I've got a VM stuck at "Getting Devices Ready" today. It's a DataCenter 2012R2 clone that I'm setting up for test purposes via the VMWare Clone operation. Not something I do a lot of, but have done a couple times now and normally it works. This time however, it won't boot...
I've heard of issues with the PNP Monitor and seen recommendations on booting into safe mode to disable that service. However, I can't seem to get into safe mode either. It appears that holding shift during boot is the only option on this version, and it does not seem to work (or I can't get from the start VM option over to the console tab fast enough).
Other ways to get into safe mode? If I do get in, is disabling PNP Monitor my best first choice?
Power cycling 3 times as suggested by Harry Johnston got me to a place I could get into safe mode. Once in safe mode I was able to go into the device manager and uninstall the Generic PnP Monitor driver. Then I was able to reboot the VM and get in normally. As a side note, the web console in vCenter would not let me click on the bottom quarter nor the right most quarter of the virtual screen. Installing and using the remote client from their MyVMWare site was the solution to that little snag.