Virtual Machine stops responding after some time

Products

• VMware vSphere ESXi

Issue/Introduction

Virtual Machine stopped responding over night or long periods of idle to ping or RDP requests.

Reviewing the affected VM's vmware.log shows the following:

/vmfs/volumes/<datastore_for_the_vm>/<vmname>/vmware.log:
YYYY-MM-DDTHH:MM:SS.110Z In(05)+ vcpu-0 - Your guest has entered a standby sleep state. Use the keyboard or mouse while grabbed to wake it.
YYYY-MM-DDTHH:MM:SS.110Z In(05)+ vcpu-0 - ---------------------------------------
YYYY-MM-DDTHH:MM:SS.146Z In(05) vmx - GuestRpcSendTimedOut: message to toolbox timed out.

Environment

• vSphere ESXi 7.X
• vSphere ESXi 8.X

Cause

Windows power settings are still enabled and putting the VM to sleep.

Resolution

Verify inside the Guest OS the Power Settings and adjust accordingly.

Additional Information

Power Settings for Windows 11