C / SX / EX / MX upgrade paths

[bpitts_80]

Hello,

I've been performing c20 upgrades via the GUI and SCP, hopping from 4.x > 5.1.1  > 7.1.1 > 7.3.2. I was told by a 3rd party support that this is the way to upgrade the C20s.

I have struggled to locate any documentation to confirm this path to upgrade to 7.3.2. I'm getting ready to move on to upgrading C40s and 60s along with SX / EX / MX  models. 

I'm looking for document validation to confirm how best to upgrade to 7.3.2 on all of the above models.

 The release notes I've looked at didn't seem to mention any version hopping requirement.

Thanks

B

[Patrick Sparkman · Accepted solution]

You can go straight to the current TC software release without having to hop through several releases to get there.  You'll just need to get TC7.x release keys from Cisco License Portal and apply it to the codecs before you do the upgrade.  Applying the release key will prompt you to restart, you can disregard and go straight to uploading the TC software as the upgrade will restart the endpoint anyway and apply the release key at the same time.

Note, it's important that you read though ALL the TC release notes from the current version you have up to TC7.  There are several releases where changes have been made that might be important to you.  Some of those changes are:

• TC5.x - Serial login required is default enabled (only important if using 3rd party control systems such as Crestron or AMX)
• TC6.x - Layouts have changed, notably when using two screens with presentation and selfview.
• TC7.x - Root access has been removed (I noticed you mention SCP which requires root access), also snapshot behavior has changed during standby.

[Wayne DeNardi]

As Patrick has indicated, yes, you can upgrade directly to the latest version - there is no need to do a stepped upgrade on the endpoints.

There was previously a siggested path, similar to what you have indicated, but this was predominantly for some of the EX series due to the camera firmware upgrades.  I can't recall the exact steps as it was a long time ago, and it may not be at all relevant these days with the improvement in the software since then.

Note: you may not even need a TC7.x release key for your device - as the TC6.1+ software does not have the same requirement for release keys as previous software versions.  It will work on the unit with any valid release key, from any previous release, installed.  Apart from an upgrade from TCNC to TC - there are special requirements for doing so, but a TC to TC (or TCNC to TCNC) upgrade will be fine.

Wayne
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[bpitts_80]

Thanks Patrick and Wayne, this will greatly reduce my upgrade times, if I can jump from 4.x to 7.3.2. 

Do either of you by chance have a link handy that sort of vets this?

[Patrick Sparkman · Accepted solution]

There is nothing that I can recall that says you can go straight to the current release from whatever release you're running. A good rule of thumb is that as you go through all the release notes for each software release, if there are any dependencies requiring an early software version to be running first, it will be noted. If there is no such notice, then you can assume it's okay to install that software version over whatever you have.