Upgrade will not begin without deploying uncommitted changes.

If you get an error message stating that you must deploy all uncommitted changes even though there are none, log into the active unit (remember, you should be upgrading the standby), create some minor change, and deploy. Then, undo the change, redeploy, and try the upgrade again on the standby.

If this does not work, and the units are running different software versions against recommendations, switch roles to make the standby unit active, then suspend high availability. Deploy from the active/suspended unit, resume high availability, then switch roles to make the active unit the standby again. Upgrade should then work.

Deployment from active unit fails during standby upgrade, or causes an application synchronization error.

This can happen if you deploy from the active unit while the standby is upgrading, which is not supported. Proceed with the upgrade despite the error. After you upgrade both units, make any required configuration changes and deploy from the active unit. The error should resolve.

To avoid these issues, do not make or deploy configuration changes on one unit while the other is upgrading, or to a mixed version pair.

Configuration changes made during upgrade are lost.

If you absolutely must make and deploy changes to a mixed version pair, you must make the changes to both units or they will be lost after you upgrade the down-level active unit.

High availability is suspended after upgrade.

After the post-upgrade reboot, high availability is briefly suspended while the system performs some final automated tasks, such as updating libraries and restarting Snort. You are most likely to notice this if you log into the CLI very shortly after upgrade. If high availability does not resume on its own after the upgrade fully completes and device manager is available, do it manually:

1. Log into both the active device and the standby device and check the task lists. Wait until all tasks are finished running on both devices. If you resume high availability too soon, you may have a future issue where failover causes an outage.

2. Select Device > High Availability, then select Resume HA from the gear menu ().

Failover does not occur with a mixed version pair.

Although an advantage of high availability is that you can upgrade your deployment without traffic or inspection interruptions, failover is disabled during the entire upgrade process. That is, not only is failover necessarily disabled when one device is offline (because there is nothing to fail over to—you are essentially already failed over), but failover is also disabled with mixed version pairs. During upgrade is the only time where mixed version pairs are (temporarily) allowed. Schedule upgrades during maintenance windows when they will have the least impact if something goes wrong, and make sure you have enough time to upgrade both devices in that window.

Upgrade failed on only one device, or one device was reverted. The pair is now running mixed versions.

Mixed version pairs are not supported for general operations. Either upgrade the down-version device or revert the higher version device. For patches, because revert is not supported, if you cannot successfully upgrade the down-version device you must break high availability, reimage one or both devices, then re-establish high availability.

Cannot reach the device.

Devices can stop passing traffic during the upgrade or if the upgrade fails. Before you upgrade, make sure traffic from your location does not have to traverse the device itself to access the device's management interface.

Upgrade or patch appears hung/device appears inactive.

If device upgrade status has stopped updating but there is no report of upgrade failure, you can try canceling the upgrade; seeCancel or Retry Threat Defense Upgrades. If you cannot cancel or canceling does not work, contact Cisco TAC.

If an upgrade fails and:

• The device reverted to its pre-upgrade state (auto-cancel is enabled), correct any issues and try again from the beginning.

• The device is still in maintenance mode, correct any issues and resume the upgrade. Or, cancel and try again later.

For more information, see Cancel or Retry Threat Defense Upgrades. If you cannot retry or cancel, or if you continue to have issues, contact Cisco TAC.

Patch failed.

I want to cancel an upgrade.

If you cannot cancel or canceling does not work, contact Cisco TAC.

I want to retry (resume) a failed upgrade.

If you continue to have issues, contact Cisco TAC.

Part of the upgrade process is choosing what happens if it fails. This is done with the Automatically cancel on upgrade failure... (auto-cancel) option:

• Auto-cancel enabled (default): If upgrade fails, the upgrade cancels and the device automatically reverts to its pre-upgrade state. This returns you to normal operations as quickly as possible while you regroup and try again.

• Auto-cancel disabled: If upgrade fails, the device remains as it is. This allows you to correct any issues and resume the upgrade.

For high availability devices, auto-cancel applies to each device individually. That is, if the upgrade fails on one device, only that device is reverted.

Upgrade readiness check for device manager-managed devices.

You can run an upgrade readiness check on an uploaded threat defense upgrade package before attempting to install it. The readiness check verifies that the upgrade is valid for the system, and that the system meets other requirements needed to install the package. Running an upgrade readiness check helps you avoid failed installations.

A link to run the upgrade readiness check was added to the System Upgrade section of the Device > Updates page.

Ability to cancel a failed threat defense software upgrade and to revert to the previous release.

If an threat defense major software upgrade fails or is otherwise not functioning correctly, you can revert to the state of the device as it was when you installed the upgrade.

We added the ability to revert the upgrade to the System Upgrade panel in FDM. During an upgrade, the FDM login screen shows the upgrade status and gives you the option to cancel or revert in case of upgrade failure. In the threat defense API, we added the CancelUpgrade, RevertUpgrade, RetryUpgrade, and UpgradeRevertInfo resources.

In the threat defense CLI, we added the following commands: show last-upgrade status , show upgrade status , show upgrade revert-info , upgrade cancel , upgrade revert , upgrade cleanup-revert , upgrade retry .

Upgrade threat defense software through device manager.

You can install software upgrades through device manager. Select Device > Updates.