Hot-removing a network adapter from a Linux virtual machine appears to complete successfully, but the network adapter is not actually removed

Products

• VMware vCenter Server

Issue/Introduction

Symptoms:

• When attempting to hot-remove a network adapter from a Linux virtual machine with the 1000 or VMXNET adapter, the task appears to complete successfully (with the green status Completed), but the network adapter is not removed and continues to remain on the guest.
• This issue occurs only in Linux virtual machines and not on Windows virtual machines.
• This is most likely to occur when VMware tools is not installed on the guest virtual machine.

Environment

VMware vCenter Server 4.1.x
VMware vCenter Server 5.0.x

Cause

The issue occurs if the acpiphp kernel module is not loaded in the Linux virtual machine.

This is not a VMware issue. For more information, see the Red Hat bug 554958.

Note: With VMware Tools installed, the acpiphp module should be loaded to the virtual machine. However, loading the module is not the responsibility of VMware Tools.

Resolution

To work around this issue, manually load the acpiphp module on the Linux virtual machine:

1. Run this command to see if the module is loaded:
   
   lsmod | grep acpiphp
   
   If you do not see any output, the module is not loaded.
   
   
2. Run this command to load the module:
   
   modprobe acpiphp
   
   
3. Run this command to verify that the module is actually loaded, and that hot-plug/hot-unplug works:
   
   lsmod | grep acpiphp
   
   
4. Manually add acpiphp to /etc/rc.modules with the commands:
   
   echo modprobe acpiphp >> /etc/rc.modules
   chmod +x /etc/rc.modules