Invalid disk device for 'cdsdisk’ error

I was trying to setup shared storage between two VMs (Linux) for my virtual environment. Hence, I added another hard disk (or shared storage) between those two virtual boxes.

However, before creating VxVM DiskGroup, when I tried to initialize the shared storage (disk) that I configured between two VMs then one of the errors that surprised me was…

“VxVM vxdisksetup ERROR V-5-2-1814 sdb: Invalid disk device for 'cdsdisk'”

Below is list of CLIs that I used to circumvent this issue and create a DiskGroup...

--------------------------Start Of Shell-----------------------------------
[root@ts ~]# vxdisk -o alldgs list
DEVICE       TYPE            DISK         GROUP        STATUS
sda          auto:none       -            -            online invalid
sdb          auto:none       -            -            online invalid
[root@ts ~]# /etc/vx/bin/vxdisksetup -i sdb
VxVM vxdisksetup ERROR V-5-2-1814 sdb: Invalid disk device for 'cdsdisk' format
[root@ts ~]# vxdisk list sdb
Device:    sdb
devicetag: sdb
type:      auto
info:      format=none
flags:     online ready private autoconfig invalid
pubpaths:  block=/dev/vx/dmp/sdb char=/dev/vx/rdmp/sdb
guid:      -
udid:
VMware%5FVirtual%20disk%5FOTHER%5FDISKS%5Fts.ts.com%5F%2Fdev%2Fsdb
site:      -
Multipathing information:
numpaths:   1
sdb     state=enabled
[root@ts ~]# vxdctl enable
[root@ts ~]# fdisk -l

Disk /dev/sda: 8589 MB, 8589934592 bytes
255 heads, 63 sectors/track, 1044 cylinders
Units = cylinders of 16065 * 512 = 8225280 bytes

   Device Boot      Start         End      Blocks   Id  System
/dev/sda1   *           1          13      104391   83  Linux
/dev/sda2              14          78      522112+  82  Linux swap
/dev/sda3              79        1044     7759395   83  Linux

Disk /dev/sdb: 2147 MB, 2147483648 bytes
255 heads, 63 sectors/track, 261 cylinders
Units = cylinders of 16065 * 512 = 8225280 bytes

   Device Boot      Start         End      Blocks   Id  System
/dev/sdb4               1         259     2080386    5  Extended
[root@ts ~]# /usr/lib/vxvm/diag.d/vxscsi -g sdb
Cannot get disk geometry on sdb !
[root@ts ~]# /etc/vx/bin/vxdisksetup -i sdb format=sliced
[root@ts ~]# vxdg init dg01 sdb cds=off
[root@ts ~]# vxdisk -o alldgs list
DEVICE       TYPE            DISK         GROUP        STATUS
sda          auto:none       -            -            online invalid
sdb          auto:sliced     sdb          dg01     online
[root@ts ~]# vxdg list
NAME         STATE           ID
dg01         enabled              1263886728.28.ts.ts.com
--------------------------End Of Shell------------------------------------

It looks like I have added IDE disk as shared storage to VMs instead of SCSI disk. However, setting disk format to sliced resolved this issue for me.