We have hundreds of servers running vmware server. Every so often (several times a month) one of our servers will fail to start a vm with consistency errors on a vmdk file. We are unsure of why we are getting these errors, the hard drives on the systems are fine, and typically the vms were shutdown nicely prior to the error. Is there something we may be doing wrong? is the original vmdk that we cloned all of these vms out of somehow corrupt but still capable of running for a while until the error occurrs?
I am copying below this part of the log of the error we usually get, thank you for any suggestions you may have.
Jul 03 10:39:16: vmx| AIOGNRC: Starting 19 I/O threads.
Jul 03 10:39:16: vmx| Msg_Hint: msg.disk.validate.dir (not shown)
Jul 03 10:39:16: vmx| DISK: OPEN scsi0:0 '/home/user/vms/SERVER1/root.vmdk' persistent R[(null)]
Jul 03 10:39:17: vmx| DISKLIB-DSCPTR: Opened : "root.vmdk" (0xa)
Jul 03 10:39:17: vmx| DISKLIB-LINK : Opened '/home/user/vms/SERVER1/root.vmdk' (0xa): monolithicSparse, 104857600 sectors / 51200 Mb.
Jul 03 10:39:17: vmx| DISKLIB-LIB : Opened "/home/user/vms/SERVER1/root.vmdk" (flags 0xa).
Jul 03 10:39:17: vmx| DISK: OPEN '/home/user/vms/SERVER1/root.vmdk' Geo (6527/255/63) BIOS Geo (6527/255/63) freeSpace=160907Mb
Jul 03 10:39:17: vmx| Msg_Hint: msg.disk.validate.dir (not shown)
Jul 03 10:39:17: vmx| DISK: OPEN scsi0:1 '/home/user/vms/SERVER1/shared.vmdk' persistent R[(null)]
Jul 03 10:39:19: vmx| DISKLIB-SPARSECHK: /home/user/vms/SERVER1/shared.vmdk Grain #75635 @9694208 is orphaned.
Jul 03 10:39:19: vmx| DISKLIB-SPARSECHK: /home/user/vms/SERVER1/shared.vmdk Grain #75636 @9694336 is orphaned.
Jul 03 10:39:19: vmx| DISKLIB-SPARSECHK: /home/user/vms/SERVER1/shared.vmdk Grain #75637 @9694464 is orphaned.
Jul 03 10:39:19: vmx| DISKLIB-SPARSECHK: /home/user/vms/SERVER1/shared.vmdk 3 orphan(s) detected
Jul 03 10:39:19: vmx| DISKLIB-SPARSE: "/home/user/vms/SERVER1/shared.vmdk" : failed to open (14): Disk needs repair.
Jul 03 10:39:19: vmx| DISKLIB-DSCPTR: Failed to open extents for embedded descriptor file in normal mode
Jul 03 10:39:19: vmx| DISKLIB-LINK : "/home/user/vms/SERVER1/shared.vmdk" : failed to open (The specified virtual disk needs repair).
Jul 03 10:39:19: vmx| DISKLIB-CHAIN : "/home/user/vms/SERVER1/shared.vmdk" : failed to open (The specified virtual disk needs repair).
Jul 03 10:39:19: vmx| DISKLIB-LIB : Failed to open '/home/user/vms/SERVER1/shared.vmdk' with flags 0x2a (The specified virtual disk needs repair).
Jul 03 10:39:19: vmx| DISKLIB-SPARSECHK: /home/user/vms/SERVER1/shared.vmdk Grain #75635 @9694208 is orphaned.
Jul 03 10:39:19: vmx| DISKLIB-SPARSECHK: /home/user/vms/SERVER1/shared.vmdk Grain #75636 @9694336 is orphaned.
Jul 03 10:39:19: vmx| DISKLIB-SPARSECHK: /home/user/vms/SERVER1/shared.vmdk Grain #75637 @9694464 is orphaned.
Jul 03 10:39:19: vmx| DISKLIB-SPARSECHK: /home/user/vms/SERVER1/shared.vmdk 3 orphan(s) detected
Jul 03 10:39:19: vmx| Msg_Question:
Jul 03 10:39:19: vmx| http://msg.disk.scaryWithNoLostSectors The disk "/home/user/vms/SERVER1/shared.vmdk" has internal consistency errors that may be caused by partial corruption of the disk file. It is recommended that you restore a backup of this virtual machine. If you do not have a backup, VMware Server can repair the disk, but there is a possibility that the data on the disk may be corrupt and affect the stability of the guest.
Jul 03 10:39:19: vmx| Do you wish to repair the disk and continue?