catalyst 6500 bootflash

[newbie]

I am having some trouble understanding the difference between the sup-bootflash and the bootflash on the 6500. on which does the ios image reside. I do a dir and I do not see the filename that is in the 'show version' command

[newbie]

hello again,

What do you think would be the quickest way to reload an image on sup-bootflash. the one that was on got deleted so now the swich is coming up in rommon mode. i have the image on a 512 compact flash card and could could set my boot statement to boot off of that but how do I get to that point.

[mohammedmahmoud]

Hi there,

I hope you are fine, and you are always welcomed, insert the disk in slot0 and then in the rommon try something like this:

"boot disk0:c6sup22-ps-mz.121-27b.E.bin"

or

"boot slot0:c6sup22-ps-mz.121-27b.E.bin"

Which shall load the image and then you'll need to configure the boot command again when the image loads and save the configuration.

HTH,

Mohammed Mahmoud.

[newbie]

I will give it a try. I have another bad sup720-3B with a different problem. I have no history on this sup. Not sure if the enable password was lost or what. Upon bootup the message comes up:changing console ownership to route processor. It then sits for about 10 minutes and then goes to rommon>1. Any thoughts on this one.

[mohammedmahmoud]

Hi Yolanda,

This message means that it is Native IOS based not Hybrid(CatOS):

The boot sequence is different on the Catalyst 6500/6000 that runs Cisco IOS System Software than the Cisco 7200 Series Router because the hardware is different. After you power-cycle the box, the switch processor (SP) boots up first. After a short amount of time (approximately 25 to 60 seconds) it transfers console ownership to the route processor (RP (MSFC)).

It seems that the image is corrupted, try putting an image on a flash card and try loading it as we said before, if you need to break its password use this link:

http://www.cisco.com/en/US/products/hw/switches/ps700/products_password_recovery09186a0080133fb1.shtml

HTH,

Mohammed Mahmoud.

[newbie]

Hi Friend,

Quick question. I am currently running adverterprisek9...sfx6 on my 6509. A collegue has SFX7 on his with a small 18mg package(pkg) along with it. Do know the difference between the 2 and what the package contains.

[newbie]

It is a brand new 6500 sup-700 right out of the box. ghow can I tell if I am in native or hybrid. Is there a command.

[ankbhasi]

Hi Friend,

Bydefault it comes with CATOS which is hybrid mode till the time you specifically order for Native IOS.

Can you paste the output of sh version and confirm if you see something like this "s72033" if yes your switch is running in Native IOS.

HTH

Ankur

[rseiler]

By default, a Catalyst 6500 SUP720, SUP720-3B, and SUP720-3BXL ship with Native IOS version 12.2(18)SXF2 or higher. This has been true for years (since 12.2(17d)SXB5). I am not aware of any SUP720 that EVER shipped with hybrid code on them.

An easier way to explain the Supervisor 2 or Supervisor 720 architecture is that there is an SP (switch processor) and an RP (route processor) on these Supervisor engines that both run IOS software. The SP is the device that boots (the main motherboard on the module) which then passes control to the RP (and switches the console port) which takes over and is actually the component that you interact with after the supervisor engine has fully booted. To send commands to the SP, simply execute the following command from the RP exec prompt: 'remote command switch ', for example 'remote command switch show version'. You can also 'switch console' to get the console on the SP for troubleshooting.

The SP is the component that used to run CatOS and had to use an external router for MLS routing (Catalyst 5000 days). In today's supervisor engines the RP actually pre-populates ASICs on the PFC (policy feature card on the supervisor engine) or DFCs (distributed feature cards on the linecards) to handle most packet forwarding functions in hardware on the PFC3B/DFC3B.

On a Sup720 with at least a PFC3B (SUP720-3B) this includes ACLs, route lookup, packet rewrite, QoS rewrite, policing, NAT, VRF, most MPLS functions, etc.

Regarding the flash storage on the SP, all new SUP720's ship with a CF-ADAPTER that actually replaces the sup-bootflash (64MB) with a sup-bootdisk (512MB), so you would want to boot from sup-bootdisk, not sup-bootflash or disk0: Also note that except for a Sup2, you don't want ANY files on the RP bootflash because it could delay the startup of the switch or force the switch to dump to rommon.

Keep in mind that there is also a rommon flash partition on both the RP and SP that needs to be kept up to date, several fixes for redundancy (SSO) have been fixed in ROMMON as recently as Sep 2006.

[newbie]

I am looking for a command that shows me that the rommon has been upgraded to say 8.4(2). Some kind of show command. I have tried remote command switch show version|include rom but this doesn't work. Also, when the rommon gets upgraded does the upgrade go in F1 or the gold region. as a side note is there a command that tells if you are in native or hybrid mode?

[mohammedmahmoud]

Hi,

A "remote command switch show version | include ROM" should tell you the current rommon version, do the | include ROM (upper case letters).

The Gold region is one-time programmable (OTP) EPROM section (can't be written on it) of the ROMMON, accordingly your new rommon will go the F1 region.

To make sure if you are working with CatOS Hybrid or Native IOS, check the naming convention of the image.

http://www.cisco.com/en/US/products/hw/switches/ps708/products_tech_note09186a008070f124.shtml#naming

NOTE: If you are using the "remote command" command then its a Native IOS, since it is not available with CatOS.

HTH,

Mohammed Mahmoud.

[newbie]

I did notice with this new IOS(adventerprisek9) that I see no bootstatements when I do a show run. I guess I am used to seeing those. Is there someplace to see the sequence of the booting.

[mohammedmahmoud]

Hi Yolanda,

If there is no boot statement the switch will take the first IOS in the flash and try to load the switch with.

Here you are the basic booting steps of Cisco devices:

1. System POST (Power-On Self Test)

2. Bootstrap code is loaded from ROM

3. The rommon configuration register (conf-reg) value is read

4. The startup-config is checked for boot system attributes. If they exist they are executed.

5. If no boot system variables exist or they fail, the router falls back first to the local flash/disk storage and loads the first IOS image it discovers (if multiple IOS images exist). If no local IOS image exists, the router will attempt a local broadcast TFTP boot. If the TFTP boot fails, the router will load the ROM based IOS, if the system supports it. Otherwise the router will return to rommon, and an X-modem or TFTP boot can be specified.

6. After IOS has been loaded, the router will load the startup-config into RAM called running-config. If additional configuration commands are defined by boot system attributes, they will be loaded as well. If no startup-config exists on the NVRAM, the router initializes the "initial setup" script.

HTH, please rate if it does help,

Mohammed Mahmoud.

[mohammedmahmoud]

Hi there,

We can say from a show version, or simply from how the prompt looks, in the case of Hybrid mode, the supervisor prompt shall be a CatOS prompt something like "6509 (enable)" or in the case of Native IOS its an ordinary IOS prompt something like "6509#".

HTH, please rate if it does,

Mohammed Mahmoud.

[newbie]

Hi again,

Just wanted to get your opinion on the best way to delete a config. I want to be able to delete all the config that a person put in. will an erase start delete everything and get me back to int intial request to being configuring. it there someplace also to look to delete everything and start from new.

[mohammedmahmoud · Accepted solution]

Hi Yolanda,

I can see that you are finding your way through :) You can use the "clear config all", to reset the switch to the factory default setting.

http://www.cisco.com/en/US/products/hw/switches/ps708/products_command_reference_chapter09186a00801dd5d9.html#wp1025367

HTH,

Mohammed Mahmoud.