“Waiting for Controller to Start” error when selecting wrong virtual NIC for VM (VM Take Control)

  • 7920481
  • 23-Jan-2006
  • 04-Sep-2012

Environment

X2V migration to target virtual host

Situation

The following article discusses the common cause for the “Waiting for Controller to Start” message during the Virtual Machine Take Control process when a wrong Virtual NIC is used.

 

Resolution

During the creation of a new Virtual Machine, Platespin job will assign the Virtual NIC (or VLAN) as per the settings defined in the migration job (Take Control of target VM section). If for some reason the virtual machine is using a virtual NIC which doesn’t have network connectivity to the Platespin server, the job will fail since the virtual machine will be unable to send heartbeat to the Platespin server.

Troubleshooting:

Ensure that the proper virtual NIC was assigned to the VM by connecting to the VM using the VMware Remote Console and type ipconfig /all

- If the response was a valid IP address (static or DHCP) try to ping the Platespin server and the default gateway or other VM’s which use the same virtual NIC. If ping fails, recheck the functionality of the virtual NIC assigned to the VM.

- If the response is a default configuration IP (.e.g. 169.x.x.x) ensure that DHCP is available via the Virtual NIC which was selected (Job Configuration Windows | Take Control | Virtual Machine | Configure) – run the job again and configure a static IP address for the VM (see Q20334 for more details).
 

For other potential heartbeat causes and troubleshooting steps please review TID 7920405.


Tips:
  • When configuring a migration job, it is recommended to select a Virtual NIC which is known to be working (e.g. successfully used by other Virtual Machines on the same virtual host).
  • Do not assign a virtual NIC called “VMotion” to Virtual Machines.
  • When creating a new migration job, first select the proper virtual NIC under Guest NIC 1 and then define the same virtual NIC under Take Control | Virtual Machine | Configure (see TID 7920420 for more information).

Workaround:

You can receover the job as per the following:

  1. Shut Down the target virtual machine created by Platespin.
  2. Access the Virtual Server MUI and  change the Virtual Machine properties to use the VNIC which has connection to the Platespin network segment.
  3. Start the Virtual Machine, the VM will now use the Virtual NIC you defined manually and will try to connect to the Platespin Server.
 
 
If you have questions about this article please contact PlateSpin Support at support@platespin.com