[SOLVED] One VM shows wrong memory use

cdsJerry

Renowned Member
Sep 12, 2011
204
8
83
I have a 6.2-15 installation running 5 Windows machines. There is a Windows10 VM that always shows the memory usage as being between 87-90% in use at all times, even when idle. When I log into the machine task manager shows it's only using about 25%.

I've tried rebooting, restarting the QEMU Guest agent. Nothing seems to correct this. Any suggestions?
 
are the Balloon and QEMU running inside the Windows VM?
Please post the VM config and the output of the following commands:
From Proxmox VE side:
Code:
pveversion -v
From Windows 10 VM:
Code:
sc qc BalloonService
sc qc QEMU-GA
 
are the Balloon and QEMU running inside the Windows VM?
Please post the VM config and the output of the following commands:
From Proxmox VE side:
Code:
pveversion -v
From Windows 10 VM:
Code:
sc qc BalloonService
sc qc QEMU-GA
The sc qc BalloonService and sc qc QEMU-GA both return "OpenService Failed 1060" messages from the command prompt.
From the Services window however it shows QEMU Guest Agent as Running (and indeed it's passing IPs etc to Proxmox). I don't see a Balloon Service but I ran the installer the same as the other VMs from the virtio-win00.1.185 Balloon\w10\amd64 disc.

Below are the results from the pveversion - v command:
root@pve:~# pveversion -v
Code:
root@pve:~# pveversion -v
proxmox-ve: 6.2-2 (running kernel: 5.3.10-1-pve)
pve-manager: 6.2-15 (running version: 6.2-15/48bd51b6)
pve-kernel-5.4: 6.2-7
pve-kernel-helper: 6.2-7
pve-kernel-5.3: 6.1-6
pve-kernel-5.4.65-1-pve: 5.4.65-1
pve-kernel-5.3.18-3-pve: 5.3.18-3
pve-kernel-5.3.10-1-pve: 5.3.10-1
ceph-fuse: 12.2.11+dfsg1-2.1+b1
corosync: 3.0.4-pve1
criu: 3.11-3
glusterfs-client: 5.5-3
ifupdown: 0.8.35+pve1
ksm-control-daemon: 1.3-1
libjs-extjs: 6.0.1-10
libknet1: 1.16-pve1
libproxmox-acme-perl: 1.0.5
libpve-access-control: 6.1-3
libpve-apiclient-perl: 3.0-3
libpve-common-perl: 6.2-4
libpve-guest-common-perl: 3.1-3
libpve-http-server-perl: 3.0-6
libpve-storage-perl: 6.2-9
libqb0: 1.0.5-1
libspice-server1: 0.14.2-4~pve6+1
lvm2: 2.03.02-pve4
lxc-pve: 4.0.3-1
lxcfs: 4.0.3-pve3
novnc-pve: 1.1.0-1
proxmox-backup-client: 0.9.7-1
proxmox-mini-journalreader: 1.1-1
proxmox-widget-toolkit: 2.3-8
pve-cluster: 6.2-1
pve-container: 3.2-2
pve-docs: 6.2-6
pve-edk2-firmware: 2.20200531-1
pve-firewall: 4.1-3
pve-firmware: 3.1-3
pve-ha-manager: 3.1-1
pve-i18n: 2.2-2
pve-qemu-kvm: 5.1.0-6
pve-xtermjs: 4.7.0-2
qemu-server: 6.2-19
smartmontools: 7.1-pve2
spiceterm: 3.1-1
vncterm: 1.6-2
zfsutils-linux: 0.8.4-pve2
 
did you got any error during the installation of the Balloon or qemu agent?

what says the output of the powershell command below?
Code:
Get-Service QEMU-GA
 
did you got any error during the installation of the Balloon or qemu agent?

what says the output of the powershell command below?
Code:
Get-Service QEMU-GA
I get back an error message saying there's no such a command.

And no, I didn't get an error during installation. I follow a guide each time I create a VM and I followed the same guide as always. The only difference is that this time I used the updated version of the virtio-win disc (0.1.185)
 
Last edited:
did you got any error during the installation of the Balloon or qemu agent?

what says the output of the powershell command below?
Code:
Get-Service QEMU-GA
did you got any error during the installation of the Balloon or qemu agent?

what says the output of the powershell command below?
Code:
Get-Service QEMU-GA
The memory usage does change in a range from about 88 to 91 so it seems to be reading _something_, but I don't know what. I've tried to reinstall the balloon drivers but it didn't change anything.
 
There are no errors during balloon installation?

what error did you get?

Which version of VirtIO are you using? did you checked our wiki [0] and [1]

[0] https://pve.proxmox.com/wiki/Qemu-guest-agent#Windows
[1] https://pve.proxmox.com/wiki/Windows_10_guest_best_practices
I'm using virtio-win-0.1.185.

I wasn't sure if you wanted me to run the command from the Proxmox prompt or the Windows Command so I tried both.
Proxmox:
root@pve:~# Get-Service QEMU-GA
-bash: Get-Service: command not found
root@pve:~#

Windows:
'Get-Service' is not recognized as an internal or external command,
operable program or batch file.

I used the guide by Dave Jansen for the setup. It's been by far the most detailed and useful guide I've found anywhere. I started in the Proxmox WIKi but Dave's guide is just so much more clear. The WIKI was clearly written by someone who knows so much about the product that they were unable to dumb it down enough for me to use. I found so many others that had the same problem. Finally finding Dave's post was a blessing. https://davejansen.com/recommended-settings-windows-10-2016-2018-2019-vm-proxmox/

I followed the same guide when building my other VMs and they all work fine. The only difference I'm aware of, is that I sued version 0.1.185 instead of 0.1.171 this time.
 
Yes. That's exactly what it looks like.

SOLVED:
I had forgotten to copy the Balloon directory into the Program Files directory and run the blnsvr.exe -i command. Once I did that, the VM started showing up correctly in the Proxmox panel.

Thank you for your help!
 
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