Major faux pas rebooting into old firmware

[jens]

I have previously reported issues with throughput on a Surf SOHO. I have authorization to RMA the unit but ran across a report where a user ugraded from 8.0.0 firmware to 8.0.2 and experienced a significant speed drop (although not on a SOHO).
Well, with the ability to easily switch back to old firmware I decided this was worth a quick test, selected firmware 8.0.0 and rebooted.
Imagine my surprise when my setups (such as networks set up) also flipped over to the old version. I have since reconfigured pretty much everything and do not have notes of my previous (temporary during initial experimentation after setting up this new router) passwords.
I find myself effectively locked out and my computer does not have an ethernet connector to do a direct connection (unknown if that would help at all).
Soooo, how can I get back to my 8.0.2 firmware configuration after making such a stupid error? I do not want to just try a power cycle because ‘trying’ got me into this mess to begin with.
BTW, I don’t think I have ever seen a situation where a firmware change impacted the configuration of the device. I expect firmware to be in one ‘bucket’ and configuration being in another ‘bucket’, independently from each other. I am sure there is a reason for this behavior but it sure caught me off guard

[sitloongs]

@jens

Please check this forum post that will explain the config in the firmware boot.

Firmware issue

As TK stated, it basically inherits the current config when upgrading firmware. Once on the new firmware, any changes applied or configuration changes that are made will not be reflected in the previous firmware bank.

May i know the device is manage via IC2 ? If yes, you can download the config from IC2.

Backing up and Restoring Device Configurations

Peplink recommends users to perform configuration backup regularly, especially before making any configuration changes. The configuration related settings are located at: System > Configuration Download Active Configurations Click Download and save the configuration file to backup the current active settings. Download Active Configurations and Backups from InControl If you have enabled InControl management for your device, InControl will automatically backup your configuration changes. On the …

[jens]

I did have IC2 active for a while as I was exploring things. I am thinking I should be able to do a factory reset and then grab the last configuration from IC2 to restore most if not all settings.
I will give that a try tomorrow.

Thank you very much !

[jens]

All fixed up … took a while to find the configuration in IC2 but I found it and all is good
Thanks!

[aquablue]

This caught me off guard too as without thinking about it, I was thinking that settings would be separate from firmware.

On the other hand, now that I know this is how it works, it has a benefit in that it’s like a “snapshot image” of the device, so if your settings don’t change very often, you have a way to go back to a “known working” snapshot where everything will be the way it was when it was previously. So there is a benefit too.

[jens]

Yes, I can certainly see the utility … but to me it would make more sense to separate firmware from configuration which is what the rest of the world does.
It is what it is, now that I know about it I will hopefully remember it next time