Proxmox cluster load high

[pvpaulo]

Hello, good morning everyone.

Could you help me?

I'm facing a problem where my Proxmox is experiencing a very high load of 28.

However, there were several VMs in this Proxmox.

I thought it was the VMs consuming too much of the virtualizer's processor.

However, since this environment is in a cluster,

I migrated all the VMs to a second Proxmox.

Now the environment has no VMs.

However, even without VMs, the load is high.

I don't know what to do.

The environment is configured with 3 iSCSI LUNs using multipath.

The Proxmox version is 8.2.

My server has plenty of resources, and I also have another Proxmox in a cluster with the same hardware configuration.

However, the other virtualizer is running normally, with all VMs and a normal load.

What could be the problem? The versions of the two Proxmox processors are the same, and the physical hardware resources are also the same.
What could be the problem, and how can I check?





root@ROMA02:~# pveversion -v
proxmox-ve: 8.2.0 (running kernel: 6.8.4-2-pve)
pve-manager: 8.2.2 (running version: 8.2.2/9355359cd7afbae4)
proxmox-kernel-helper: 8.1.0
proxmox-kernel-6.8: 6.8.4-2
proxmox-kernel-6.8.4-2-pve-signed: 6.8.4-2
ceph-fuse: 17.2.7-pve3
corosync: 3.1.7-pve3
criu: 3.17.1-2
glusterfs-client: 10.3-5
ifupdown2: 3.2.0-1+pmx8
ksm-control-daemon: 1.5-1
libjs-extjs: 7.0.0-4
libknet1: 1.28-pve1
libproxmox-acme-perl: 1.5.0
libproxmox-backup-qemu0: 1.4.1
libproxmox-rs-perl: 0.3.3
libpve-access-control: 8.1.4
libpve-apiclient-perl: 3.3.2
libpve-cluster-api-perl: 8.0.6
libpve-cluster-perl: 8.0.6
libpve-common-perl: 8.2.1
libpve-guest-common-perl: 5.1.1
libpve-http-server-perl: 5.1.0
libpve-network-perl: 0.9.8
libpve-rs-perl: 0.8.8
libpve-storage-perl: 8.2.1
libspice-server1: 0.15.1-1
lvm2: 2.03.16-2
lxc-pve: 6.0.0-1
lxcfs: 6.0.0-pve2
novnc-pve: 1.4.0-3
proxmox-backup-client: 3.2.0-1
proxmox-backup-file-restore: 3.2.0-1
proxmox-kernel-helper: 8.1.0
proxmox-mail-forward: 0.2.3
proxmox-mini-journalreader: 1.4.0
proxmox-offline-mirror-helper: 0.6.6
proxmox-widget-toolkit: 4.2.1
pve-cluster: 8.0.6
pve-container: 5.0.10
pve-docs: 8.2.1
pve-edk2-firmware: 4.2023.08-4
pve-esxi-import-tools: 0.7.0
pve-firewall: 5.0.5
pve-firmware: 3.11-1
pve-ha-manager: 4.0.4
pve-i18n: 3.2.2
pve-qemu-kvm: 8.1.5-5
pve-xtermjs: 5.3.0-3
qemu-server: 8.2.1
smartmontools: 7.3-pve1
spiceterm: 3.3.0
swtpm: 0.8.0+pve1
vncterm: 1.8.0
zfsutils-linux: 2.2.3-pve2





pvecm status
Cluster information
-------------------
Name: roma
Config Version: 2
Transport: knet
Secure auth: on

Quorum information
------------------
Date: Fri Nov 28 08:20:01 2025
Quorum provider: corosync_votequorum
Nodes: 2
Node ID: 0x00000001
Ring ID: 1.188d9e
Quorate: Yes

Votequorum information
----------------------
Expected votes: 4
Highest expected: 4
Total votes: 4
Quorum: 1
Flags: 2Node Quorate WaitForAll

Membership information
----------------------
Nodeid Votes Name
0x00000001 2 200.201.235.106 (local)
0x00000002 2 200.201.235.107

 

[MagicFab]

First, upgrade. I've had high load on empty / low use PVEs before on HPE servers, until I upgraded to 9.0. We're now at 9.1, upgrade. You version is more than 1.5y old, a LOT has been fixed and improved since.

If this is a production system of if it's important in any capacity, get a support subscription.

---

Fabián Rodríguez | Le Goût du Libre Inc. | Montreal, Canada | Mastodon
Proxmox Silver Partner, server and desktop enterprise support in French, English and Spanish

 

[pvpaulo]

This is a productive client environment.
They don't want to provide support.
I have a cluster with 2 physical Proxmox processors.
This is my processor:
CPU(s): 56
Intel(R) Xeon(R) CPU E5-2680 v4 @ 2.40GHz

Is there any solution?
Can I update to version 9?
Is there a risk of losing the VMs?
What would be the ideal procedure to correct this?

Or is there a way to fix it and keep it in this version?

 

[MagicFab]

This is a productive client environment.
They don't want to provide support.
I have a cluster with 2 physical Proxmox processors.
This is my processor:
CPU(s): 56
Intel(R) Xeon(R) CPU E5-2680 v4 @ 2.40GHz

Is there any solution?
Can I update to version 9?
Is there a risk of losing the VMs?
What would be the ideal procedure to correct this?

Or is there a way to fix it and keep it in this version?

A few ideas before attempting an upgrade :

- Make sure all three systems are running the latest in Proxmox 8.x series, and booting into the same kernel version:

apt-get update && apt-get dist-upgrade -y

This will NOT upgrade to 9.1, for now in my opinion it's best to try and find the problem before upgrading.

A single Proxmox host can have a bad iSCSI path, a flaky switch port, a kernel regression, or blocked I/O tasks while the others stay healthy. High load with no VMs almost always comes from I/O wait on that specific node. Search for “Proxmox high load I/O wait” or “multipath troubleshooting” and follow the usual diagnostics.

BTW, running a 2‑node Proxmox cluster is generally not good practice unless you add a QDevice. It's not the cause of high load, though.

 

[ness1602]

Usually very high load shows problems with storage, eg disks cannot write fast enough. First look at disks.