4500X in VSS - Upgrading IOS XE

generalcommunications · ‎04-05-2016

Hi Everyone,

I need to upgrade IOS XE on a pair of 4500X's...Id prefer not to try/use ISSU, as they are remote switches and in production(ISSU may work(now ;) ) without issue, but Ive read too many bad reports, so would prefer not to "try" this method...and we have no spare 4500X's to lab test)....so Im hoping someone has performed an upgrade on these boxes(In VSS) and can provide some guidance on a method that "works"

Ive read where people disconnect the VSS link (Or shutdown those ports), and perform the upgrade on the 2 switches, then reconnect VSS....but could you do something like this:

conf reg on both switches is already set to 0x2102, so the switches should honour the bootvar variables

copy new IOS XE to bootflash & slavebootflash

update boot var to point to new XE image

boot system flash bootflash:xxx

wr mem and check bootvar is updated

and reload both switches:

redundancy reload shelf

This should reload both switches, and they should come up with the new image, and VSS should re-establish?

Thanks in advance for any advice/recommendations.