Firmware upgrade - slot used

During firmware upgrade, which slot is being upgraded? Is it the current slot, the slot running the latest firmware, or something else?

My router looks per the following screenshot. Currently booted to 8.1.0 and has 8.1.1 Beta 1 in the second slot. If I upgrade to 8.1.1 Beta 2 would it overwrite 8.1.0 or 8.1.1 Beta 1?

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The upgrade happens to the copy of the firmware that is NOT currently in use.

FYI. You can play tricks with this discussed here

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Thanks @Michael, very helpful answer & blog post.

Peplink, perhaps you could consider updating the corresponding KB (at Upgrading Firmware - The Manual Method) to make this clear. Also, perhaps the UI can advise the user which firmware is about to be upgraded as part of the upgrade confirmation prompt.

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Article updated, do you think this is clear/helpful?

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@Travis, yes! Thanks for the quick processing.

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@Travis , to clarify, does this work the same with beta firmware?

For example, my router currently has 8.1.1 running in Slot A and 8.1.2 Beta 1 in Slot B. It’s booted into Slot B. Do I need to boot into Slot A before running the upgrade?

Note: I would want to retain production firmware in one slot and use the other slot for for the experimental 8.1.2 versions

@Vitaly ,

Yes, if you need retain the 8.1.1 firmware partition , you need to booted into Firmware 1 (Slot A) and run the upgrade.

P/S:

  • Configuration changes make in the running partition won’t be available in the second firmware, make sure you backup the configuration before you boot into other firmware slot. In any worst case , if the configuration is not matched after boot into other slot, you can restore the configuration.
  • Configuration migrate/convert only happen when you perform firmware upgrade/downgrade .
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Thanks @sitloongs.

Just upgraded as you described and it worked exactly as expected:

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