Displays information about powered off VMs, idle VMs, snapshots and orphaned disks. This information helps to identify the amount of resources that can be reclaimed and provisioned to other objects in your environment or amount of potential savings that can be done in each month.

The types of VMs are ranked in the order of their importance in a reclamation action. A VM whose attributes match more than one VM type is included with the higher-ranking VM type. Grouping the VMs this way eliminates duplicates during calculations. As an example, powered-off VMs are ranked higher than snapshots, so that a powered-off VM that also has a snapshot appears only in the powered-off VM group.

If you exclude a given type of VM, all VMs matching this type are included with the next lower-ranked group they match. For example, to list all snapshots regardless of whether their corresponding VMs are powered-off or idle, deselect the Powered-off VMs and Idle VMs check boxes.

Further, you can configure how long a given class of VMs must be in the designated state - powered-off, for example, or idle - to be included in the reclamation exercise. You also can choose to hide the cost savings calculation.

Table 1. Reclamation Settings
Property Description
Show Cost Savings Controls whether to show Cost savings in 'Overview' which is found under Optimize Capacity in the left navigation pane.
Powered-Off VMs VMs that have been continuously powered off during the defined period of time.

The total storage capacity used is reclaimable. Total storage reclaimable cost is computed by multiplying storage rate with storage utilization. The direct cost of VM is also attributed.

Idle VMs VMs that remain idle during the defined period of time. You can configure the following parameters based on which vRealize Operations calculates idle VMs:
  • Duration for which the VM was idle.
  • MHz of CPU consumption of VMs, and percentage of the time VMs have less than defined MHz of CPU within each day.
  • VMs that are excluded based on how recently they were provisioned.
Note: Changing the idle VM settings will affect all scheduled reclamation jobs.

Total CPU, memory, and storage capacity allocated to the VMs is reclaimable. Resource level costs are computed by multiplying resource base rate with utilization levels. Direct cost of VM is also attributed.

Snapshots VM snapshots that have existed for the entire defined period of time.

Snapshots of a VM use storage space and such storage is reclaimable. The reclaimable cost is computed by multiplying storage rate with reclaimable storage value.

Orphaned Disks

VMDKs on datastores that are not connected to any registered VMs and have not been modified during the defined period of time.

Orphaned disks are VMDKs which are associated with a VM which are not in inventory, but still available in a datastore. You can configure the minimum number of days for which VMDKs not related to any existing VM will be reported as orphaned and appear under Orphaned Disks in Reclaim page.

Note: You can navigate to Cost/Price section under Administration > Global Settings in the left menu, and change the value of the Orphaned Disks Collection time. At this time that you set, vRealize Operations checks for orphaned VMDKs in vSphere Client instances. The settings for Cost Calculation and Orphaned Disks Collection are interrelated. The default value for Cost Calculation is 9:00 PM, and the default for Orphaned Disks Collection is 8:00 PM. It is recommended to schedule Cost Calculation after Orphaned Disks Collection.
Note: If you are unable to make changes in the Reclamation Settings page, your user role in the Access Control page (Roles tab) under Administration > Access Control must be modified by an administrator. The Manage Global Settings permissions under Administration > Global Settings in the Permissions pane controls access to the Reclamation Settings page.