VMDK of cloned machines refer to the source machines disk

Products

• VMware vCenter Server

Issue/Introduction

• The cloned virtual machines' VMDK file(s) will be pointed to the VMDK file(s) of the source machine used for the clone
• Attempting to power on cloned VM results in error: Unable to access file /vmfs/volumes/<uuid>/<VM-Name>/<VM-Name>-flat.vmdk since it is locked

Environment

VMware vCenter Server Appliance 6.7.x
VMware vCenter Server Appliance 7.0.x

Cause

The issue is seen if the clone operation matches the below conditions:

• Clone operation is performed via HTML5 client
• Source VM has disk.EnableUUID = TRUE parameter

Resolution

• This issue is resolved in vCenter 7.0U3D (7.0P04) build 19480866.
• To work around this issue, Power off VM before initiating the clone operation.

Additional Information

Impact/Risks:

• Power on operation of the Cloned machine will fail.
• Attempting to power on the clone will corrupt the original virtual machine if the original VM is powered off at the time the clone is powered on.
• Deleting either virtual machine from disk will cause loss of the vmdk.