Sometimes a Virtual Machine can’t be stopped via the VIClient. The job just hangs. There are a number of options to stop your Virtual Machine from within the Service Console. Keep in mind that these are last resort options!
- Stopping the virtual machine by issuing the command vmware-cmd /vmfs/volumes/<datastorename>/<vmname>/<vmname>.vmx stop. This must be done on the ESX host where the Virtual Machine is running!
- If this does not work, one can issue the following command: vmware-cmd /vmfs/volumes/<datastorename>/<vmname>/<vmname>.vmx stop hard. This will try to kill the Virtual Machine instantly.
- A final solution is to kill the PID (process ID). Issue the following command: ps auxfww | grep <vmname> to locate the correct PID (BTW: this cannot be done via ESXTOP). The first number to appear in the output is your PID. The PID can be used to terminate the process by issuing kill -9 PID.
