Performing a backup of the VM fails with: "Could not complete network copy for file"

Products

• VMware vSphere ESXi

Issue/Introduction

• Unable to backup or clone the VM
• Local datastore ( embedded within the server )
  
  Error:  Could not complete network copy for file /vmfs/volumes/datastore_UUID/Server_name.vmdk

Environment

• VMware ESXi 7.x
• VMware ESXi 8.x

Cause

• Observed medium error
• The storage adapter and storage device reported failed commands, failed R/W operations, failed R/W blocks
• As a result the I/O performance have deteriorated

Resolution

Engage the hardware / server vendor respectively.

Additional Information

When performing I/O operations on a LUN, the ESXi host reports SCSI Medium Errors in /var/log/vmkernel.log. These errors occur when attempting to read data from a specific Logical Block Address (LBA) on the storage device.
Example log entries:

• /var/run/log/vmkernel.log

DD-MM-YYYY HH-MM-SS cpu4:2097963)ScsiDeviceIO: 4176: Cmd(0xxxxxxx) 0x28, CmdSN 0x80000017 from world 2541872 to dev "naa.#############" failed H:0x7 D:0x2 P:0x0  Medium Error, LBA: ########
DD-MM-YYYY HH-MM-SS cpu18:2097967)ScsiDeviceIO: 4176: Cmd(0xxxxxxx) 0x28, CmdSN 0x8000007d from world 2541872 to dev "naa.#############" failed H:0x7 D:0x2 P:0x0  Medium Error, LBA: ########