virtual server is running elsewhere, shutting down!

This error appears when the specified server is already running in another instance.

Possible causes

• You were moving a virtual server from one instance to another while both instances were running.
  • Moving virtual servers between two running instances is currently not reliably possible. You need to restart the instance you moved the virtual server to, which will cause the virtual server you moved to shutdown in the old instance if it hasn't been already.
    If you do not restart the target instance after the move, the virtual server will shutdown within an hour. It cannot be predicted whether it will shutdown in the old or the new instance.
• You attempted to start a virtual server in an instance that previously crashed or was forcefully terminated.
  • If the old instance was not cleanly shutdown or was otherwise unable to inform our servers of being shutdown, our systems will continue to assume the servers are running for a period of 3 hours.
    There are safeguards in place to prevent this error from happening, however they only work if the virtual server is automatically launched with the instance (virtualserver_autostart=1). If your virtual servers are set to not launch automatically when the instance is started (virtualserver_autostart property is 0) the instance will report that it is running empty. Now when you attempt to start your virtual servers, the next time the instance reports to us it will have servers running, but according to our data these servers are still being run in the old instance that crashed or was forcefully terminated.
• You got two instances running that use the same database with the same settings.

How to fix?

We strongly recommend against setting the virtualserver_autostart property of virtual servers to 0 if you intend them to be running.

You can of course set it to 0 if the server shouldn't be running (e.g. customer didn't pay), however if the server is supposed to be running it should always be set to 1.

When moving virtual servers between instances you currently have to restart the target instance to make sure our servers know it is supposed to be running in this instance. Keep in mind that you should've set the virtualserver_autostart property of that virtual server to 1.