Best Practices and Recommendations for Uploading files to cases on the Broadcom Support Portal

Products

VMware vSphere ESXi 8.0 VMware SDDC Manager VMware NSX

Issue/Introduction

Longer Time taken for FTP bundle Uploads
Time Out and Errors during file uploads

Cause

Based on live customer Log upload samples across the Globe and the series of tests it was narrowed down that the issues are mostly environment in nature
Below were the tests performed

Log upload time taken
Upload Speed check
network bandwidth checks
Time taken for upload only versus time taken for copying logs off the Jump host

It was narrowed down to the Average time taken for the Log upload for a customer was around 4.55 minutes and the test samples that delayed was mostly environmental factors.

Resolution

The cause of Log / File upload slowness to the Broadcom Support Portal or failures may lie across multiple layers, including:

Log capture slowness: This could be due to the size of the inventory
Example - A vCenter with a large inventory or one that has undergone multiple upgrades, which may result in longer log capture times
Packet loss in the network traffic between source and destination
High latency along the network path
Low bandwidth between the source and the destination
Firewall configurations on the environment

Steps to Improve the Upload speed

Before uploading large files, it's important to ensure the Internet connection is fast and stable enough to handle the data transfers without interruptions or failures.
One can run speed test via Google website / External websites like Speed test/ Fast Com / Test My Net
Validate if the machine where the upload is being performed does not have any speed limit capped
(Capping internet speed can refer to the environment's ISP's data cap, which limits your total data usage and can slow down the log uploads, This could also be the environmental where the specific Organization IT team ahs set limits within the network). Please consult the ISP provider or the IT team for assistance.
Validate if the Website Broadcom Portal is white listed in your environment to avoid Time Outs and upload delays.
Time taken from the datacenter environment to the Jump box machine could have slow transfer speeds, hence slowing down the whole upload process.

Reduce Latency
- Geographic Proximity: Ensure the jump box is geographically close to your local machines or users

Network Path Optimization

- Use tools like traceroute, My Trace route (network diagnostics tool), to diagnose slow hops.
- Contact ISP or Internet hosting provider if specific network segments are slow

Bandwidth and Throughput

- Upgrade internet bandwidth if it's saturated during peak usage
- It is recommended to use wired Ethernet instead of Wi-Fi for local machines, to have faster uploads as the Wi-Fi resource may be shared across multiple users and devices
If the Primary upload method as updated in this KB - 140731 is slow, then attempt using SFTP method as explained in the KB - 202298
There are other methods of Log Uploads like (SFTP, SCP or HTTPS) also explained in the KB - 385549
The vCenter Log generation time taken can be longer due to TASK and EVENTS database tables. It is recommended configure vCenter Server to retain events in the database for a limited period. Discarding events periodically ensures optimal performance of the database. This will eventually improve the time taken for the log collection, refer the below link
Retention of Events in the vCenter Server Database
It is also recommended to clean up old files residing in /var/core files frequently, else the time taken for Log generation will be longer.

NOTE - If the vCenter has gone through multiple upgrade versions or the size of the vCenter Inventory is very large, the time taken for the log generation will be usually longer.