CUCM Upgrade / Migrate from 8.0(3) to 10.5(1) - Should I upgrade phone firmware first?

[lisacoody]

Greetings,

I'm planning an upgrade / migration from physical MCS servers on CUCM 8.0(3) to virtual UCS 10.5(1) servers using PCD. I'm trying to think of everything that needs to get done first in order to have the smoothest migration / upgrade possible. The folks in this forum have been SO helpful already, I thought I'd ask another question.

My question is about upgrading the firmware on my phones prior to the actual migration / upgrade. The phones I have are 7911G, 7942G, 7962G, 7975G, and 7914 expansion modules on version 9-0-3S and 7937G on 1-4-2-0. Is it a good idea to upgrade the firmware first? The IP addresses of the upgraded cluster will remain the same. 

Thanks in advance!

Lisa

[Jaime Valencia · Accepted solution]

Yes, as you can control the process, and not move the phones to the new cluster and have them all try to get their new FW, make sure to match the ones from your target version.

[lisacoody]

Thank you very much. I appreciate you taking the time to reply to my query, Jaime.

The release notes for version 10.5(1) say 9.3(1)SR4 is supported. Should I download the firmware only package or the package with the load signed COP file? 

The release notes say to make sure the latest device pack is installed before upgrading the phone firmware. I checked the chart and there are no device packs for my current CUCM version (8.0(3)). How do I find which device packs (if any) I have installed?

Is there a way to revert to the previous firmware if something goes wrong? 

[Jaime Valencia · Accepted solution]

Use the .cop files to install the FW

Look at the installed SW via CLI, if there are no devpacks, you can still upload it

Yes, change the FW version in the CUCM config to go back.

[lisacoody]

Thank you so much!

[lisacoody]

I have another question, Jaime.

After further research, I found that there is a couple of bugs I would like to avoid in 9.3(1)SR4 and think I should use 9.4.2 instead. I can't find any documentation that tells me if I need to install a device pack first (the documentation only goes back to CUCM version 8.6(1)). Do you happen to know if there is a device pack I need to install? My current Call Manager version is 8.0(3) and I have 7911, 7937, 7942, 7962, and 7975 phones. I'm going to move to 10.5(1) very shortly.

Thank you!

[sulfi salahudeen]

Hello Lisa

Are you able to upgrade the Firmware of the phones before your migration?Do you installed any device pack  or individual phone firmwares  for this.Much helpful if you can share me the details as I we are also planning one upgrade from 8.0(3) to 10.5

Regards

Sulfi

[lisacoody]

Hi Sulfi,

I used a TFTP server to upload the .cop.sgn file (cmterm-7942_7962-sccp.9-4-2SR1-1.cop.sgn) to CUCM and changed the default phone load for a few individual phones to make sure they would work. Change the default load for an individual phone on the phone's configuration page. Once you're comfortable that all is well, then make the change for that type phone system wide on the "Device Defaults" page. Make a note of what the current load is in case you want to roll back to the previous firmware. Once you're ready to move to the new firmware you'll need to reboot your phones. That takes time, so do that during a maintenance window. I connected from home and rebooted groups of phones during off-hours. I think it took about 10 minutes for each group of phones to finish the upgrade.

I didn't have to install any dev packs either. It was a pretty simple procedure actually. 

I'd suggest posting any questions you have to this forum - everyone here is very helpful!

Lisa

[sulfi salahudeen]

Hi Lisa

Thank you.So there is no issue if the phone  is on SCCP41.9-0-3S & can upgrade to 7941_7961-sccp.9-4-2-1.Because the device pack is showing another version which is not the one we are seeing in 10.5

Also for the PCD migration do you have the steps to upgrade.What PCD version you have used?

Regards

Sulfi

[lisacoody · Accepted solution]

Sulfi,

I'm not sure about your dev pack issue - I checked the documentation and found I didn't need to have it with the phones I have (mainly 7942 and 7962). If you're in doubt about anything and you are able to, you might open a TAC with Cisco to get all of your questions answered.

I used PCD version 10.5.1.10000-6. It was really easy. It upgraded the publisher in just under 2 hours but got stuck initiating the upgrade process on the subscriber and I had to open a ticket with Cisco. The engineer did a Webex session to get the process started; after that it finished without further issues. I watched this video many times and found it extremely helpful - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nMrS0hMES7A

Just be sure to read your documentation thoroughly to make sure you understand it. Ask questions if you're not sure about something. It's better to ask a stupid question than make a stupid mistake. I wanted to avoid making any mistakes so researched the upgrade for about 3 months before actually doing it. 

Lisa

[sulfi salahudeen]

Hi Lisa

I have downloaded the PCD latest version from the below link. But it a ISO file not OVA.We just need to rename it to .OVA?

Can you tell me from where you downloaded the OVA .or you can give me the link for the same

https://software.cisco.com/download/release.html?mdfid=285963825&flowid=50402&softwareid=286287305&release=10.5(3)&relind=AVAILABLE&rellifecycle=GD&reltype=latest

Thanks

Sulfi

[Manish Gogna]

Hi Sulfi,

You do not get the bootable images on cisco.com. You need to order it through PUT, it is included when you order BE6K. Please check the following post for more details

https://supportforums.cisco.com/discussion/12321806/access-prime-collaboration-deployment-105-softwareova

Manish

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