Linux Guest VMs fail to boot after changing the SCSI Controller from LSI Logic Parallel to VMware Paravirtual

Products

• VMware vSphere ESXi

Issue/Introduction

• VM with Linux Guest OS fails to boot after the virtual SCSI Controller is changed from LSI Logic Parallel to VMware Paravirtual (PVSCSI). 
  
  
• Following error message is seen in the VM Console during the boot failure : 
  

  [ 1##.7####] dracut-initqueue[####]: Warning: dracut-initqueue timeout - starting timeout scripts
  [ 1##.8####] dracut-initqueue[####]: Warning: Could not boot.
  [ 1##.9####] dracut-initqueue[[####]: Warning: /dev/mapper/ol-root does not exist
  [ 1##.6####] dracut-initqueue[[####]: Warning: /dev/ol/root does not exist
  [ 1##.5####] dracut-initqueue[[####]: Warning: /dev/ol/swap does not exist
            Starting Dracut Emergency Shell...
  Warning: /dev/mapper/ol-root does not exist
  Warning: /dev/ol/root does not exist
  Warning: /dev/ol/swap does not exist
  
  Generating "/run/initramfs/rdsosreport.txt"
  
  Entering emergency mode. Exit the shell to continue.
  Type "journalctl" to view system logs.
  You might want to save "/run/initramfs/rdsosreport.txt" to a USB stick or /boot
  after mounting them and attach it to a bug report.
  
  dracut:/# _
  

   

  Screenshot for an example:
  
  

Environment

VMware vSphere ESX

Cause

When the SCSI controller is changed, the initramfs (initial RAM filesystem) or boot loader may not be configured to load the correct PVSCSI driver or identify disk paths under the new controller because of which the system does not find the boot devices correctly, 

Resolution

Reach out to the respective Guest OS vendor to fix the issue as this is occurring within the Guest OS boot process. 

Additional Information

Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL) VM fails to boot on ESXi after changing its SCSI controller from LSI Logic Parallel to VMware Paravirtual