Error message stating task already in progress when trying to power off VM

Products

• VMware vSphere ESXi

Issue/Introduction

You have a VM that is hard down and you are unable to restart or shutdown the VM. You are getting an error that a task is already in progress when you try to power it down or restart it.

Environment

ESXi 7.0

ESXi 8.0

Cause

There are many tasks that are queued up for the VM.  

Resolution

Reference KB: Collecting information about tasks in VMware ESXi

 

1. SSH to the host running the VM.
2. Get the vm ID.
   
   vim-cmd vmsvc/getallvms
   
   
3. Use the vm ID to get the power state of the VM.
   
   vim-cmd vmsvc/power.getstate #
   Example: vim-cmd vmsvc/power.getstate 52
   
   
   1. Verify VM is powered on.
4. Get task list for the VM.
   
   vim-cmd vmsvc/get.tasklist #
   Example: vim-cmd vmsvc/get.tasklist 52
   
   
5. Verify tasks are not active.
   
   vim-cmd vimsvc/task_info 'task_name'
   
   Example:  
   vim-cmd vimsvc/task_info 'task_name'
(vmodl.fault.ManagedObjectNotFound) {
   faultCause = (vmodl.MethodFault) null,
   faultMessage = <unset>,
   obj = 'task_name'
   msg = "Received SOAP response fault from [<<io_obj p:0x0000000000000000, h:5, <TCP '127.0.0.1 : 12345'>, <TCP '127.0.0.1 : 6789'>>, /sdk>]: GetInfo
The object 'task_name' has already been deleted or has not been completely created"
}
   
   
6. If a third party action is causing the tasks cancel the action.
7. Follow KB Powering off an unresponsive virtual machine on an ESXi host to cancel tasks and power off VM.
8. If necessary restart ESXi host management agents.