How to Increase The vCPU and vMem Memory Of a VM Using PowerCLI – VirtuallyThatGuy

So a colleague asked me. Is it possible to increase the memory and cpu sizes of a bunch of VMs using powershell? My answer was everything is possible with powercli so I told him let me have a look for you. First of all you can only increase memory or vCpu of a VM if hot plug is enabled. Without that, you will need to shutdown the VM and apply these changes.

## Load Powershell and import the VMware modules needed for below

Import-Module vmware.vimautomation.core

Get-Module -ListAvailable VMware* | Import-Module | Out-Null

## Connect to the vCenter or vCenters of the VMs to make these changes to

Connect-VIServer uk3p-vc01.lab.local, ntcp-vc01.lab.local

## Once Connected Set your variables for the VMs ## vCSA 1

$vCSA1 = "DTCP-PRGT01","DTCP-SRM01","DTCP-AUTODEPLOY01","UK3P-WEB01","UK3P-WEB02","DTCP-DC01"

## Once Connected Set your variables for the VMs ## vCSA 2

$vCSA2 = "HDCP-CONNSVR01","HDCP-CONNSVR02","HDCP-COMPOSER01","HDCP-THINAPP","HDCP-WEB01","HDCP-WEB02", "HDCP-SECURITY01"

## Verify the VMs matches the once you have specified above

get-vm $vCSA1 | select Name, PowerState, MemoryGB, NumCPU, VMhost, Version | ft -a

get-vm $vCSA2 | select Name, PowerState, MemoryGB, NumCPU, VMhost, Version | ft -a

### Once Happy, proceed to below

## Increase $VCSA1 and $VCSA2 VMs memory and cpu ###

get-vm $vCSA1 | set-vm -memoryGB 4 -NumCpu 2 -Confirm:$false

Start-Sleep -Seconds 3

get-vm $vCSA2 | set-vm -memoryGB 4 -NumCpu 2 -Confirm:$false

Write-Host "!!!VM Specs Configurations Complete!!!" -ForegroundColor Green

##### End of Script #########

You can alternatively use a csv and call it using specified Variables. I will cover this in a later post.

## Load Powershell and import the VMware modules needed for below

Import-Module vmware.vimautomation.core
Get-Module -ListAvailable VMware* | Import-Module | Out-Null

## Connect to the vCenter or vCenters of the VMs to make these changes to

Connect-VIServer uk3p-vc01.lab.local, ntcp-vc01.lab.local

## Once Connected Set your variables for the VMs ## vCSA 1

$vCSA1 = "DTCP-PRGT01","DTCP-SRM01","DTCP-AUTODEPLOY01","UK3P-WEB01","UK3P-WEB02","DTCP-DC01"

## Once Connected Set your variables for the VMs ## vCSA 2

$vCSA2 = "HDCP-CONNSVR01","HDCP-CONNSVR02","HDCP-COMPOSER01","HDCP-THINAPP","HDCP-WEB01","HDCP-WEB02", "HDCP-SECURITY01"

## Verify the VMs matches the once you have specified above

get-vm $vCSA1 | select Name, PowerState, MemoryGB, NumCPU, VMhost, Version | ft -a 

get-vm $vCSA2 | select Name, PowerState, MemoryGB, NumCPU, VMhost, Version | ft -a 

### Once Happy, proceed to below

## Increase $VCSA1 and $VCSA2 VMs memory and cpu ###

get-vm $vCSA1 | set-vm -memoryGB 4 -NumCpu 2 -Confirm:$false

Start-Sleep -Seconds 10

get-vm $vCSA2 | set-vm -memoryGB 4 -NumCpu 2 -Confirm:$false

Write-Host "!!!VM Specs Configurations Complete!!!" -ForegroundColor Green

##### End of Script #########

#### Updated Script ####


$cred = Get-Credential
$vCenters = "lab-vcenter01.lab.local", "lab-vcenter02.lab.local"
Connect-VIServer $vCenters -Credential $cred

$VMsToUpgrade = get-vm |?{$_.Name -like "*windows*"} | select name | export-csv -Path C:\Temp\VMsToUpgrade.csv

## Or You can use below hashed out 
## $Windows = "HDCP-CONNSVR01","HDCP-CONNSVR02","HDCP-COMPOSER01","HDCP-THINAPP","HDCP-WEB01","HDCP-WEB02", "HDCP-SECURITY01"
##$VMsToUpgrade = get-vm $windows | select name | export-csv -Path C:\Temp\VMsToUpgrade.csv

$vm_name = (Import-Csv -Path C:\Temp\VMsToUpgrade.csv).Name
ForEach ($vm in $vm_name){
$vm_name | Shutdown-VMGuest –Confirm:$False
Sleep 60
$vm_name | Set-VM –MemoryGB 16 –NumCpu 4 –Confirm:$False
$vm_name | Start-VM
}

## Above will export VMs with name "*Windows*" to a csv and the a shutdwon request will be issued changing vMem to 16 and Numcpu to 4

1 thought on “How to Increase The vCPU and vMem Memory Of a VM Using PowerCLI – VirtuallyThatGuy”

Leave a Reply Cancel reply