Recommended AsyncOS Version for C680 ESA Appliances

[dave_s]

Hi

We have been advised to upgrade our AsyncOS on our two C680 ESA Appliances from version 10.1 to a version higher than 11.

Please could you advise which is the most stable version 11, and is version 12 considered stable yet for these appliances?

Thanks

Dave

[dmccabej]

Anything 11.0.x or 11.1.x should be safe, along with 12.1.x. You can review the release notes to check for new features and any currently impacting defects. If you're dealing with an SMA as well, you may want to hold off on 12.x since there are still a few quirks to be worked out. 

https://www.cisco.com/c/en/us/support/security/email-security-appliance/products-release-notes-list.html

Thanks!

-Dennis M. 

[dave_s]

Cheers for this,

Do you have any thoughts on 11.5.1 for the ESA?  (as this was another suggestion from someone internally)

Thanks

Dave

[dmccabej]

11.5.x would be for the SMA, but yes that is also a stable release. 

Thanks!

-Dennis M.

[Ken Stieers]

12.x is stable...

I concur with Dennis' assessment of the SMA, don't go if you don't have to...



Ken

[Paul Thomas Cyblue]

Going to v11 we noticed a step change in CPU and thus more workqueues on burst traffic. So assess how much under load and consider your DR strategy.

Just make sure you read the Release Notes + search the Bug lists for that version and around it, to assess if any bug is using a specific feature that is something you depend on.  I had to discount certain versions and could ignore certain bugs to end up where we are.  There is no straight answer.

But this required an upgrade to the SMAs and this is where the problems have been.

SMAs under heavy load or using all Message Tracking Quota - then v11.5 + v12 for SMA are having considerable stability problems with bad workarounds.  This looks like a fix in SMA v13 and ESA v12 - which will need their own time to bed in to find other issues.