F5 rSeries appliance firmware upgrade question

Hi,

For the F5OS host upgrade itself, license reactivation is not required. F5 states it explicitly in K000139939: "It's currently not required to re-activate the license when upgrading only the F5OS hypervisor software." - https://my.f5.com/manage/s/article/K000139939

What you do need to verify is the Service Check Date: on rSeries the license lives on the host and the tenants inherit it (K000157898 - https://my.f5.com/manage/s/article/K000157898), so if that date is earlier than the License Check Date of the TMOS version you are upgrading LTM_A/LTM_B to, the tenant initializes but does not load its configuration. Table per version in K7727 - https://my.f5.com/manage/s/article/K7727

F5 also lists it as a prerequisite in the F5OS-A Installation and Upgrade guide: "Update/reactivate your system license, if needed, to ensure that you have a valid service check date." - https://techdocs.f5.com/en-us/f5os-a-1-8-0/f5-rseries-systems-installation-upgrade/title-install-before-install-upgrade.html

You can check it on the host with "show system licensing"; the rSeries reactivation procedure is in K000151705 - https://my.f5.com/manage/s/article/K000151705

If you do reactivate, plan it: all tenants reload the license and their configuration, which briefly interrupts traffic (K22424342 - https://my.f5.com/manage/s/article/K22424342). Do appliance_B first while LTM_B is standby, then fail over and repeat on appliance_A.

Hope this helps with your upgrade. 

JQuiroga 😁