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A small detail that can lead to extended troubleshooting with Citrix PVS on XenServer.
When provisioning VMs through the CVAD Setup Wizard, the number of vCPUs must match the CPU topology of the XenServer template.
The vCPU count must be a multiple of Cores per Socket.
Example:
Cores per Socket: 4
PVS Wizard: 6 vCPUs ❌
PVS Wizard: 8 vCPUs ✅
With an invalid combination, the VM is provisioned but cannot subsequently boot.
XenServer may report:
VCPU_max must be a multiple of platforms:cores-per-socket
The tricky part:
The VM exists.
The PVS target exists.
The vDisk assignment looks correct.
Troubleshooting can quickly focus on PXE, BDM, streaming or the vDisk, although the actual issue is the VM’s CPU topology.
Citrix continues to track this as PVS-1126.
👉 So, for PVS targets that do not boot on XenServer, always check:
vCPU ↔ Cores per Socket.
A small setting with a big impact. 😉
