Upgrading CUCM 6.1.4 to 8.6 questions

[Jonathan Beardsley]

I have two questions about upgrading Call Manager 6.1.4 to Communications Manager 8.6 on one publisher and one subscriber:

- Can I upgrade directly from 6.1.4 to 8.6, or is there an incremental upgrade I need to do?

- Do I need to do any manual phone upgrades, or will this take place automatically after the CM servers are upgraded?

Thanks in advance,

Jonathan

[Joseph Martini · Accepted solution]

Yes you can directly upgrade from 6.1(4) to 8.6(1) here's where it's documented:

http://www.cisco.com/en/US/docs/voice_ip_comm/cucm/compat/ccmcompmatr.html.

The only trick is that you have to install

ciscocm.refresh_upgrade_v1.0.cop.sgn before you upgrade which you can download here: http://tools.cisco.com/squish/dAc86

The phones will automatically upgrade their firmware too.

[Jonathan Beardsley]

Thanks!

Our phones have the 8-5-2 firmware so we should be good to go! Thanks for the detailed response and links for downloads and reference!

I hope to be so helpful someday, but am just starting out for now...

Thanks again,

Jonathan

[Sean McQuade]

Sorry to dig up an old thread, but just wanted to say thanks to Joe. I had been searching Cisco's site for a while and couldn't find the upgrade path, and then got it from you right away.

[clileikis]

To add to Joe's response (+5) you will also want to make sure you upgrade your phones firmware to atleast 8.5.2 before doing the upgrade incase they aren't already as you'll receive an auth failed message on your phones if you're trying to upgrade any phones firmware to a release later than 8.5.2 before stepping to that version first.

HTH,

Chris

[Rob Huffman]

Hi Jonathan,

Just to add a note to the greta tips from Joe & Chris. You will want to make sure that your

existing servers will support the upgrade to 8.6(x)

This is the "master" list for Server support;

Supported Cisco Unified Communications Manager Releases by Server

http://www.cisco.com/en/US/prod/collateral/voicesw/ps6790/ps5748/ps378/prod_brochure0900aecd8062a4f9.html

Cheers!

Rob

[Jonathan Beardsley]

I failed to mention that I've already purchased and obtained the memory to meet the hardware requirements for the upgrade.

The one I'm scared of is Unity going from 5.0 to 7.0. And of course, due to licenses that need to be loaded, it is the most critical one to upgrade.

[abduljaleel]

Hello friends,

Can anybody update me what is the overall time duration that i need to account for the upgrade process. I am looking for duration of only the upgrade from 6.1 to 8.6 without any further configuration.

I would really appreciate your views on this, as this will help me estimate the PS efforts needed for uprade opportunities.

Thank You

AJ

[Jonathan Beardsley]

abduljaleel,

I was able to complete CUCM upgrade from 6.1.4 to 8.6 on two servers, Presence from  7.0 to 8.0, and Unity from 5.0 to 7.0 in a 16 hour Saturday. The CUCM servers took about 3 hours each, and I had to call TAC once Unity was upgraded. After several hours troubleshooting with TAC, we found that it was a weird issue that was no fault of my own.

I would caution you to check your servers and make sure they can handle 8.6. We are pushing the limit with ours, and my CUCM's have maxed CPU a few times running 8.6.

See Rob's link to server compatibility....

Thanks,

Jonathan

[Rob Huffman]

Hey Jonathan,

Thanks for posting back with your results. Great work +5

That sounds like quite the day. WOW!

Cheers!

Rob

[Jonathan Beardsley]

Thanks!

Rob, do you know if the MCS7816H3-K9-CMB2 servers can handle 6GB of RAM? Or I guess what I really need is a better processor, but not sure I can upgrade that.... any suggestions?

According to the link you provided, 8.6 is supported on these servers.

Thanks!

[Rob Huffman]

Hi Jonathan,

I don't want to sound too negative here but you should try to move

away from the 7816's as soon as possible

Cisco shouldn't really have sold them as production boxes as they

aren't capable of supporting any sort of enterprise deployment and

are best used for lab boxes. As you've already seen you've pegged the CPU

a number of times already.

Cheers!

Rob

[Jonathan Beardsley]

Oh wow.....

I hadn't heard that. After the insane amount of money we spent on them, it is unfortunate that only 3 years down the road we have to go repurchase. We got these on CUCM 6.1.2, I think.

is there anything out there I could take to my boss to show him that might support this claim?

I started discussion with my cisco rep last week about a server upgrade, but that won't be in the budget until next year.

[Rob Huffman]

Hi Jonathan,

I don't think you will find any Cisco docs that support

this viewpoint, and, it is, only an opinion here You will see

some highly respected NetPros have this outlook as well if you

search the forums, but I don't want to speak on their behalf.

One doc that management might see to support expediting this move, is the 7816

End of Life doc;

http://www.cisco.com/en/US/prod/collateral/voicesw/ps6790/ps5748/ps378/end_of_life_notice_c51-519083.html

Cheers!

Rob

[abduljaleel]

Thanks a lot guys, this really helps +5 from me too ☺

Thanks

AJ