Increasing Disk on VMware AVI Load Balancer on an Existing Service Engine (SE) in vCenter/NSX Cloud Environment

Products

• VMware Avi Load Balancer

Issue/Introduction

The AVI Service Engine (SE) is running low on disk space.

Environment

Product: VMware AVI Load Balancer
Infrastructure: vCenter Server / NSX

Resolution

There are two methods to increase disk space on the AVI Service Engine:

Method 1: Increase Disk Without Rebooting the SE VM

• Log in to the vCenter Server.
  • Locate the target SE VM.
  • Right-click the VM → Edit Settings → Increase the disk to the desired size.
    
    
• Expand Disk within the Service Engine:
  
  • Access the AVI SE via SSH.
  • Gain root privileges on the SE:
    
    • sudo -i
      
      
  • Run the below command to check the current size.
    • root@Avi-se-####:~# df -h
      
      
  • Rescan the SCSI device to detect the increased disk size:
    • root@Avi-se-####:~# echo 1 | sudo tee /sys/class/block/sda/device/rescan
      
      
  • Extend the partition:
    • root@Avi-se-####:~# growpart /dev/sda 3
      
      
  • Resize the filesystem to utilize the new space:
    • root@Avi-se-####:~# resize2fs /dev/sda3
      
      
• Example: increasing from current 17 GB to 20 GB (steps after increasing from vCenter server) 
  • • • root@Avi-se-####:~# df -h
        Filesystem      Size  Used Avail Use% Mounted on
        udev            974M     0  974M   0% /dev
        tmpfs           198M   18M  180M   9% /run
        /dev/sda3        17G  4.1G   12G  26% /host
        tmpfs           467M   25M  443M   6% /dev/shm
        tmpfs           5.0M     0  5.0M   0% /run/lock
        tmpfs           986M     0  986M   0% /sys/fs/cgroup
        tmpfs            20M     0   20M   0% /run/hmuser
        
        
      • root@Avi-se-####:~# echo 1 | sudo tee /sys/class/block/sda/device/rescan
        1
      • root@Avi-se-####:~# growpart /dev/sda 3
        CHANGED: partition=3 start=524416 old: size=35127135 end=35651551 new: size=41418591 end=41943007
        
        
      • root@Avi-se-####:~# resize2fs /dev/sda3
        resize2fs 1.45.5 (07-Jan-2020)
        Filesystem at /dev/sda3 is mounted on /host; on-line resizing required
        old_desc_blocks = 3, new_desc_blocks = 3
        The filesystem on /dev/sda3 is now 5177323 (4k) blocks long.
        
        
      • root@Avi-se-####:~# df -h
        Filesystem      Size  Used Avail Use% Mounted on
        udev            974M     0  974M   0% /dev
        tmpfs           198M   18M  180M   9% /run
        /dev/sda3        20G  4.1G   15G  22% /host
        tmpfs           467M   25M  443M   6% /dev/shm
        tmpfs           5.0M     0  5.0M   0% /run/lock
        tmpfs           986M     0  986M   0% /sys/fs/cgroup
        tmpfs            20M     0   20M   0% /run/hmuser
        
        

Method 2: By rebooting the Service Engine

• After increasing the disk on the vCenter server.
• Reboot the SE
• Important: An SE reboot is part of this method. Please ensure it's performed during a planned maintenance period to avoid disruption.

 

Validation:

• root@Avi-se-####:~# df -h