Question: I want to identify virtual machines which are powered off. What query can I run which will return the full list of virtual machines within a VMWare vCenter database where the power state = OFF.

Answer: It is possible to return the recordset by querying the  database. Find a sample query executed on a vcDB database. The query includes some extra information , which you may find useful .

The key column is the POWER_STATE column in the vpxv_vms table. There are different potential  power states  for  a virtual machine . Possible values are off, on, and suspend

SELECT 
VMS.name AS [Server Name], VCR.name AS [Cluster Name], HOS.name as [Host Name], 
VMS.DNS_name, VMS.IP_ADDRESS, HOS.hostid, VMS.power_state FROM vpxv_vms VMS 
 INNER JOIN VPXV_HOSTS HOS on VMS.hostid = HOS.hostid
 INNER JOIN VPXV_COMPUTE_RESOURCE VCR on HOS.farmid = VCR.RESOURCEPOOLID
 WHERE VMS.power_state =  'off' 
 ORDER BY VCR.name, VMS.name

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