[VCDR] Virtual Machine Snapshot may fail in VCDR recovery with error "VMX file size is too big"

Products

• VMware Live Recovery

Issue/Introduction

To provide steps to resolve the snapshot failure

Symptoms:
Following error may be seen in the VCDR UI

Error Severity Warning Timestamp Nov-07 02:01 am7h ago Target VMCAWS Linux - VMDR Description Failed to backup VM 'VM Name' (/UUID/VM Name.vmx) during stage: finishing backup, for task: drc-UUID. VM VM Name snapshot failed. Internal error: VMX file size is too big. Please contact support.

Or 

Description Failed to backup VM 'VM Name' (/VM Name/VM Name.vmx) during stage: performing backup, for task: drc-5163e544-8d3f-11ee-98e1-066ac0c545f9. VM bisecpdbm snapshot failed. Internal error: VMX file size is 55370 bytes which exceeds the max supported small file size 53320 bytes. Please contact support.

drcMgr.log 

[SnappleServer.DRCTasks:0] [DRC] [drc-UUID] Task drc-mgr-UUID is started for VM[/UUID/VM Name.vmx] for task
 [SnappleServer.DRCTasks:0] [DRC] Task drc-mgr-UUID failed: Error VM_BACKUP_FAILED (6900): Failed to backup VM '[WorkloadDatastore] UUID/<VM name.vmx>' (VM Name): VM <VM Name> snapshot failed. Internal error: VMX file size is too big. Please contact support. (Created at DRCAgentSvc.java:5147)
 [SnappleServer.DRCTasks:0] __ERR__ [DRC] [drc-UUID] Backup task drc-mgr-UUID failed.

Manual snapshot succeeds on the same VM from either vCenter or ESXi host.

Cause

The failure is due to a larger VMX file size caused by guestInfo.appInfo information from the appInfo plugin. This is an application tool that is dumping alot of info into the VMX file. VCDR has a  hard 55K limits on the VMX file size due to the way they are stored on the underlying filesystem.

Resolution

Schedule a maintenance window for the VM and disable appinfo plugin via VMware tools configuration file at the VM level. 

To disable appInfo plugin, login to the guest with admin credentials

Linux Guest 

vmware-toolbox-cmd config set appInfo disabled true 
OR
vmware-toolbox-cmd config set appinfo poll-interval 0

Windows Guest

VMwareToolboxCmd.exe config set appInfo disabled true 
OR
VMwareToolboxCmd.exe config set appInfo poll-interval 0

For additional information about appInfo plugin refer VMware tools documentation

Additional Information

Impact/Risks:
VM protection will be impacted as VCDR cannot take snapshots.