ASA License question

[startx001]

Hi All,

I have two ASA 5500 in failover mode. 

I want to upgrade license on one ASA with

ASA   5500 SSL VPN 250 to 500 Premium User Upgrade License

Does i need to upgarde IOS , and how will they work in failover  if license is put only on one ASA and not on other  .

Thanks

VZ

[Collin Clark]

With version 8.3 and greater, a failover pair will share the license. If your 8.2 or earlier you would have to buy a license for each device.

[Karsten Iwen]

Collin already polinted out the important changes in 8.3. If you are still on ASA version 8.2 or even lower, then upgrading the ASA (which often needs a memory-upgrade) is likely less expensive then bying two times the licenses you need what was needed with the older versions.

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[startx001]

Yes , thx .

Can i put license to Active unit when is version 8.2 , and after that if i upgrade Active and standby to 8.3  , will license be shared ? Can i share license then ?

[Karsten Iwen]

Up to version 8.2 the licenses have to be identical. So if you have 2*250 Premium licenses on your ASAs now, the moment you upgrade to 8.3 you have 500.

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Don't stop after you've improved your network! Improve the world by lending money to the working poor:
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[startx001]

So just to confirm .

I will put license to Active unit first , then upgrade to 8.3.1 or later ( both units )  and license from Active will be shared to standby  ?

[Karsten Iwen]

You first have to upgrade (don't use 8.3, better go to the latest 8.4). After that you can apply a license to you primary ASA if you still need the license.

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Don't stop after you've improved your network! Improve the world by lending money to the working poor:
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[Marvin Rhoads]

Like Karsten implied - if you put the license only on the Active unit of a failover pair while still running 8.2, the failover pair will break as they will detect non-identical licenses.

That's why you upgrade first (or do without redundancy until you do so).