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I have some VMs in vSphere running on several ESXi servers. The guests do NOT have VMWare Tools installed and the tools cannot be installed on the guests. The guest OS can respond and do a graceful shutdown if it receives an ACPI shutdown signal though (i.e. a tap on a physical power button of a modern PC and not a long press or a yank on the cord). Is there any way to send an ACPI shutdown signal in VMware ESXi/vSphere?

The only options readily apparent are to do a "Power Off" which cuts power immediately without the guest doing a graceful shutdown or to do a "Shutdown Guest OS" but that requires VMWare Tools be installed.

Thanks!

Ben Franske
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1 Answers1

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You can graceful shutdown machine using command-line on ESXi console:

vim-cmd vmsvc/power.shutdown VMID

If it still fail you can power off machine, but thats not an answer... vim-cmd vmsvc/power.off VMID

To get list of VMs use:

vim-cmd vmsvc/getallvms
Slideroh
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  • My understanding is that only works if you have the VMware Tools installed and does not simply send an ACPI shutdown signal (akin to pressing the power button on a regular ACPI controlled physical system). – Ben Franske Dec 19 '19 at 16:39