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VMWare Server: 511 vmware-serverd service is not running.

with 22 comments

At some point the VMWare Server  host run out of diskspace on which the virtual guest machines were stored. Windows started to complain about low disk space and only 32KB was left. I tried to open VMWare Server console and I got the error message below "511 vmware-serverd service is not running." All virtual machines were running except the one which consumed the remaining diskspace of the physical SAS drives.

image

To resolve this issue I shutdown one of the virtual machines with a RDP session and moved the directory to another VMWare Server host; next step I did I tried to bring other virtual machines down by a RDP session and at some point I was left with two other virtual machines which both were not accessible by RDP nor by SSH for the linux one.

I opened Task Manager and located the remaining processes for the virtual machines.

image

vmware-vmx.exe is individual process for each virtual machine. Two were left and I stopped both vmware-vmx.exe processes. Open Services.msc console and restart the "VMware Registration Service" service.

image

After the service was restarted the initial process of starting the virtual machines started and all virtual machines were up and running. This is how I resolved the problem with VMWare Server, but it brings me back to the root cause of why this happened and one of the import things is to really think how you are going to seize your virtual machines and their disk space. I am going to implement thresholds and notifications with CactiEZ appliance soon and hopefully something which can help you also.

Written by Ivan Versluis

March 2nd, 2008 at 1:25 pm

22 Responses to 'VMWare Server: 511 vmware-serverd service is not running.'

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  1. It’s a very good post.
    Thanks for the help.
    Ram

    ram

    18 Apr 08 at 7:44 am

  2. Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00

    [HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\VMAuthdService]
    “DependOnService”=hex(7):76,00,6d,00,78,00,38,00,36,00,00,00,77,00,6d,00,69,00,00,00,00,00

    This is the fix, copy the above to a file with a .reg extension and run it. It will add a dependency to the VMWare Authentication service

    Mike D

    22 Apr 08 at 9:28 pm

  3. Thanks a lot to Mike D.
    I had a similar problem running VMware server 1.05 on a 2kpro.
    The missing wmi dependency caused a fault in Auth service start that caused a fault in registration service start.
    With his fix, everything works fine.

    Claudio Laurita

    Claudio Laurita

    27 Apr 08 at 11:26 am

  4. I have no VMware Registration Service. What I have to do?

    yannis

    2 May 08 at 10:42 am

  5. Very helpful post. Thank you

    ab

    3 May 08 at 4:08 pm

  6. [...] here is a useful link on this issue : http://www.networknet.nl/apps/wp/archives/385 [...]

  7. thanks a lot..
    XD

    mobo cray

    23 Jul 08 at 1:08 am

  8. Thanks….

    -RAM-

    10 Aug 08 at 3:42 am

  9. Thank you! this post help me to solve problem :)

    reN

    18 Aug 08 at 1:00 pm

  10. Fantastic! Was stuck with this error and following your article got it working. Keep writing good solutions like these.

    Thanks,
    Arun.P.C
    http://www.arunpc.com

    Arun.PC

    25 Aug 08 at 12:10 pm

  11. Thank you.
    Your post helped me resolve my problem

    Homer

    25 Sep 08 at 10:55 am

  12. thanks a lot..very helpful

    sud

    26 Sep 08 at 5:17 pm

  13. Thank you!!!!
    Good post

    raf

    28 Sep 08 at 11:24 am

  14. thank u for help !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

    sphinxradycal

    1 Oct 08 at 1:51 pm

  15. thanks you, very helpful post!

    Benz

    13 Oct 08 at 5:30 pm

  16. Very useful Info. Thanks a lot!

    Boss

    9 Dec 08 at 5:50 pm

  17. Make D, thanks a lot!

    Pavel N

    21 Mar 09 at 11:47 pm

  18. Thanks Ivan! This post addressed my problem.

    angie

    7 May 09 at 5:03 pm

  19. Hi all,

    Thanks for this suggested fixe but it does not fixe my issue.
    I applyied this fixe provide by Mike but no success.

    I uninstalled VmWare then reinstalled it: issue still present.

    Any ide is very welcome.

    Thanks,

    abo

    27 May 09 at 2:19 pm

  20. Hi abo,

    did you upgrade your vmware server version?
    what is your current one?

    torteflo

    12 Jun 09 at 12:23 pm

  21. very good post, thanks!

    armando

    2 Oct 09 at 9:08 am

  22. I use XP os
    I execute this command :
    C:\Program Files\VMware\VMware Server\vmserverdWin32.exe
    than i solve this problem!

    sky86

    5 Jan 10 at 5:36 pm

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