When I try to create a catalog, I get the following error.

Failed to copy the snapshot image;

I'm running XenServer 5.6 FP1 on three servers in a pool, and using a Dell EqualLogic SAN for storage.

This is a known bug with xenserver 5.6 and that san, upgrade to fp1 and it should work fine.

Mark.

I'm already running XenServer 5.6 FP1.

Sounds like we'll need some more logs. If you download CDFControl, capture logs for all modules and then either post the log here or mail it to me (zipped, but without a .zip extension or our firewall may swallow it), I may be able to take a look at it.

Here's the log file from when I tried to create a catalog.

Benjamin,

It looks like we're getting back an error from XenServer which we haven't seen before, which is why you're not getting a helpful error message back. Many thanks for finding this - we've now made the code change to ensure we handle this better in the next version of the XenDesktop!

In the meantime, it should be possible to get some more information on this from XenServer itself. If you again attempt to create a catalog and when it fails, get XenCenter to generate a server status report ("Get Server Status Report..." on the main Tools menu) and attach/mail that to me we should be able to work out what's happening here.

With help from the XenServer engineering team, we've determined that you're hitting a XenServer bug. We've raised an internal issue to fix this, but unfortunately don't have an ETA or a workaround at the moment.

What type of bug is it? Would it be something that I could fix by taking a server with a clean install of XenServer 5.6fp1 and starting a new pool and creating the virtual desktop there?

I answered my own question, a fresh install of Xen 5.6 fp 1 on a server away from the pool doesn't work as well. Is there any solution, other than junking either XenServer or the EqualLogic?

Can you use iscsi to connect to the equalogic? As I understand it the problem lies in the array specific provider in xenserver, direct iscsi if available may work. The downside to this is that it will use thick provisioning which is why nfs is the recommended shared storage type with xenserver and xendesktop.

Mark.

.

Edited by: sivaram gaddam on Apr 14, 2011 5:36 PM

Mark, I am now reading in the XenDesktop docs that XenServer 5.6 FP1 doesn't work with Machine Creation Services. Why did you tell me to upgrade to a known non working setup? Also, what is the real solution to my problems?

The situation with XenServer 5.6 FP1 is more complicated than "doesn't work". As far as the XenDesktop engineering team are aware, there is only one known issue with FP1, and that is a performance issue which manifests itself only at large scale. However, XD5 has not been formally tested with XS 5.6 FP1, and so we do not claim to support it.

On the other hand, there is a known issue with XS 5.6 and the Dell EqualLogic which means that it doesn't work at all under some circumstances.

Formally, this does mean that there is no way you can currently run in a supported configuration with the Dell EqualLogic. Your choices are therefore the obvious: run in an unsupported configuration until the upcoming service packs for XenDesktop and XenServer are released, remove the EqualLogic from your system or remove XenServer from your system. I'm aware none of these are ideal.

In the documentation for XenDesktop 5, updated 2011-03-21:

http://hqextsrvsft01.citrix.com/proddocs/index.jsp?topic=/xendesktop-rho/cds-sys-reqs-provision-rho.html

"Machine Creation Services and run-time Active Directory account injection into VMs is supported on:

Citrix XenServer 5.6 Standard and Enterprise editions.

Note: Machine Creation Services will not work with earlier versions of XenServer or with Citrix XenServer 5.6 Feature Pack 1. For information on system requirements, see the XenServer Administrator's Guide and the XenServer Installation Guide."

I didn't notice this before I started asking for help, or I would have never upgraded our pool to 5.6 FP1.

We've been having more issues with our EqualLogic and XenServer 5.6 FP1 than when we had XenServer 5.6 installed. I am planning on rolling our pool back to 5.6 due to the major issue we're having with creating new VMs.

Also, I've never been able to find any info telling me exactly what is the issue with EqualLogic and XenServer 5.6 is. Could you tell me what the known issue is exactly?

The docs are wrong; the correct position is what I have stated above. I'll see what I can do to get docs corrected.

The problem with the Equalogic and XenServer 5.6 is that the snapshot operation copies a piece of metadata from the original source into the snapshot that should be copied which then causes a problem if the snapshot then needs to be copied (which is basically what the Machine Creation Services).

Here's my post on the issue I'm having with XenServer 5.6 FP1, complete with my workaround to be able to create a new VM in our pool. We were not having that issue with XenServer 5.6. With 5.6 and 5.6 FP1 MCS doesn't work on our setup.

http://forums.citrix.com/message.jspa?messageID=1547565#1547565

The situation is that there was most definitely an issue in XenServer 5.6 which prevented things working with the EqualLogic SAN; a fix for that issue in present in XenServer 5.6 FP1, which fixed the problem as we/the XenServer team understood it. It's of course possible that you are hitting a related issue which isn't fixed in FP1, but the first thing we need to do is to work out whether it's a XenDesktop issue or a XenServer issue.

Could you provide us with full CDF logs demonstrating the problem - that will let us know where to direct this issue.

Thanks!

I posted eariler in the thread my CDF logs for when I tried running MCS with the current setup. Do you want me to make another attempt and send a fresh set of logs?