Restored VMs do not keep the original VM's motherboard settings on hardware version 21

Products

• VMware vCenter Server

Issue/Introduction

When restoring a VM, the VM does not keep the configuration set in VMX in the original backed up VM.

After restoring the VM and viewing Advanced VM Settings, the chipset.motherboardLayout is not the same as the original VM's chipset.motherboardLayout.

As a result, upon powering on the restored VM, a new IP address is assigned to the VM. This IP address still occurs if the VM was configured to have a static IP address.

This means that restored Virtual Machines (VM) do not have the correct IP Address after power on post-restore.

Environment

vCenter Server

The restored VM is on hardware version 21

Cause

When the chipset.motherboardLayout is not retained by the backup vendor's solution, hardware version 21 defaults the chipset.motherboardLayout to ACPI.

As a result when the restored VM is powered on, the chipset.motherboardLayout change results in a new PCI device for the restored VM.

When a new PCI device is created, a new IP address is assigned to the powered on VM.

The above notes were observed in Windows Operating Systems (OS) but may also occur in other OS depending on how that OS reacts to the chipset.motherboardLayout change.

Resolution

Reach out to the vendor for the backup solution on why their backup feature is not keeping the original VM's chipset.motherboardLayout value.

Although this is a known issue regarding the backup and restore solution not retaining the chipset.motherboardLayout value, there may be other fields that are not being carried over from the original VM upon restore.

Additional Information

This has been observed with the following backup and restore solutions:

• Cohesity
• IBM Storage Protect.