VxRail: ESXi Nodes Randomly Try to Connect to an Orphaned NFS Datastore

Summary: Nodes are trying to connect to an unmounted Network File Share (NFS) due to information left in the configuration file.

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Symptoms

Post unmounting the NFS datastore from the VxRAIL cluster there are traces on the vmkernel.log that the ESXi hosts try to connect the NFS orphan shares causing a lot of unwanted logging information:
 

cat vmkernel.log | grep -i nfs
2019-08-20T05:48:50.335Z cpu29:2098455)WARNING: NFS: 221: Got error 13 from mount call
2019-08-20T05:49:20.340Z cpu21:2098455)WARNING: NFS: 221: Got error 13 from mount call
2019-08-20T05:49:50.348Z cpu12:2098455)WARNING: NFS: 221: Got error 13 from mount call
2019-08-20T05:50:20.373Z cpu17:2098455)WARNING: NFS: 221: Got error 13 from mount call
2019-08-20T05:50:50.379Z cpu28:2098455)WARNING: NFS: 221: Got error 13 from mount call
2019-08-20T05:51:20.386Z cpu8:2098455)WARNING: NFS: 221: Got error 13 from mount call
2019-08-20T05:51:50.393Z cpu31:2098455)WARNING: NFS: 221: Got error 13 from mount call
2019-08-20T05:52:20.400Z cpu1:2098455)WARNING: NFS: 221: Got error 13 from mount call
2019-08-20T05:52:50.408Z cpu24:2098455)WARNING: NFS: 221: Got error 13 from mount call
2019-08-20T05:53:20.421Z cpu29:2098455)WARNING: NFS: 221: Got error 13 from mount call
2019-08-20T05:53:50.427Z cpu31:2098455)WARNING: NFS: 221: Got error 13 from mount call
2019-08-20T05:54:20.432Z cpu11:2098455)WARNING: NFS: 221: Got error 13 from mount call
2019-08-20T05:54:50.440Z cpu10:2098455)WARNING: NFS: 221: Got error 13 from mount call
2019-08-20T05:55:20.447Z cpu79:2098455)WARNING: NFS: 221: Got error 13 from mount call

 

Cause

This is caused by stagnant entries of the NFS share left in the ESXi esx.conf file.

Resolution

Action Plan:

  1. Ensure that the NFS storage has been correctly removed as per VMware KB https://kb.vmware.com/s/article/1005057This hyperlink is taking you to a website outside of Dell Technologies.
  2. Check if there are any traces of the share in the esx.conf file as per below:
/nas/NFS/readOnly = "false"
/nas/NFS/host = "fs-Cork-av.lab.org"
/nas/NFS/share = "/ifs/FS-CORK-AV/VM"
/nas/NFS/enabled = "true"
  1. If you see entries like above, proceed with the following action plan.
    1. Take a backup of the esx.conf file: cp esx.conf esx.conf.old
    2. Remove any lines related to /nas/NFS storage in the esx.conf file and save the file.
    3. After editing the lines out of the file, run the following command to commit the changes: auto-backup.sh
    4. Place the node in maintenance mode and reboot the same.

Affected Products

VxRail, VxRail Appliance Series, VxRail G Series Nodes, VxRail D Series Nodes, VxRail D560, VxRail D560F, VxRail E Series Nodes, VxRail E460, VxRail E560, VxRail E560F, VxRail E560N, VxRail E660, VxRail E660F, VxRail E660N, VxRail E665, VxRail E665F , VxRail E665N, VxRail G560, VxRail G560F, VxRail P Series Nodes, VxRail P470, VxRail P570, VxRail P570F, VxRail P580N, VxRail P670F, VxRail P670N, VxRail P675F, VxRail P675N, VxRail S Series Nodes, VxRail S470, VxRail S570, VxRail S670, VxRail Software, VxRail V Series Nodes, VxRail V470, VxRail V570, VxRail V570F, VXRAIL V670F, VxRail VD-4510C, VxRail VD-4520C, VxRail VE-660, VxRail VE-6615, VxRail VP-760, VxRail VP-7625 ...
Article Properties
Article Number: 000082205
Article Type: Solution
Last Modified: 02 Jun 2025
Version:  4
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