Technical Tip: Forming an HA cluster with models of different hardware revision level

[jintrah_FTNT]

Description

This article describes that FortiGate models have multiple versions of hardware. Typically, this means minor changes such as an increase in memory or a different disk drive vendor while retaining the same major platform name. These different versions are known as 'revision' levels (for example FortiGate-101F gen1, FortiGate-101F gen2).

When RAID is configured on one device but not on the other(s) it will result in a different hard disk status.

By default, when configuring high availability (HA), FortiGates with different revision levels and/or hard disk status will NOT be able to join together in a cluster.

The following commands will enable FortiGates with different revision hardware to form an HA cluster.

Scope

FortiGates are the same model but with different hardware revisions.

Solution

exec ha ignore-hardware-revision status

exec ha ignore-hardware-revision enable

It should be noted that running the command 'exec ha ignore-hardware-revision enable' will cause a reboot of the firewall.

Executing the above command disables 'config system storage' as well as disk logging.

For more information, refer to the 'Troubleshooting HA clusters' section of the chapter 'High Availability' in the FortiOS Handbook.

Note:

1. This command is only available on FortiGates that have multiple hardware revisions. There are some exceptions to certain models where this command is not feasible, though there are different hardware generations, such as the FortiGate-1500D. Check with support for hardware generation information.
2. No action is needed for hardware generations where the difference is not related to the disk (for example TPM chip only). The command ignores HA checksums related to the disk details when calculating differences between HA cluster members.

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