This chapter provides a brief description of the initial SteelHead-v configuration process and detailed information on licensing, upgrading, and verifying SteelHead-v. Initial configuration for SteelHead-v is the same as for a physical SteelHead; for complete details about the initial configuration process see the SteelHead Installation and Configuration Guide.

To finish setting up your SteelHead-v, complete the actions listed in this table

SteelHead-v includes a configuration wizard which you can access through your virtual machine’s command console. Typically, the command console appears after you install SteelHead-v and start the virtual machine. Use the configuration wizard to perform the initial configuration.

This section describes how to log in to the SteelHead-v Management Console. The Management Console provides a web browser interface that facilitates managing SteelHead-v.

You can connect to SteelHead-v through any supported web browser. To connect, you must know the host, domain, and administrator password that you assigned during the initial setup.

The first time you purchase a license you receive a customer key, which is used across all subsequent purchases. Licenses are tied to your customer key and are provided for model performance tier, WAN optimization, and optional add-on features. Some features may require a challenge-response to activate the license. See “To activate a license that requires a challenge-response” on page 73.

In addition, a support identification code is provided for included or purchased support services.

Virtual appliances with subscription licenses must run in connected mode, which requires daily connectivity to the Riverbed Cloud Portal. Virtual appliances with evaluation licenses or perpetual licenses can run in disconnected mode and do not require a connection to the internet. When a virtual appliance with a subscription license cannot connect to the Riverbed Cloud Portal, an email alert is sent daily for two weeks, or until connectivity is restored, to the address that is configured on the appliance to receive event notifications. If connectivity is not restored after two weeks, the license expires and the functionality associated with it stops.

One-year, three-year, and five-year subscription licenses are available. When a SteelHead-v is licensed for a capacity that exceeds the capacity of the underlying virtual machine’s hardware configuration, the SteelHead-v will operate at the maximum capacity allowed by the underlying virtual machine’s hardware configuration.

RiOS 9.7.1 and later support automatic licensing. To use automatic licensing, the appliance must run in connected mode.

You can switch among models from the Administration > Maintenance: Licenses page in the Management Console. Before you change models, ensure that you have purchased licenses appropriate to the model and functionality you want to use and that the appliance can connect to the Riverbed license portal.

All models are listed under the Appliance Specifications section. Only those models with specifications supported by your currently installed licenses and your underlying virtual machine hardware are selectable. By default, your SteelHead-v runs the highest capacity hardware specification that your license and underlying virtual machine hardware configuration allows.

If you require a model that is not selectable, ensure that you purchase a license for that model and that the underlying virtual machine hardware is sufficient to run that model’s hardware specification.

Before you can add licenses to legacy SteelHead-v models, you must purchase a token from Riverbed. The token is associated with a model number that is assigned to SteelHead-v during licensing.

To view your purchased tokens, log in to your account at https://support.riverbed.com.

After you receive a token, you are ready to install the licenses.

Starting in RiOS 8.0.2, you can delete an instance of SteelHead-v and deploy a new instance with the same token. When you reuse a token, the system indicates the reuse and recommends removing the old instances. Each new instance using the same token invalidates the previous instance. Requests from an old instance to get licenses result in an error message. The serial number remains the same for the new instance and licenses.

You can reuse a token up to five times. After reusing a token five times, contact Riverbed Support for a new token. 

This section describes how to install, update, downgrade, and remove a license. It also describes how to use flexible licensing to manage model configurations and upgrades. It includes these topics:

You perform all license management and SteelHead-v model upgrades in the Administration > Maintenance: Licenses page.

RiOS provides a flexible way to manage SteelHead-v licenses, model configurations, and upgrades. Rather than performing an incremental model upgrade or replacing a virtual appliance with a new OVA image, RiOS provides specification licenses that configure specific performance characteristics of SteelHead-v. A specification license points to a specific, validated model and includes the required licenses and the virtual hardware specification.

Version 8.5 and later include improvements in licensing and model upgrades.

SteelHead-v can run with a specification license for a higher model. For example, if there is only VCX755H hardware, but there is a specification license to run a VCX1555H, then the appliance can operate as the VCX755H model until more hardware is available.

If you are licensed for a higher model than you have hardware for, you can shut down SteelHead-v, add the hardware, and power it back on. When SteelHead-v comes up again, it automatically upgrades to the highest runnable model.

In addition, when you add a specification license for the first time (or whenever RiOS is not running), SteelHead-v automatically upgrades to the highest runnable model based on the available hardware and license. No reboot is required.

By activating a specification license on SteelHead-v, you can transform its capabilities to meet performance characteristics for any model within a platform family.

Model downgrades are not supported, even for model evaluations. If you purchase a V250L and want to evaluate a V550M, you can install an evaluation license. When the trial period for the V550M expires, you cannot downgrade SteelHead-v to the V250L. For this reason, you must create a new, separate VM for the evaluation. If you decide to upgrade to the new model, you purchase the full license for the V550M (in this scenario) and upgrade the SteelHead. Upgrading to a new model requires a new token and hardware specification for the new model, and you must restart SteelHead-v with a clean RiOS data store.

You cannot upgrade from one model family to a different model family. For example, SteelHead-v xx50 models cannot be upgraded to VCX xx55 models, and VCX xx55 models cannot be upgraded to VCX10 through VCX110 models.

This section describes how to activate a token, receive the license, and install the license on
SteelHead-v. The procedure in this section describes both autolicensing and manual licensing.

Some model upgrades require additional virtual hardware. When the appliance has the required virtual hardware, activating the hardware specification upgrades the appliance to the new model number. When the existing hardware is not adequate, the message “hardware required” appears after the hardware specification description.

For details about SteelHead-v model requirements, see “SteelHead-v models” on page 17.

With SteelHead-v 8.5 and later, you can configure the size of the RiOS data store disk for SteelHead-v on VCX models. This configuration is still fixed for other SteelHead models.

If you upgrade to a version later than 8.0.3, your RiOS data store configuration remains intact. However, due to changes in the RiOS data store disk layout, if you modify the disk size either manually or during a model upgrade and then later downgrade to the earlier image, data store corruption can result.

If you see errors related to the RiOS data store, you must clean it. If your disk is smaller than the SteelHead model is expecting based on the values required in the earlier version, increase the disk size to the expected size, and then enter the restart clean command.

To avoid this situation, upgrade the SteelHead model prior to upgrading to SteelHead-v 9.0 or later.

After installing a license, the next steps to complete a model upgrade depend on whether the upgrade requires additional virtual hardware:

This section describes how to activate a hardware specification that does not require additional virtual hardware on SteelHead-v.

Upgrades to models within a platform family require only a new license because the existing virtual hardware is sufficient.

This section describes how to activate a hardware specification that requires additional virtual hardware on SteelHead-v.

When you reserve CPU and other resources, reserve the full amount required for the SteelHead-v model. In addition, verify that additional unclaimed resources are available. Due to hypervisor overhead, VMs can exceed their configured reservation.

The overhead calculations for the ESXi and Hyper‑V hypervisors differ:

To upgrade a model and add virtual hardware, perform this procedure after installing the license.

When the upgrade is complete, the new model number appears on the SteelHead-v banner in the upper-right corner of the screen.

After using flexible licensing to upgrade, you cannot return SteelHead-v to a lower model using the SteelHead UI. You can use the SteelHead CLI to perform a downgrade operation.

You can remove a SteelHead-v license.

Your new RiOS software is backward compatible with previous RiOS versions. However, to obtain the full benefits of the new features in this version, you must upgrade the client-side and server-side SteelHeads on any given WAN link. After you have upgraded all appliances, all the benefits of the new RiOS features and enhancements are available.

If you mix RiOS software versions in your network, you might not be able to take full advantage of new features that are not part of older software versions.

You can reboot or shut down the system in the Administration > Maintenance: Reboot/Shutdown page.

Rebooting the system disrupts existing network connections that are currently proxied through it. Rebooting can take a few minutes.

When you shut down the system, connections are broken and optimization ceases. Shutdown can take several minutes.

This section describes how to verify that you have properly connected SteelHead-v.

This section describes how to verify that you have properly configured SteelHead-v.

After you deploy a SteelHead-v appliance, you might want to verify the appliance’s optimization and disk usage performance before using the appliance in a production environment. You can run tests that benchmark your appliance’s performance against that of other Riverbed products from the Reports > Diagnostics: Benchmarks screen. Test results indicate the highest virtual appliance that can be run on the hardware supporting the tested appliance.