asked on

ESXI 4.1 Host draws HIGH CPU at Idle

Hello Expert Friends,
I manage a single ESXI host for a client and lately, (but maybe I did not notice it before) it is showing 50% CPU in the VI client when the system is totally idling. It is a IBM-Lenovo RD120 (M6447-18U) server running 12 VM's as Virtual Desktops. When a user logs in, performance is very poor and simply opening a browser window usually pegs CPU for a 30 seconds or more. Given is shows 50% usage totally idling (and all the VM's show nearly 0 CPU usage) makes me think there is a serious issue. Why would the CPU be so high when it is not taken by the VM's? All health parameters in the VI client logs are good.

THanks!
-John

Andrew Hancock (VMware vExpert PRO / EE Fellow/British Beekeeper)

what you do not state is the amount of memory in the host, memory assigned to 12VMs, high cpu usage is normal with a user login to desktop, if the datastore is slow or host is suffering memory starvation, and its paging swapping to disk.

Andrew Hancock (VMware vExpert PRO / EE Fellow/British Beekeeper)

have you tried Veeam Monitor for free to start checking all the performance metrics for the host and VMs, do VMs for instance use roaming profiles and or virus scanning.

JohnnyD74

ASKER

Hi Hanccoka,

I am running 20GB of memory on the host and 15K SAS RAID 5 array. The Key is that i am seeing 50% host CPU useage at IDLE with ABSOLUTELY 0 ACTIVITY ON TH VM'S. The VM's even show 0 CPU Useage....yet still the 50% Useage. I have a moderate about of experience with VMware and ESX and this is quite abnormal.

Thanks.

JohnnyD74

ASKER

Oh...and 2GB of memory are assigned to each winXP VM.

Andrew Hancock (VMware vExpert PRO / EE Fellow/British Beekeeper)

So if ALL the VMs are OFF, you have 50% CPU?

Memory in the VMs, OS in the VMs?

Andrew Hancock (VMware vExpert PRO / EE Fellow/British Beekeeper)

RAID 5 datastore is poor choice of RAID for Desktop VMs.

Andrew Hancock (VMware vExpert PRO / EE Fellow/British Beekeeper)

So 24GB memory assigned to VMs, on a 20GB host, so its over committed, by 4GB.

JohnnyD74

ASKER

Yes...I know, but that is what I have and not related to my CPU delema.

JohnnyD74

ASKER

Yes...correct on the memory numbers.

JohnnyD74

ASKER

No....I believe if they are off, the CPU goes down but the VI client shows near 0 useage for all VM's at Idle.

Andrew Hancock (VMware vExpert PRO / EE Fellow/British Beekeeper)

So, when powering up the VMs, one by one, when does 50% CPU occur?

Andrew Hancock (VMware vExpert PRO / EE Fellow/British Beekeeper)

I would suggest using Veeam Monitor for free to analyse the metrics.

Andrew Hancock (VMware vExpert PRO / EE Fellow/British Beekeeper)

also you state in the opening question, that you did not notice, what do the performance charts state for the year? has this always been the case, or has it just started occuring.

JohnnyD74

ASKER

When powering up the VM's Host CPU is at 100%....the 50% at Idle seems to illustrate the Issue and weakness of the CPU...and I don't believe it has always done this..

Andrew Hancock (VMware vExpert PRO / EE Fellow/British Beekeeper)

Performance Chart History?

ASKER CERTIFIED SOLUTION

Andrew Hancock (VMware vExpert PRO / EE Fellow/British Beekeeper)

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JohnnyD74

ASKER

Hi Hanccoka,

Sorry for my delay. I was out for awhile.THANK YOU for all the details. I understand the impact on startup but the the host CPU will hang at 50% utilization for HOURS ON END AND COSTANTLY with NO load at all. The office is closed on weekends and I have checked the CPU utilization on the weekends and it still is at 50%. I will check your suggestions and get back with you. Thanks Again!

JohnnyD74

ASKER

Thanks for all your help Hanccocka! I am still having the issue but with all your suggestions here, I am sure I will get to the bottom of things.