Hot-Plug CPU and RAM Windows 2016 server issues

After adding CPU and RAM to a Windows 2016 Server instance, the instance does not recognize the added resources. Additionally, if the Windows 2016 server has 2GB or less RAM, hot-plugging CPU can cause the operating system to be sluggish and on rare occasions crash.

These issues are caused by a bug in the Microsoft ACPI driver that prevents the hot-plug of CPU for Windows 2016.

One solution is to reboot the instance. After the reload, the added resources are recognized by the instance.

Another method is to edit the Windows registry by following these steps:

  1. Uninstall the existing HID Button over Interrupt driver package for this device, which shows up in Device Manager as not working properly.
  2. Download PsTools from the Windows Sysinternals website.
  3. Extract PsTools from the archive.
  4. Open a command shell with administrator privileges and navigate to the directory containing the PsTools.

    For example: cd c:\users\admin\downloads\pstools

  5. Execute the following command:

    psexec -s -i regedit.exe

  6. Open the Windows Registry by executing the following command:

    regedit

  7. In the registry, navigate to HKLM\SYSTEM\DriverDataBase\DriverPackage\hidnterrupt.inf_x86<some instance ID>\Descriptors\ACPI.
    1. Right-click the ACPI0010 subkey and select Export. Export the file to a memorable location.
    2. Right-click the ACPI0010 subkey and select Delete. Confirm the deletion of the subkey.
  8. In the registry, navigate to: HKLM\SYSTEM\DriverDataBase\DeviceIds\ACPI\ACPI0010
    1. Right-click the bidinterrupt.inf subkey and select Export. Export the file to a memorable location.
    2. Right-click the bidinterrupt.inf subkey and select Delete. Confirm the deletion of the subkey.
Parent topic: Application instances