Difficult (?) upgrade and expansion

[nick.dumitrescu]

Hi guys,

I am trying to figure out the best path for upgrading and expading our wireless network (by extending into a new building), and I would really need your feedback. 

We have the following infrastructure:

1. WLC Controller 2504 with the following sysinfo:

Manufacturer's Name.............................. Cisco Systems Inc.
Product Name..................................... Cisco Controller
Product Version.................................. 8.0.121.0
Bootloader Version............................... 1.0.20
Field Recovery Image Version..................... 7.6.101.1
Firmware Version................................. PIC 20.0

Build Type....................................... DATA + WPS

2. 3 APs connected so far:

AIR-CAP1702I-E-K9

AIR-CAP1702I-E-K9

AIR-LAP1042N-E-K9

To this, I want to add 4 more APs: AIR-AP2802E-E-K9

I understand that I need to upgrade the software to the latest version, which I found to be 8.5, but on some link I found to be 8.8. My questions are:

1. What is the latest version - 8.5 or 8.8?

2. If 8.5, can I make the upgrade in one step? If 8.8 I know I have to make 2 steps

3. Will all my old APs still be supported in the new version?

4. How do I do the pre-download process properly, to limit the downtime?

5. Any other advices?

This is my first time upgrading the WLC controller, I really don't want to mess it up, we're a production environment and things might get sensitive if the WiFi is down on a Monday morning. I can afford downtime during the weekend, but none Monday-Friday.

Your feedback is highly appreciated!

[patoberli]

That's great.



You might want to have a read here, maybe some of the new features are of use to you. Most of them are disabled by default:

https://www.cisco.com/c/en/us/support/docs/wireless-mobility/wireless-lan-wlan/201007-AireOS-feature-list-per-release.html

[nick.dumitrescu]

Thanks, going through the updates now :)

One of the new 2800s replaced the oldest AP, it is joined all up and running. Any idea how long it would take clients to see it as the nearest AP and connect to it? It's been up for 15 minutes but no clients are connected to it...

L.E. Strange thing - the APs LED is blinking blue-green-red. THe status on the controller is shown as UP, but there is something wrong with it. It is indeed connected to a different switch than the first time, but the port is configured the same...

[patoberli · Accepted solution]

Sounds like it doesn't get enough power. The 2800 series require PoE+, does your switch provide 30W?

One more thing, it can take up to 20 minutes on the first boot + software upgrade, but it shouldn't take longer than that.

[nick.dumitrescu]

You are, yet again, 100% correct - the PoE of the old AP did not supply enough power. Changed the PoE to it's designated one, it starts to register clients now :)

I just have one more question: the old 1700s APs are in the flexconnect-group, while the new 2800s is in the default-flex-group - does this matter? How could I get it inside the same Flex Connect group as the other ones? Everything is configured the same on all of them, but for some reason there is this difference, and I wonder if it has any impact on connectivity or anything else for the clients using the 2800s AP.

[patoberli]

Not working with Flexconnect, neither with AP groups. In any case, with AP groups and also Flex groups you can have different policies/configurations. A new AP (as far as I remember) always lands in the default group and can afterwards be added to the correct group.
I suggest you do that, unless you know the configuration differences between the two groups and are ok with them.

[nick.dumitrescu]

Yes, this true - it always lands in the default group, but the question is how to change the default group to correct one afterwards, I could not find anything yet.

[patoberli · Accepted solution]

I currently don't have a Flex AP connected. But you should be able to do that in the group properties. Here the manual (Step 9):

https://www.cisco.com/c/en/us/td/docs/wireless/controller/7-4/configuration/guides/consolidated/b_cg74_CONSOLIDATED/b_cg74_CONSOLIDATED_chapter_010001111.html#ID1375

[nick.dumitrescu]

For the n-th time, thank you!