Change VM Video Memory
I was contacted by a colleague asking if there was an easy way to set the video memory for a number of virtual machines, he had been working with a customer who had received an error when a virtual machine was being Vmotioned, the Vmotion completes successfully but the following error is received:
Insufficient video RAM. The maximum resolution of the virtual machine will be limited to 1176×885 at 16 bits per pixel. To use the configured maximum resolution of 2360×1770 at 16 bits per pixel, increase the amount of video RAM allocated to this virtual machine by setting svga.vramSize=”16708800″ in the virtual machine’s configuration file.
After applying his best Google-Fu he managed to find the following KB article: http://kb.vmware.com/kb/1014593
This clearly tells him the issue and how to resolve this by changing the video memory on the virtual machine, however, after changing this setting he then came across another issue as SRM was unable to protect these virtual machines as described in this KB article: http://kb.vmware.com/kb/1020796
The long and the short of it was that he needed to change the video memory in over 3000 VMs, you can of course do this in the vCenter client using the following screen but for 3000 VMs this may take a while !
PowerCLI to the rescue !
With the following PowerCLI function he will be able to adjust a number of VMs without spending hours pointing and clicking.
function Set-VMVideoMemory {
<# .SYNOPSIS Changes the video memory of a VM .DESCRIPTION This function changes the video memory of a VM .NOTES Source: http://virtu-al.net Author: Alan Renouf Version: 1.1 .PARAMETER VM Specify the virtual machine .PARAMETER MemoryMB Specify the memory size in MB .EXAMPLE PS> Get-VM VM1 | Set-VMVideoMemory -MemoryMB 4 -AutoDetect $false
#>
Param (
[parameter(valuefrompipeline = $true, mandatory = $true, HelpMessage = "Enter a vm entity")]
[VMware.VimAutomation.ViCore.Impl.V1.Inventory.VirtualMachineImpl]$VM,
[int64]$MemoryMB,
[bool]$AutoDetect,
[int]$NumDisplays
)
Process {
$VM | Foreach {
$VideoAdapter = $_.ExtensionData.Config.Hardware.Device | Where {$_.GetType().Name -eq "VirtualMachineVideoCard"}
$spec = New-Object VMware.Vim.VirtualMachineConfigSpec
$Config = New-Object VMware.Vim.VirtualDeviceConfigSpec
$Config.device = $VideoAdapter
If ($MemoryMB) {
$Config.device.videoRamSizeInKB = $MemoryMB * 1KB
}
If ($AutoDetect) {
$Config.device.useAutoDetect = $true
} Else {
$Config.device.useAutoDetect = $false
}
Switch ($NumDisplays) {
1{ $Config.device.numDisplays = 1}
2{ $Config.device.numDisplays = 2}
3{ $Config.device.numDisplays = 3}
4{ $Config.device.numDisplays = 4}
Default {}
}
$Config.operation = "edit"
$spec.deviceChange += $Config
$VMView = $_ | Get-View
Write-Host "Setting Video Display for $($_)"
$VMView.ReconfigVM($spec)
}
}
}
# For a single VM setting the video memory to 4MB
Get-VM VIEW01 | Set-VMVideoMemory -MemoryMB 4 -AutoDetect $false
# For all VMs on a Host setting the vide memory to Auto Detect
Get-VMHost Host01 | Get-VM | Set-VMVideoMemory -AutoDetect $true
# For all VMs in a cluster to set the Video Memory to 8MB
Get-Cluster Production | Get-VM | Set-VMVideoMemory -MemoryMB 8 -AutoDetect $false
PowerCLI Book Preview EMC PowerShell Cmdlets – Where to start
Thanks for the post, just one suggestion – since you are applying the same spec to all the VM’s you can re-use the $spec, so just create it once, and then run something along the lines of:
$VM | get-view | % { $_.ReconfigureVM($spec) }
Also, why the switch on the NumDisplays, you can just get away with $config.device.numDisplay = $NumDisplay
Thanks for the comment, I agree for performance reasons you could do it the way you suggested with $VM | get-view | % { $_.ReconfigureVM($spec) } but I guess I just like knowing if and when an error occurred, good catch though.
As for the NumDisplays, I do it this way as the only options you can have are 1-4 if I did it your way there would be no way of checking the user hadn’t put 20 in, I guess more error checking could be added.
Thanks for the comment
[...] Change VM Video Memory « « Virtu-AlVirtu-Al I’m getting more and more into PowerCLI as a way to manage my vSphere instances. Examples like these rock. Thank you Virtu-Al! [...]
So the two VMware articles you mention contradict each other. Any chance that VMware will correct this in the future?
I think decreasing the resolution on the guest would be a better option.
Seems like a waste to increase the video memory usage on every single vm.
Good job，I got it.
[...] של Alan Renouf תוכלו למצוא סקריפט PowerCLI שיכול לשנות את ההגדרות של מספר [...]
[...] pour le sport, voici la version oneliner du script d’Alan permettant de fixer la taille de la mémoire vidéo des VM à AutoDetect pour éviter les warnings lors de vmotion : Insufficient video RAM. The maximum resolution of the [...]
It took me some time to succeed but here is the oneliner version : http://www.hypervisor.fr/?p=3024
Hi the snippet at the bottom does the same, except implemented in perl using the VMware perl api.
#!/usr/bin/perl -w
use strict;
use warnings;
use VMware::VIRuntime;
use Data::Dumper;
my $vm_name = “vmnamehere”;
my $shiny_new_vm = Vim::find_entity_view(view_type => ‘VirtualMachine’,
filter => { ‘config.name’ => $vm_name });
my $deviceList = $shiny_new_vm->config->hardware->device;
foreach my $device (@$deviceList) {
if ( ref ($device) eq “VirtualMachineVideoCard” ){
$device->useAutoDetect(1);
my $spec = VirtualMachineConfigSpec->new(
changeVersion => $shiny_new_vm->config->changeVersion,
deviceChange => [
VirtualDeviceConfigSpec->new(
operation => VirtualDeviceConfigSpecOperation->new("edit"),
device => $device
)
]
);
eval {
$shiny_new_vm->ReconfigVM(spec => $spec);
};
}
}
[...] Pour aller plus loin, Alan Renouf propose une fonction très complète à intégrer dans votre shell PowerCLI: http://www.virtu-al.net/2011/03/10/change-vm-video-memory/ [...]