vCenter Reports "Host Storage Status" Alarm Due to RAID 1 Physical Drive Failures

Products

• VMware vSphere ESXi

Issue/Introduction

In the vCenter Server UI, a host triggers a "Host Storage Status" alarm. However, the hardware out-of-band management console (such as Dell iDRAC) might falsely report normal status or display misleading alerts, masking the true physical layer failure.

The vmkernel.log recorded “H:0x8 D:0x0 P:0x0 ” messages for LUNs, such as:
YYYY-MM-DDTHH:MM:SS In(182) vmkernel: cpu4:2097782)lsi_mr3_0000:65:00.0: mfi_TaskMgmt: 689: Processing taskMgmt virt reset for device: vmhba2:C2:T1:L0
YYYY-MM-DDTHH:MM:SS In(182) vmkernel: cpu9:2097757)HPP: HppScsiThrottleLogForDevice:523: Error status H:0x8 D:0x0 P:0x0 Invalid sense data: 0x0 0x0 0x0. from device naa.########### repeated 10 times, hppAction = 3
YYYY-MM-DDTHH:MM:SS In(182) vmkernel: cpu0:2112979)HBX: 3089: 'datastore19': HB at offset 3244032 - Waiting for timed out HB:

The logs show repeated H:0x8 D:0x0 P:0x0 status codes. This indicates a Host Error (0x8), meaning the HBA driver aborted the I/O or the HBA issued a target reset because the underlying storage became completely unresponsive.

Running storage identification commands reveals the profile of the affected device:
#esxcli storage core device list
naa.###########
   Display Name: Local DELL Disk (naa.###########)
   Model: PERC H730P Adp   
   Drive Type: logical
   RAID Level: RAID1
   Number of Physical Drives: 2
   Status: on

 Although the logical status is shown as on, the Drive Type: logical and RAID Level: RAID1 configurations confirm that this device is not a standalone physical drive. It is a Virtual Disk managed by the Dell PERC H730P controller backing two physical hard drives. The repetitive I/O aborts strongly imply that one or both underlying physical disks are experiencing silent failures or media errors that the controller is struggling to handle.

Environment

VMware vSphere ESXi 8.0

Cause

The issue is caused by underlying physical drive degradation or failures within a configured RAID 1 volume, leading the Host Bus Adapter (HBA) driver to abort I/O requests and issue virtual resets to the logical target.

Resolution

Because ESXi perceives the storage target through the RAID controller abstraction, deep hardware-level diagnostics must be performed directly on the controller component.

1. Engage Hardware Vendor Support to extract and analyze the hardware controller TTY logs (PERC/LSI controller logs) and advanced SupportAssist collections.

2. Have the vendor inspect the health state of the two specific physical disks assigned to this RAID 1 volume.

3. Replace any faulted, predictive-failing, or degraded physical drive identified during the vendor hardware analysis and allow the RAID 1 array to rebuild completely.