VMware Virtual Machine (REST & VI/JSON) Sensor

Credentials

The sensor requires credentials for VMware vSphere in the settings of the parent device.

Parent device

This sensor requires a parent device as of vCenter Server 8.0 Update 1.

If you set up this sensor on multiple probes (for example, when using remote probes or when running a failover cluster), you might need to change the settings of your VMware host so that it accepts more incoming connections. Otherwise, you might receive connection timeouts and errors when running many VMware sensors with a short scanning interval.

For more information, see the Knowledge Base: How can I increase the connection limit on VMware systems?

Meta-scan

This sensor uses the meta-scan feature. After sensor creation, some settings might appear for reference purposes only.

IPv6

This sensor supports IPv6.

Performance impact

This sensor has a very low performance impact.

Lookups

This sensor uses lookups to determine the status values of one or more channels.

VM ID

Shows the managed object identifier (MOID) of the VM that this sensor monitors.

Name

Shows the name of the VM that this sensor monitors.

Power State

Shows the power state of the VM that this sensor monitors.

Powered-Off VM Handling

Define how the sensor reacts to VMs that are powered off:

• Show down status when VM is powered off (default): Change to the Down status if the VM is powered off. This overrides the lookup handling of all channels.

If the sensor is in the Down status, it does not record any data in any of its channels.

• Use channel lookup states: Set the sensor status based on the channel lookups of the Disk Consolidation, Power State, and VMware Tools Status channels.

Primary Channel

Select a channel from the list to define it as the primary channel. In the device tree, PRTG displays the last value of the primary channel below the sensor's name. The available options depend on what channels are available for this sensor.

You can set a different primary channel later by clicking below a channel gauge on the sensor's Overview tab.

Graph Type

Define how this sensor shows different channels:

• Show channels independently (default): Show a graph for each channel.
• Stack channels on top of each other: Stack channels on top of each other to create a multi-channel graph. This generates a graph that visualizes the different components of your total traffic.
  You cannot use this option in combination with manual Vertical Axis Scaling (available in the channel settings).

Stack Unit

This setting is only visible if you select Stack channels on top of each other above.

Select a unit from the list. PRTG stacks all channels with this unit on top of each other. By default, you cannot exclude single channels from stacking if they use the selected unit. However, there is an advanced procedure to do so.

Result Handling

Define what PRTG does with the sensor result:

• Discard result (default): Do not store the sensor result.
• Store result: Store the sensor result and the last response in the \Logs\sensors subfolder of the PRTG data directory on the probe system. The file name is Result of Sensor [ID].log. This setting is for debugging purposes. PRTG overwrites this file with each scanning interval.

This option is not available when the sensor runs on the hosted probe of a PRTG Hosted Monitor instance.

In a cluster, PRTG stores the result in the PRTG data directory of the master node.

Ballooned Memory

The ballooned memory

CPU Ready

The CPU readiness (%)

CPU Usage

The CPU usage

Datastore Read Latency

The datastore total read latency

Datastore Write Latency

The datastore total write latency

Disk Consolidation

If the disks of the VM require consolidation

• Up status: Not Needed
• Warning status: Needed
• Unknown status: Unknown

Disk Throughput

The disk throughput

Downtime

In the channel table on the Overview tab, this channel never shows any values. PRTG uses this channel in graphs and reports to show the amount of time in which the sensor was in the Down status.

Memory Active

The active memory

Memory Consumed

The consumed memory

Memory Size

The configured memory size of the VM

Memory Usage

The memory usage (%)

Network Received

The received bytes

Network Throughput

The network throughput

VMware reports this value as an aggregate counter, usually equal to the sum of the Network Received and Network Transmitted values.

Network Transmitted

The transmitted bytes

Oldest Snapshot Age

The oldest snapshot age

If the sensor cannot determine the number of snapshots, this channel shows no data.

Power State

The power state of the VM

• Up status: Powered On
• Warning status: Powered Off, Suspended
• Unknown status: Unknown

This channel is the primary channel by default.

Snapshot Count

The snapshot count

If there are no snapshots, this channel shows 0.

VMware Tools Status

The status of VMware Tools on the VM

• Up status: Running (Current)
• Warning status: Running (Version Warning), Running (Guest Managed), Not Running, Not Installed
• Unknown status: Unknown