F5 ARX-2000 Use and care manual

ARX 2000 / D108
RMA4 Replacement Script
Full Appliance
March 20, 2011
Version 1.03

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Copyright © 2010, F5 Networks, Inc. All rights reserved.
Index
ARX2000 Chassis Overview –Front with Bezel...............................................................................2
Status and Alarm LEDs ......................................................................................................................3
ARX2000 Chassis Overview –Back..................................................................................................5
ARX 2000 Chassis Replacement .......................................................................................................7
PREPARATION - VERIFY CHASSIS IS BACKUP SWITCH ................................................................7
STEP 1 TAG ALL CABLES...................................................................................................................7
STEP 2 POWER DOWN CHASSIS......................................................................................................7
STEP 3 REMOVE ALL CABLES...........................................................................................................8
STEP 4 REMOVE CHASSIS ................................................................................................................8
STEP 5 REPLACE CHASSIS...............................................................................................................9
STEP 6 RECONNECT CABLES AND POWER ON CHASSIS.............................................................9
STEP 7 ENSURE REPLACEMENT FUNCTIONAL............................................................................10
STEP 8 REPLACE FRONT BEZEL....................................................................................................10
STEP 9 INITIAL INTERVIEW PROCESS, SOFTWARE RESTORATION AND LICENSING STEPS.10
Appendix A. Dead NVRAM battery. .................................................................................................10
Appendix B. F5 Licensing for ARX Use Case.................................................................................11
Version History .................................................................................................................................31

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Copyright © 2010, F5 Networks, Inc. All rights reserved.
ARX2000 Chassis Overview –Front with Bezel

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Copyright © 2010, F5 Networks, Inc. All rights reserved.
ARX2000 Chassis Overview –Front without Bezel
Serial number
Reference
Component
Description
A
NVRAM
NV (Non-Volatile) RAM battery
B
Power LED, power button
and reset button
Indicates that power has been applied
C
Drive Bays
2 redundant 150GB internal SATA hard drives
D
Ethernet Ports
Copper 100/1000 gigabit Ethernet ports (12). Used to
access CLI from client or server networks.
Status and Alarm LEDs

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Copyright © 2010, F5 Networks, Inc. All rights reserved.
This section describes the ARX-2000 LEDs. It is provided for reference only. NSE can obtain more
information from the ARX2K Hardware Installation guide. (F5 internal only):
http://techpubs.acopianet.com/danwood2/pubs6_0_0/docs/HW_InstallA2K/HWInstall.pdf
LED definitions:
LED State
Definition
Blinking
LED turns on and off at a steady rate.
Flashing
LED is off most of the time. Occasionally, the LED
illuminates.
Flickering
LED turns on and off at an erratic (not constant)
rate.
The lower left of the front panel contains the LEDs shown on the picture above.
The table below contains details on the status and alarm LED functions.
Callout
Feature
Function
A
Alarm LED
Indicates various alarm states.
When blinking, the LEDs blink ON for a half second
and OFF for a half second. For details on the LED colors and blinking patterns,
see next table
B
Status LED
The status LED displays green, yellow, or red with
intermittent blinking patterns, depending on the
state.
When blinking, the LEDs blink ON for a half second
and OFF for a half second.
C
Power Supply
LED (status of
both power
supplies
aggregated into
one LED)
The LED displays:
• Green, indicating power is on.
If you receive an SNMP trap indicating a power
supply failure, go to the back of the switch and
examine the power supplies to determine which
has failed. The LED on the failed power supply
will be amber. For details on the states indicated
by the power supply LED, see Power Supply
LED, on page 4-7.
For details on replacing a failed power supply,

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Copyright © 2010, F5 Networks, Inc. All rights reserved.
see Replacing the Power Supplies, on page A-9.
• Red, indicating the unit is in standby mode. The
unit has AC power applied at the back, but the
switch is not powered on.
D
NVRAM LED
The LED displays:
• Amber. Battery is in backup mode.
• Off. Battery is not in backup mode.
E
PCI-E Cable
Link Status
LED
The LED displays:
• Green. Link established.
• Amber. Link faulted.
Table below describes the LED colors and patterns that occur during various
operational states, such as booting, diagnostics, and so on.
Alarm LED
Status LED
Module State
Off
Green
Offline
Red
Green blinking
In the process of booting
Off
Amber
Onlinse Partial. At least one
processor is online,
but at least one processor is not
online yet.
If the offline processor does not
come online in
5 minutes, this status changes
to Failed Partial.
Red
Amber
Failed Partial. At least on
processor is online, but at least
one processor failed.
Off
Off
No power
ARX2000 Chassis Overview –Back
Reference
Component
Description
A
Serial Console Port
Used to access and manage the switch through a local

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Copyright © 2010, F5 Networks, Inc. All rights reserved.
console terminal and the command line interface (CLI).
B
Out of Band Management
Port
Used to access the CLI or GUI from the management
network.
C
Power Supplies and fans
2 power supplies (1+1 redundancy). There is a fan on
each supply.

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Copyright © 2010, F5 Networks, Inc. All rights reserved.
ARX 2000 Chassis Replacement
Preparation - Verify Chassis is backup switch
Verify that the Field Tech has a copy of this document for reference.
Verify that the Field Tech understands that he or she will be working under your direction at all
times.
Inform the Field Tech that it is very important to work on the backup switch and not to do
anything until the backup switch has been positively identified as powering off the active
switch will cause a service outage.
Verify the identity of the backup switch for the Field Tech

Step 1 Tag all cables
Instruct the Field Tech to label each network cable with the name of the port to which it is
connected.
Step 2 Power down chassis
Instruct the Field Tech to remove the front bezel to access the power button (see Fig.1). by,
putting his fingers through the two cutouts on the lower half on either side of the bezel and
pulling it gently towards himself.
Instruct the Field Tech to locate the Power Button which is the left most button on the chassis.
Instruct the Filed Tech to press and hold the button for approximately 5 seconds to power off
the unit.
Have the Field Tech verify that the unit is powered off by confirming that the blue light next to
the power button is off.
Fig.1

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Copyright © 2010, F5 Networks, Inc. All rights reserved.
Step 3 Remove all cables
Instruct the Field Tech to disconnect all the tagged cables including power cables.
Step 4 Remove chassis
Instruct the Field Tech to slide the chassis out the front of the rack until the rails lock in place.
Instruct the Field Tech to rotate the locks at the front of each rail clockwise
Instruct the Field Tech to slide the device out another inch and lift it up to free it from the rack
rails. (see Fig.9)
Fig. 9

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Copyright © 2010, F5 Networks, Inc. All rights reserved.
Step 5 Replace chassis
Instruct the Field Tech to fully extend the rails out the front of the rack.
Instruct the Field Tech to line up the buttons on the outside of the unit over the slots in the rails
and lower the unit onto the rails.
Instruct the Field Tech to gently push the unit towards the rack to seat it on the rails.
Instruct the Field Tech to press the purple lever on the outside of the rails and push the unit
into the rack (see Fig.10).
Instruct the Field Tech to place the failed unit into the shipping container that was used to
deliver the Replacement Appliance
Fig. 10
Step 6 Reconnect cables and power on chassis
1) Instruct the Field Tech to reconnect the tagged cables and power cords
2) Instruct the Field Tech to connect the laptop to the Console Port, using console cable
3) Set the following terminal parameters to match those on the console interface:
a) 9600 baud rate (default)
b) XON-XOFF flow control
c) 8 data bits

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Copyright © 2010, F5 Networks, Inc. All rights reserved.
d) 1 stop bit parity
4) Instruct the Field Tech to launch his favorite console application
5) Instruct the Field Tech to turn on the unit by pushing the Power Button.
6) Ask the Field Technician to confirm that the tech is seeing the messages on the console
application.
In the event the field technician gets no console output after starting the replacement chassis the
tech should attempt to reboot it.
Step 7 Ensure Replacement Functional
Instruct the Field Tech to standby while you ensure that the Replacement is functional.
Step 8 Replace front bezel
Once you are satisfied that the Replacement is working, instruct the Field Tech to re-install the
front bezel.
Step 9 Initial Interview Process, Software Restoration and Licensing Steps
From this point on, all steps are executed by the NSE. Technician should be instructed to remain
onsite just in case if he is needed for troubleshooting.
Document http://techpubs.acopianet.com/danwood2/pubs6_0_0/docs/HW_Install2500/HWInstall.pdf
starting on page 3-6 describes the Initial interview Process. Although this is the guide for the ARX
2500, but the 2 new interview questions (DNS and BRK) did not exist in releases earlier than 6.0.0.
The initial interview would get the appliance up and running on the release that it is shipped with.
Then NSE needs to upgrade to the software that is running on the peer box. That is covered in
section 6 of this guide:
http://techpubs.acopianet.com/danwood2/pubs6_0_0/docs/cliMaint/cliMaint.pdf
Appendix B describes the licensing use case that covers all the different licensing options for the ARX
(auto/manual from the CLI/GUI).
Appendix A. Dead NVRAM battery.
If the replacement unit has a dead NVRAM battery, it may be due to the time it had been sitting idle
in the box. For as long as the battery is dead, the unit will be in the “global status” and will not
allow any network connections (lights next to network jacks on front will be off) There are 2
solutions to this issue: wait for the battery to charge (could be a few hours) or issue a “term debug”
command (customers are not supposed to go to term debug) to ignore the fact that the battery is not
charged. The NSE can solve this issue or ask the tech onsite to do it. The NSE also should remind
the customer to keep the replacement appliance plugged into the power even if the unit is offline.
Here is the series of commands to ignore the battery (should work for any model):
supARX4000> en

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Copyright © 2010, F5 Networks, Inc. All rights reserved.
supARX4000# config
% WARNING: CHASSIS_NOT_READY_REASON (38010969):
The switch is not ready for the operation: Insufficient ACM NVR Battery.
supARX4000> en
supARX4000# term debug
supARX4000# ignore battery
The NVRAM battery charge is not sufficient to preserve data for 72 hours.
Are you sure? [yes/no] yes (“yes”, not just “y”)
Appendix B. F5 Licensing for ARX Use Case
Purpose:
Starting with the ARX Virtual Edition (ARX VE) version 5.3.0, the ARX adopts and integrates the
licensing used by other F5 products. In the 6.0.0 release, this licensing is extended to the ARX
hardware platforms. Each ARX device is assigned a unique base registration key (BRK). This BRK
is used to create a license dossier that is delivered to the F5 license server. The license server
returns a license that can only be applied to that device. This license sets the feature limits of the
box. The limits that are enforced by licensing are designed to be greater than or equal to any limits
that were hard coded in the ARX software prior to licensing. This should prevent licensing from
breaking any existing configuration that was allowed by earlier releases of the software. Once a
license is applied to a box, you should not need to apply it to that box again. This use case is
designed to walk through the scenarios where customers need to apply a license in order to use
license aware ARX releases. The scenarios that are covered are as follows:
Upgrade to license aware software from non-license aware software
New ARX hardware with a pre-programmed base registration key.
Running through initial interview wizard on license aware code without a pre-programmed base
registration key. [ARX VE and RMA Scenarios]

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Copyright © 2010, F5 Networks, Inc. All rights reserved.
Licensing Scenarios:
Upgrade to license aware software from non-license aware software
Obtain the ARX serial number
Via the ARX CLI
ARX1> show chassis
Identification:
Hostname UUID
------------------------------------ ------------------------------------
--
ARX1 b51af944-02db-11e0-a310-f3554fa47bb1
Chassis:
Chassis Type Model Number HW Ver. Serial
------------ ------------------------------------ ------- ------------
-
ARX-2000 ARX2000URLX 02010003
Via the ARX Manager GUI
Obtain base registration key (BRK)
During the beta process evaluation BRKs will be provided by an F5 New Product Introduction
Engineer. These evaluation keys will be time limited and will need to be replaced with permanent
BRKs for testing or production use beyond the beta period.

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Copyright © 2010, F5 Networks, Inc. All rights reserved.
Prior to general availability release of the 6.0.0 software, F5 will launch a “transition” website. This
website will allow customers to enter the „show chassis‟ output from an ARX into the website and get
an email with the base registration key for that ARX.
Refer to section 6 of the ARX CLI Reference Guide “Upgrading your software.”
When you reach the licensing steps, you can continue to follow the documentation or follow the 3rd
section of this use case: Activate the license on your ARX
New ARX hardware with a pre-programmed base registration key
The F5 manufacturing operation will begin to pre-populate the assigned base registration key for each
ARX on all switches that ship with the 6.0.0 code. In these cases, the Interview Wizard will have a
base registration key pre-populated.
IP address of a DNS server to be used by automatic activation of the license key.
A name server must be assigned so that the software can be activated. 4.
Enter the DNS name server IP address to access the license server in the
format nnn.nnn.nnn.nnn. #
Base Registration Key
The base registration key is used to activate the software license for
this system.
8. Enter the chassis’ base registration key in the format xxxxxxx-xxxxxx-
xxxxx-xxxx-xxxxxxx.(default=GABCDEF-ABCDEF-ABCDE-ABCD-ABCDEFG) #
If this information is entered at the interview wizard the base registration key will be used
automatically by any of the licensing operations.
After you log into the chassis, follow the 3rd section of this use case: Activate the license on your
ARX
Running Through initial interview wizard of license aware software without a pre-programmed base
registration key
In most cases the base registration key will be pre-programmed on the hardware by manufacturing or
via an upgrade from non-license aware to license aware software. Two notable exceptions to the
pre-programmed base registration key are deployments of a license aware ARX Virtual Edition and
switch replacement due to an RMA of a defective switch. To handle the VE and RMA cases, the
initial interview wizard of DMOS 6.0.0 has been modified to account for the addition of licensing.
Two new questions have been added:
IP address of a DNS server to be used by automatic activation of the license key.
A name server must be assigned so that the software can be activated. 4.
Enter the DNS name server IP address to access the license server in the
format nnn.nnn.nnn.nnn. #
Base Registration Key
The base resistration key is used to activate the software license for
this system.
8. Enter the chassis’ base registration key in the format xxxxxxx-xxxxxx-
xxxxx-xxxx-xxxxxxx. #
If this information is entered at the interview wizard the base registration key will be used
automatically by any of the licensing operations.
After you log into the chassis, follow the 3rd section of this use case: Activate the license on your
ARX
Activate the license on your ARX:
There are 2 different methods of activation, automatic and manual. Automatic activation requires that
your ARX can access http://activate.f5.com and a DNS name server is configured. If your ARX can
not directly access http://activate.f5.com, you must activate your license from a computer that can
access http://activate.f5.com, using one of the manual methods detailed below.

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Copyright © 2010, F5 Networks, Inc. All rights reserved.
Each licensing scenario is covered below for the ARX Manager and the CLI. You only need to
perform one activation method.
ARX Manager based automatic activation:
Complete Initial setup wizard to add proxy IPs, DNS, etc:
Launch the Activate License wizard:

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Copyright © 2010, F5 Networks, Inc. All rights reserved.
Enter Base Registration Key from email. (If the key was entered during the interview wizard or by F5
manufacturing, it will be prepopulated for you.)
Activation Method: Select Automatic.
Click Next

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Copyright © 2010, F5 Networks, Inc. All rights reserved.
Accept the terms of the EULA.
Click Next

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Copyright © 2010, F5 Networks, Inc. All rights reserved.
License is successfully activated.
Click Finish.

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Copyright © 2010, F5 Networks, Inc. All rights reserved.
CLI based automatic activation:
If your base registration key was entered during the interview wizard or
was pre-programmed on the ARX:
STSTEPHEN# license activate
% INFO: The license has been successfully activated.
If your base registration key was not entered during the interview wizard
and was not pre-programmed on the ARX:
STSTEPHEN# license activate base-reg-key GABCDEF-ABCDEF-ABCDE-ABCD-ABCDEFG
% INFO: The license has been successfully activated.
NOTE: If it is the first time you are activating the BRK, you will be asked to accept the 16-page EULA.
END USER SOFTWARE LICENSE FOR NON-COMMERCIAL USE
IMPORTANT - READ BEFORE INSTALLING OR OPERATING THIS PRODUCT
.... 16 pages displayed on the CLI …
Do you accept this license? [yes/no]
Manual Activation via the ARX Manager:

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Copyright © 2010, F5 Networks, Inc. All rights reserved.
Registration Key: Enter Base Registration Key from email. (If the key was entered during the
interview wizard or by F5 manufacturing, it will be prepopulated for you.)
Activation Method: Select Manual
Click Next