UCS 2.2(8i) upgrade to 3.2 with 6120 Fabric Interconnects

[mjvanko43]

We upgraded a UCS at one location form 2.2(8i) to 3.2(2d) successfully. Attempted the upgrade on a second UCS at a different location and discovered it is using 6120 Fabric Interconnects which are no longer supported (thought both UCS installed hardware were identical) when UCS Manager failed to respond after an hour into the upgrade and contacted TAC support.

There is no UCS Manager GUI available and SSH to the cluster IP address or node address of the FIs shows a deprecated set of options available - SHOW, END and EXIT. The SHOW command does not even respond properly when attempting to use, i.e. SHOW VERSION gets an "% Invalid Command" response.

What are the options to get this upgrade to rollback to version 2.2(8i)? Can the Fabric Interconnects be power cycled after hours (running VMs on the servers in the UCS)?

Any assistance would be appreciated.

[sankbhat · Accepted solution]

You need physical access to the FI. Reboot the switch and in the console, press Ctrl+L as it boots to get the loader prompt.

loader>

You may need to press the selected key combination multiple times before your screen displays the loader prompt. I prefer keep on pressing it continuously while the FI boots

Example:

loader> dir
nuova-sim-mgmt-nsg.0.1.0.001.bin
ucs-6300-k9-kickstart.5.0.2.N1.3.02d56.bin
ucs-6300-k9-system.5.0.2.N1.3.02d56.bin
ucs-manager-k9.3.02d56.bin
loader> boot ucs-6300-k9-kickstart.5.0.2.N1.3.02d56.bin >>> Select the kickstart image that is available for previous version
switch(boot)#
switch(boot)# load ucs-6300-k9-system.5.0.2.N1.3.02d56.bin >> Select the system image available to the FI

FI should come up .... you will see the basic configuration setup as usual...

[mjvanko43]

Should both FI 6100s be powered off simultaneously and then one powered up to run this procedure, then after it is up, bring up the second?

[sankbhat]

If both the FI's are impacted, better you remove the L1/L2 cluster cable connecting both the FI.. this way you can make them up individually...