WBSn Family FW Upgrade WBSn-2400 and WBSn-2450 Software Version: 1.3.2 Doc version: v1 Jan 2013
WBSn Family FW Upgrade Procedure Copyright 2013 Alvarion All rights reserved. FCC Statement Federal Communication Commission Interference Statement This equipment has been tested and found to comply with the limits for a Class B digital device, pursuant to Part 15 of the FCC Rules. These limits are designed to provide reasonable protection against harmful interference in a residential installation. This equipment generates uses and can radiate radio frequency energy and, if not installed and used in accordance with the instructions, may cause harmful interference to radio communications. However, there is no guarantee that interference will not occur in a particular installation. If this equipment does cause harmful interference to radio or television reception, which can be determined by turning the equipment off and on, the user is encouraged to try to correct the interference by one of the following measures: Reorient or relocate the receiving antenna. Increase the separation between the equipment and receiver. Connect the equipment into an outlet on a circuit different from that to which the receiver is connected. Consult the dealer or an experienced radio/tv technician for help. FCC Caution: Any changes or modifications not expressly approved by the party responsible for compliance could void the user s authority to operate this equipment. This device complies with Part 15 of the FCC Rules. Operation is subject to the following two conditions: (1) This device may not cause harmful interference, and (2) this device must accept any interference received, including interference that may cause undesired operation. For product available in the USA/Canada market, only channel 1~11 can be operated. Selection of other channels is not possible. This device and its antenna(s) must not be co-located or operated in conjunction with any other antenna or transmitter. IMPORTANT NOTE: FCC Radiation Exposure Statement: This equipment complies with FCC radiation exposure limits set forth for an uncontrolled environment. This equipment should be installed and operated with minimum distance 20cm between the radiator & your body. Copyright Alvarion Ltd. All rights reserved. The material contained herein is proprietary, privileged, and confidential and owned by Alvarion or its third party licensors. No disclosure thereof shall be made to third parties without the express written permission of Alvarion Ltd. Alvarion Ltd. reserves the right to alter the equipment specifications and descriptions in this publication without prior notice. No part of this publication shall be deemed to be part of any contract or warranty unless specifically incorporated by reference into such contract or warranty. Limitation of Liability: (a) Alvarion shall not be liable to the purchaser or to any third party, for any loss of profits, loss of use, interruption of business or for any indirect, special, incidental, punitive or consequential damages of any kind, whether arising under breach of contract, tort (including negligence), strict liability or otherwise and whether based on this agreement or otherwise, even if advised of the possibility of such damages. (b) To the extent permitted by applicable law, in no event shall the liability for damages hereunder of Alvarion or its employees or agents exceed the purchase price paid for the product by purchaser, nor shall the aggregate liability for damages to all parties regarding any product exceed the purchase price paid for that product by that party (except in the case of a breach of a party s confidentiality obligations). WBSn Family FW Upgrade Procedure ii
WBSn Family FW Upgrade Procedure Contents 1 Scope... - 4-2 Prerequisites... - 4-3 Firmware Upgrade Procedure... - 4-3.1 Step 1 Uploading Firmware File (DLV)... - 5-3.1.1 Uploading firmware file using FTP... - 5-3.1.2 Uploading firmware file using HTTP... - 6-3.2 Step 2 - Switching to the Upgraded Firmware Version... - 6-3.3 Step 3 - Validation of Current Firmware Version... - 7-3.4 Using the Rollback Procedure... - 7-4 Best Firmware Upgrade Practices... - 8-5 Firmware Upgrade Troubleshooting... - 8 - WBSn Family FW Upgrade Procedure iii
1 Scope This document describes firmware upgrade procedure for Alvarion s WBSn family of WiFi base-stations, using the internal web management tool (EMS). Prior to upgrading, it is recommended to backup your base station configuration (refer to the relevant section in the User Manual document). Note: In order to perform a successful upgrade session it is recommended to perform the upgrade at a time when the system is not fully utilized (e.g. at late night hours when traffic is low). This will ensure minimal interference with customer traffic and flawless firmware download performance. 2 Prerequisites It is immanent that the user performing the upgrade/downgrade procedure is familiar with Alvarion s WBSn-2400/2450 family of base stations prior to reading and implementing the instructions in this document. Information of the system and its operation is found in the updated manuals of the version. As this document refers to these manuals it is highly recommended that the installer shall have the mentioned manuals at hand when performing the upgrade/downgrade procedure. Tools and data required for upgrade: Portable PC with an Ethernet port or wireless port. Administrator password of the unit that is to be upgraded. Default administrator credentials are admin/admin Default IP address is 192.168.1.1/24 (or mask 255.255.255.0). Firmware DLV file WBSn unit to be upgraded 3 Firmware Upgrade Procedure The firmware upgrade procedure described in this section enables you to upgrade the firmware of your WBSn device, or to rollback to a previous firmware version. Upgrading can be performed using either HTTP or FTP servers, according to your requirements. WBSn Family FW Upgrade Procedure - 4 -
3.1 Step 1 Uploading Firmware File (DLV) 3.1.1 Uploading firmware file using FTP 1. Navigate to Administration => Firmware. 2. In the Upgrade Protocol field, select FTP from the drop-down list. The FTP Server IP field is automatically populated by the information specified in Configuring an FTP Client. 3. In the Upgrade File Path (FTP) field, specify the path to the firmware file provided to you separately by Alvarion. Note: The Upgrade File (HTTP) field is disabled. 4. Click Upgrade. A notification message is displayed, informing you of the expected time that it will take for the upgrade to be performed. 5. A progress bar will be displayed to show the advancement of the upgrade process 6. When the firmware upgrade is finished, a red Status: Success indication will be displayed and a pop-up saying FW upgrade process finished successfully will come up. Without getting these indications one should not proceed to the next step (switching FW banks). After this, proceed to Switching to the Upgraded Firmware Version. To configure the FTP Client 7. Navigate to Administration => Management => FTP Client. 8. Specify the parameters as described in the following table. Parameter Description and values Server IP Anonymous Login FTP User FTP Password The FTP Server IP address Specify whether anonymous login is enabled or disabled Specify the FTP user to be used during login Specify the password for the FTP user WBSn Family FW Upgrade Procedure - 5 -
Note: When performing a firmware upgrade using FTP protocol, the FTP Server address is displayed in the Firmware screen. Any change made to the server address in that screen, is automatically reflected in the FTP Client screen, and vice versa. For more information, see the section entitled Firmware. 3.1.2 Uploading firmware file using HTTP 1. Navigate to Administration => Firmware. 2. In the Upgrade Protocol field, select HTTP from the drop-down list. The FTP Server IP field is automatically disabled. 3. In the Upgrade File (HTTP) field, click Browse, and navigate to the path where the firmware file, provided to you separately by Alvarion, was saved. Note: The Upgrade File Path (FTP) field is disabled. 4. Click Upgrade. A progress bar is displayed, showing you the percentage of upgrade progress in real time. 5. A progress bar will be displayed to show the advancement of the upgrade process 6. When the firmware upgrade is finished, a red Status: Success indication will be displayed and a pop-up saying FW upgrade process finished successfully will come up. Without getting these indications one should not proceed to the next step (switching FW banks). Proceed directly to Switching to the Upgraded Firmware Version. 3.2 Step 2 - Switching to the Upgraded Firmware Version Once you have uploaded the upgraded firmware version, you must then officially implement it into your system. The Alvarion EMS has two software storage areas (banks), both displayed in Status => System => Software versions, and described in the below table. Field Description and Values Main Firmware Shadow Firmware Indicates the name of the current loaded version of the administration firmware (i.e. the version currently running) Indicates the name of the new or the previously loaded version of the firmware WBSn Family FW Upgrade Procedure - 6 -
1. Once the new upgrade version of the firmware has been uploaded to the Shadow Firmware bank, click Switch. This enables you to switch over to the newly uploaded version. 2. The system performs a reboot, and when it powers up, does so using the new version of the firmware. Note: while the system reboots to switch to another FW bank, it s recommended to check connectivity with the system by running a constant ping (-t option) to system s IP address, in order to know when the switching process is finished. In any case, switching operation should not exceed 2 minutes. 3. If at this stage you wish to revert back to the previous version of the software, it s highly recommended to do it by pressing Rollback button, and not by clicking Switch again in any case. For proper rolling-back to previous FW version please refer to Using the Rollback Procedure section. 3.3 Step 3 - Validation of Current Firmware Version It s a good practice to validate the actually loaded firmware version at the end of an upgrade process. To see the currently loaded FW version please navigate to Status => System => Software Versions. You should see the newly upgraded FW version string inside the Main Firmware field; the previous FW version string should appear in the Shadow Firmware field: 3.4 Using the Rollback Procedure Running firmware has its own running configuration file. After a firmware upgrade procedure is performed, a new configuration file is included in the upgrade, which will adopt the current configuration settings, once the newly upgraded firmware is run. WBSn Family FW Upgrade Procedure - 7 -
This configuration file may contain new features that could modify current configurations. Also, even if no new features were included in the upgrade, but new configurations were specified by the user, a newer version of the configuration file is created. If you wish to revert back to the previous firmware and the previous configuration file, you need to perform a Rollback procedure. To Rollback the Firmware 1. Navigate to Administration => Firmware. 2. Click Rollback. The following message is displayed: 3. Click Yes to reboot your system, and rollback to the previous firmware and configuration file. 4 Best Firmware Upgrade Practices Two recommended actions to perform when upgrading WBSn devices: Prior to performing FW upgrade (especially from version older than 1.3.2.x), it s recommended to reboot the WBSn device. WBSn device can be rebooted by pressing reboot button in EMS (Administration => reboot) or through a scheduled task in NMS (for multiple device at once). Once the firmware upgrade process is successfully finished (WBSn device is up with the new FW version in Main Firmware bank), it is recommended to clear all the browsing history in the Internet Options, as well as to clear java temporary files in Control Panel => java menu. 5 Firmware Upgrade Troubleshooting As it s been stated above, a normal firmware upgrade operation (before switch command) should take around 3-4 minutes and should be followed by a Status: success indication and a pop-up with upgrade success message. Here we list a few known issues related to firmware upgrade process: Issue 1: Error Writing to Server message during FW upgrade operation Solution: reboot the WBSn unit and try to initiate the upgrade process again Issue 2: FW Upgrade progress bar reaches 100% almost immediately Solution: this is expected to happen when upgrading from versions older than 1.3.1.x; one should ignore the fast advancement of the progress bar and wait for proper indication of successful finish of upgrade process, as described in Step 1 above. WBSn Family FW Upgrade Procedure - 8 -
Issue 3: FW Upgrade success indication appears too quickly (when progress bar only reaches 6-7%) Solution: this issue is expected to happen when upgrading to some specific revisions of version 1.3.1.x. The recommendation here is to use a newer version to upgrade to (1.3.2.x). Issue 4: Switch process fails Solution: when FW switch process fails, one of two of the following happens: there is a pop-up with switch failure notice, or the new FW version string still appears in the Shadow Firmware bank (see Step 3 above). This is a rear case and the solution here is to perform upgrade to an intermediate version 1.3.2.rev10. Once successfully upgraded to the intermediate version, one can upgrade further to the latest available version. Issue 5: FTP/HTTP Upgrade from an older version to version 1.3.2.rev14 may result in failure ( Status: Fail indication in EMS), although upgrade actually succeeded Solution: Despite the failure indication, the new firmware version is supposed to appear in the Shadow Firmware EMS field (Status => System => Software Versions page). If so, one should ignore the failure message and proceed to the firmware switch operation. WBSn Family FW Upgrade Procedure - 9 -