AMA - Software Upgrade on Catalyst 9000 Series Switches

Published on by Brooke Hammer | Updated on

Ask Me Anything Event

Welcome to the Cisco Community Ask Me Anything conversation. Submit your questions from Monday, November 4, 2024 through Friday, November 15, 2024. Our colleagues Rohit Chopra, Vaibhav Aggarwal, Anuraag Majumdar, Saquib Zeya, Akash Chatterjee, and Poojan Nandoria will be waiting to assist you and resolve any questions that have not been clarified, or answer any new questions that you may have. We are waiting for you!

More about this event:

Join us for an Ask Me Anything (AMA) event where you can dive deep into Cisco Catalyst 9000 Switch Upgrades!

What is it?

The Cisco Catalyst 9000 family of switches are Cisco’s lead fixed, modular and compact enterprise access, aggregation and core switching platform. They are built to transform your network to handle a hybrid world where the workplace is anywhere, endpoints could be anything, and applications are hosted all over the place.

The Catalyst 9000 family, including the new Catalyst 9000X models, continue to shape the future with ongoing innovation that helps you reimagine connections, reinforce security, and redefine the experience for your hybrid workforce big and small.

Install & Bundle Modes: Bundle mode is the traditional method of upgrading a Catalyst Switch. You boot a .bin file that contains everything you need to run the Cisco IOS. As per traditional Cisco IOS, you have a boot statement that points to the .bin file you want to load and that gets loaded at the time of boot. The Install mode is the newer and recommended mode to run. This breaks the .bin file up into smaller .pkg files that must be loaded into memory independently of each other, and allows you to boot faster and utilize memory better. The .bin file that you download from software.cisco.com has all the .pkg files you need inside.

ISSU Upgrade: In-Service Software Upgrade (ISSU) is a procedure to upgrade a Switch image to a later release while the network continues to forward packets. ISSU helps network administrators avoid a network outage in a critical environment (Ex - Hospital) while performing a software upgrade.

Auto-Upgrade: Auto-Upgrade allows the Active supervisor to upgrade the Standby supervisor regardless of what image is loaded onto the standby (bundle/install/etc). However, you have to boot the standby into some valid image in order for the process to start.

Official Resources:

Upgrading a Stack of Catalyst 9200 Switches in Install Mode

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ee87CLHPYKQ&list=PLfeWBHdC6yGsvdsMrGU8QTrzwUO69UqmH&index=2

Upgrading Catalyst 9600 Quad-Supervisor StackWise Virtual Setup with ISSU

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VRO8WFAtvwA&list=PLfeWBHdC6yGsvdsMrGU8QTrzwUO69UqmH&index=1

IOS Recommendation and Download for Catalyst 9K Platforms

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dwxFJfP31RM&list=PLfeWBHdC6yGsvdsMrGU8QTrzwUO69UqmH&index=3

Upgrade a Standalone Catalyst 9300 switch in Install Mode

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YtKVKAz7yoA&t=274s

Upgrade Cat9K with ISSU

https://youtube.com/watch?v=icE4d6knSS8

C9600 - Auto-Upgrade Procedure

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZL25qh1PJrE&t=130s

Standalone Catalyst 9000 Switch: Convert from Bundle Mode to Install Mode

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZH_jxo9XJ4A

Upgrade Guide for Catalyst 9000 Switches

https://www.cisco.com/c/en/us/support/docs/switches/catalyst-9300-series-switches/216231-upgrade-guide-for-cisco-catalyst-9000-sw.html

Join us for this insightful Ask Me Anything session and gain valuable insights into the world of Cisco Catalyst 9000 series switches upgrades. Let's uncover the solutions to your challenges and explore the vast possibilities in this dynamic field.

Enter the forum