Upgrade the ASA-5505 after the SecPlus is installed.

[Kerry Kriegel]

I have several ASA-5505 units with the SecurityPlus license.  These are running older OS versions and I would like to upgrade them.  I am wondering if I will lose the SecurityPlus if I upgrade the image to 8.3

[Marvin Rhoads]

No. Your license and associated activation-key will be carried forward.

(It is a good practice to back up that key offline somewhere in the event of failure of the device.)

Note 8.3+ typically requires memory upgrade on older platforms. Reference.

[Kerry Kriegel]

When I purchased the SecPlus and went to Cisco's website, I was required to enter the device Serial Number to generate the activation key.

In the evant of a device failure, will that key be of any use on any another device?  I have always assumed ( yeah yeah, I know) that the key was only good on that serial numbered device.

My solution so far is to have a hot-swap spare sitting on the shelf (with SecPlus installed).

[Marvin Rhoads]

My backup suggestion was for software catastrophes.

If the failure is hardware and you are issued another unit by the TAC, they will authorize you for a new license activation-key.

If your backup solution is self-coverage then, yes - you will need two licenses.

[Ramraj Sivagnanam Sivajanam]

Hi There

The activation-key is only good for that chassis alone. For this reason, when you wanted to have the new activation-key that comes with SecPlus, the Cisco website requested you to enter the chassis serial number. Otherwise, every Tom Dick and Harry who has a Cisco ASA 5505 will enjoy SecPlus features for FREE, if they were to get hold of your SecPlus activation-key :-)

Hence, your objective to have a hot-swap device on standby just in case, the unit goes down cannot be achieved unless your spare units too have its' own  SecPlus license enabled. Alternatively, you might wanna consider running your Cisco ASA 5505 in Active/Standby failover provided both the chassis has SecPlus license enabled.

Unfortunately, Cisco doesn't provide demo license for SecPlus. Otherwise, you could load that demo license in your spare chassis. I know this for a fact, as I've asked Cisco for this 1,000 times in the past.

If you were to ask me, why don't you signed up a support Maintenance Contract with a local Cisco Gold Partner. These partners will have various Cisco ASA  models with SecPlus readily available in their store, just waiting to be deployed, in the event of a P1 case logged.

Note: If you're new to Cisco ASA, I wouldn't recommend you to upgrade to 8.3 and above for now. The syntax for NATs and objects have changed so dramatically, it's rather confusing at first. Just stick to version 8.2.4 max (not even 8.2.5 ~ very buggy). However, if you're comfortable with software version 8.3 and above, then it's always good to have the latest stabile Cisco software version in your FW.

P/S: If you think this comment is useful, please do rate it nicely :-)