the options tab, click General
- Then click on Configuration Parametes
- click Add Row
- Insert the following item devices.hotplug
with value of false
- close and save everything
- power the VM back on
And Yes, you need to perform this procedure
on each Virtual Machine.
Luckily, on a VDI environment hundreds of
virtual desktops are based on a single virtual machine. So, perform this step
on the parent virtual machine and recompose the pool, every virtual desktop
will inherit this configuration.
Another Yes........ you will lose the capability
of Hot Add/Remove devices on this virtual desktop, but, it’s not a thing you
would need to be worried about on a VDI environment.
I hope this tip helps you preventing your users from losing connection from their virtual desktops and why not reducing the calls into your support : )
