Re: CatOS/IOS Levels

Hi Charles,

On Wed, Feb 10, 2010 at 8:37 AM, Charles T. Alexander
<charles.t.alexander_at_verizon.net> wrote:
> Can anyone point me to best practices on keeping a Catalyst Switch 6509
> up to date. I'm interested in CatOS 6.3(7) IOS 12.1(8b) where I would
> find [recommendation] on what release one should be at.

"It depends."

Since you're running hybrid, I assume (perhaps incorrectly) that it's
an older supervisor engine (SUP2?).

The code you can run might be limited by the flash memory and DRAM on
the SP and RP. I upgraded some 6500s running hybrid recently and was
only able to go to 12.1(27b) on the RP. I couldn't go to anything
newer, even after trying to do something tricky like storing RP code
in SP flash.

In my experience, with 6500s, it's a bit like this:

- Go for the newest code you can
- Find stable code for your environment (it is feature dependent)
- Once you've found something stable, stick to it
- Only upgrade if you need a feature or your device is vulnerable to a
security flaw

Don't forget to upgrade ROMMON code if you're doing SP/RP code upgrades.

Cheers,
Dale
PS: I don't mind CatOS, but if you're doing upgrades, you might
consider moving to native IOS.

Blogs and organic groups at http://www.ccie.net
Received on Wed Feb 10 2010 - 08:55:53 ART