Unable to Remove CD/DVD Drive from VM in Powered-On State

Products

• VMware vSphere ESXi

Issue/Introduction

In the VM Edit Settings menu, the option to remove the CD/DVD drive from a virtual machine (VM) is grayed out when the VM is powered on.

Environment

VMware vSphere 7.x

VMware vSphere 8.x

Cause

Virtual machines configured with Hardware Version 9 or lower do not support hot removal of the CD/DVD drive. This limitation prevents removal while the VM is powered on.

Resolution

To remove the CD/DVD drive:

• Power off the virtual machine.
• Navigate to the VM settings and remove the CD/DVD drive.