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How to upgrade Cisco IP Phone firmware

by | Nov 17, 2017 | BusinessIT, Feed

Following these instruction you will be able to upgrade you firmware or migrate you phone to use either SIP or SCCP image. This guide also allows you to unbrick you phone if you did brick it by mistake. You are recovering a bricked phone please take especially note of section “Starting the update in your phone” step 5.

What do you need

  • a Windows computer with an Ethernet port (you can also use Linux, but this guide cover only Windows)
  • a cross over ethernet cable or a spare ethernet switch that doesn’t have other devices connected to it
  • TFTPd32 http://tftpd32.jounin.net/tftpd32_download.html
  • a Cisco IP Phone firmware image (you can find it from Cisco Downloads site)

 What to do

The actual updating is devided in to four phases. You need the be careful not to make typos. Follow the instructions in the exact order they are presented here.

If you have a very old version of SCCP, you can’t upgrade directly to the newest one. The solution is to flash a earlier version first. If that is the case, just upgrade first to version 3 (P00303010102), then to version 5 (P00305000500), then jump to version 8.0.9 (P00308000900) and finally then to 8.3.3. After that you should be able to flash 9 series.

First you need to configure your IP settings

  1. Connect cross over cable to the computer and switch port of the phone or connect both devices to the switch that doesn’t have other devices connected to it
  2. Disable any firewall (remember to check Windows Firewall also)
  3. Configure a static IP of 192.168.1.1 / 255.255.255.0 on the computer (no need for DNS/Gateway settings)

Configure your DHCP and TFTP server

  1. Start TFTPd32 software as administrator (right-click and “Run as administrator”)
  2. Click settings
  3. Uncheck everything except TFTP Server and DHCP Server
  4. TFTP tab: set a Base Directory to somewhere convenient
  5. TFTP tab: set TFTP Security to None
  6. DHCP tab: set IP pool starting address to 192.168.1.2, size of pool bigger than 1, mask 255.255.255.0
  7. DHCP tab: If your phone has firmware below 8.3.3 use option 150 with value 0x0101A8C0
  8. DHCP tab: If you phone has firmware equal or greater than 8.3.3 use additional option 66 and 192.168.1.1
  9. To close the settings dialog click OK
  10. Restart TFTPd32 as administrator

TFTP directory content

  1. Extract the firmware you have downloaded from Cisco.com to the TFTP Base Directory
  2. If you have a 7940/7960 phone you need some additional configuration files (these steps below do not apply to the 79×1/79×2/79×5 Java based phones). Create a file named “XMLDefault.cnf.xml” to the TFTP base directory. The contents are below.


<Default>
<callManagerGroup>
<members>
<member priority=”0″>
<callManager>
<ports>
<ethernetPhonePort>2000</ethernetPhonePort>
<mgcpPorts>
<listen>2427</listen>
<keepAlive>2428</keepAlive>
</mgcpPorts>
</ports>
<processNodeName></processNodeName>
</callManager>
</member>
</members>
</callManagerGroup>
<loadInformation>IMAGENAME</loadInformation>
<authenticationURL></authenticationURL>
<directoryURL></directoryURL>
<idleURL></idleURL>
<informationURL></informationURL>
<messagesURL></messagesURL>
<servicesURL></servicesURL>
</Default>

Edit the file loadInformation tag to reflect the image file name without the file extension (ig. “<loadInformation>SIP11.9-4-2SR3-1S</loadInformation>”).

Starting the update in your phone

  1. Unplug the phone from power
  2. Clear the configuration by holding down the # key and then plugging in the phone power
  3. Hold the # key untill all the lights cycle or the extension lights blink amber/red (depends on the phone model)
  4. If you have a funtional firmware in the device you may use soft factory reset: press 123456789*0# followed with the 2 key
  5. If you do not have a function firmware in the device you need to use hard reset: press 3491672850*#
  6. After a while you should see the files uploading to the phone in your TFTPd32 (see the Log viewer tab)
  7. Wait until the device has complited the firmware flash download and rebooted

Throubleshooting tips

Messages like the one below is repeated in the TFTPd32 Log viewer tab

Rcvd DHCP Rqst Msg for IP 0.0.0.0, Mac 00:11:BB:0D:E7:AE [01/08 16:20:58.113]

TODO: check your TFTPd32 DHCP tab for the correct additional option value. For more details see the section “Configure your DHCP and TFTP server” steps 7 and 8.