Upgrade firmware on Cisco UCS M4s without hardware support

[dbutch1976]

Hello,

We have a number of Cisco UCS M4s which we no longer have hardware support for, however there are some legacy applciations running on them, so we need to keep them running for the foreseeable future. 

We are currently running 3.2(3c) on the Infrastructure and 3.2(3a)B on the blades. 

My question is: Can I direclty upgrade to the most recent version of the firmware from the current version? Secondly, since we no longer have support from Cisco am I even able to download the most recent firmware? Lastly, since we do not have support, would it even be advisable to proceed with the update?

[Kasun Bandara]

@dbutch1976 hi, you can upgrade the server even without the contract. but to download the OS, you need contract bound to your cisco account. or ask help from your cisco partner to check if they have any contracts.

[dbutch1976]

Thanks for your response. Assuming I can get the most recent firmware, is there a way that I can confirm the upgrade path? My main concern is that we are so far behind that I may not be able to upgrade directly to the most recent version and may need an intermediary upgrade. Is there a way to confirm this?

We are currently running 3.2(3c) on the Infrastructure and 3.2(3a)B on the blades. 

[riaan.vanniekerk · Accepted solution]

According to the Cisco UCS Manager Upgrade/Downgrade Support Matrix you are looking at a three-step upgrade, e.g. something like

3.2(3) → 4.0(1) → 4.0(4n) → 4.2(3)

(4.2 is the last version supporting M4, meaning you cannot go to 4.3)

Also ensure that you have the corresponding drivers installed in the OS running on these blades, as per https://ucshcltool.cloudapps.cisco.com/public/

(we had bad things happen when our UCS firmware overshot the fnic drivers that they were installed on ESXi 5.0 ten or so years ago.)

[dbutch1976]

That was a huge help. Thank you!