VMware backups fail with VMWARE VMOMI65535 - A general system error occurred
Problem description
VMware backups fail with VMWARE_VMOMI65535 - A general system error occurred.
Cause
You may run into this error when the number of snapshots created exceeds the maximum number of snapshots that can be created. The Druva Phoenix backups delete snapshots after the backup completes. However, if a third-party (non-Druva) application is configured to create snapshots, the maximum count can get breached.
Traceback
The job logs have the following error:
'Starting snapshot operation.'
[ERROR] SyncError: A general system error occurred
Resolution
VMware supports a maximum of 32 snapshots in a chain, however the recommendation is to only use two to three snapshots. Delete the manually created snapshots that are no longer required so that newer snapshots can be created. For more information, see Best practices for using VMware snapshots in the vSphere environment.