How to upgrade MSFC2 in standby mode in CAT6513?

astanislaus · ‎06-22-2007

Customer has a CAT 6513 which originally had two SUP2/MSFC2 running CatOS 7.6(7) on SUP2 and IOS 12.1(20)E on MSFC2.

This switch has a FlexWAN card with 2 ATM-DS3 PAs in slot 3 and another FlexWAN card with 2 ATM-DS3 PAs in slot 4.

A S/W defect was encountered where both these FlexWAN cards would crash intermittently and reboot.

The fix was to upgrade IOS on MSFC2 to 12.1(27b)E1. Customer was worried to upgrade both cards. So he asked us to unplug

SUP2/MSFC2 in slot2 so that he has a fall back plan in case 12.1(27b)E1 causes other problems.

So, we unplugged slot 2 and upgraded only the MSFC2 in slot 15 (i.e. slot 1 SUP2's MSFC2).

The problem appears to have been resolved.

After 24 hours of stabilty and after no further issue, we have been asked to plug back the card in slot 2 and upgrade it's

MSFC2 also to 12.1(27b)E1.

Now:

We have the following config in SUP2:

=====================================

set system highavailability enable

and versioning is disabled.

We have the following config in MSFC2:

======================================

redundancy

high-availability

single-router-mode

Question:

=========

Now say I want to upgrade the MSFC2 in slot 16.

When we plug back SUP2 in slot 2 I believe the following things will happen (please note this SUP2 is not a new module,

but the same module that was removed from slot 2 just before the above upgrade). SO it should have all the SUP2 config and

MSFC2 config still in NVRAM.

1. The SUP2 CatOS will sync.

2. The SUP2 config will sync

3. The MSFC2 config will sync

4. The MSFC2 IOS will still be the old 12.2(20)E and not sync. I have proved this many times before.

But "I think" then this MSFC2 boot command strings (copied from slot 15 MSFC2) will say boot 12.1(27b)E1 and this MSFC2

won't find this image and go into a boot loop or rommon. Right?

I know how to recover this MSFC2 as per the document at:

http://www.cisco.com/warp/public/473/124.html#topic1

Once I follow this document and boot, now I have to change the boot string - right?

But being a slave or standby MSFC2 it won't let me go to configuration mode and will say standby CPU cannot be

configured - right?

What is the best way to overcome my problem - other than take the module to the lab and do it there?

Customer would not allow us to do a switch supervisor from slot 1 to make slot 2 the Active one, because his FlexWAN cards

will crash within a few minutes and loose all ATM connectivity on slots 3 and 4 because this MSFC2 in slot 16 will still be

running 12.1(20)E.

So what is my option now?

Any suggestions?

JORGE RODRIGUEZ · ‎06-22-2007

I have done this but I had to isolate both MSFCs ..

the rommom encounter is possible, in any case . I would do the upgrade of the secondary MSFC2 the same as you did with the primary !! isolated !! , this will require downtime.

after successful IOS upgrade on the secondary ensure there is no config on the MSFC2. Then go back and re-insert the primary which has the up todate config and code. Then insert secondary sup2 and configure MSFC2 for SRM settings.

HTH

Jorge

Jorge Rodriguez

astanislaus · ‎06-23-2007

One thing I forgot to mention is that there will be nobody near the switch other than a non-technical person pushing the module into slot 2. All management and troubleshooing will be done remotely from miles away. So please don't say switch console 16 and move console cable to SUP2 in slot 2. The person on-site cannot do that.