Error: Alarm on is outside expected limits (3 >= 3) in VMware probe

Products

• DX Unified Infrastructure Management (Nimsoft / UIM)

Issue/Introduction

Users receive alerts for multiple Virtual Machines (VMs) from the VMware probe with the message: `Alarm on is outside expected limits (3 >= 3)`. These alerts often do not auto-resolve even after the condition returns to normal. This behavior occurs because these specific alarms are VMware events forwarded to DX UIM, rather than standard QoS-based monitors.

- Alarms trigger with the text: `The monitor ####.Alarm on #### is outside expected limits (3 >= 3)`.
- Alarms remain active in the UIM alarm console after the condition is cleared in vCenter.
- No specific metric or threshold is visible within the probe configuration for these alerts.

Environment

- DX Unified Infrastructure Management
- VMware probe (all versions, specifically 8.10 and earlier)
- VMware vCenter

Cause

These alarms represent VMware events being forwarded from the vCenter server to the VMware probe. Unlike standard probe monitors that poll for data and clear alarms when thresholds are no longer breached, forwarded events follow a one-way communication path. There is no automated synchronization to clear the UIM alarm when the event status changes in VMware.

Resolution

Review the specific events on the VMware server to determine the root cause of the alert. Because these are forwarded events, they do not auto-clear in DX UIM. 

1. Manually acknowledge or clear the alarm in the UIM Alarm Console once the issue is resolved in VMware.
2. To investigate the trigger, engage VMware administrators to check the vCenter event logs for the affected resource.

 

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Additional Information

- Contact Broadcom Support
- For information on how to subscribe to KB updates, see Article 275360.