Need to suspend CA with an offline firmware upgrade

[Rharreveld]

Hello,

Is it neccesary to suspend the CA traffic during an offline controller/disks upgrade.
I can only find documentation about suspending the traffic with an online upgrade.

Let me know,

[AWilliams_1 · Accepted solution]

If it is an offline upgrade then the EVA goes offline before the upgrade takes place which automatically suspends CA.
It is probably safer to suspend the DR groups manually because if a problem occurs at least you wont replicate corrupted data. I always like to leave the replication suspended until I am sure the hosts have all restarted and confirmed their data is OK.
It is easy enough to create an SSSU script to suspend the DR groups prior to upgrade.

[Torsten.]

What array do you talk about?

Answers will be more specific if you tell us ...

[Rharreveld]

Hello

It concerns replication between two eva6000 arrays. They are connected by fibre and located on the same compound. I hear different stories about this issue. Also that replication does not need te be suspended because all connected systems will be taken offline and there will be no or almost no replication data.
It will be a controller firmware upgrade from xcs6200 to xcs6220 and about 40 drives to be flashed on each eva.

Awaiting your reaction,

[AWilliams_1]

I would still suspend the CA as per my previous comment.
The controller firmware upgrade takes about 10 minutes and the disk drive update can be done while the array is online and takes about 30-60 seconds per disk.
I also delay the update of the 'paired' array for several days to ensure that there is no latent issue with the firmware.

[Rharreveld]

Thanks for the support.

I susspended the replication and update was successfully.

[Rharreveld]

Thnx.

Replication was halted and firmware upgrades succeeded.