This topic describes how to upgrade Basic Edition transit routers to Enterprise Edition.

Background information

  • During the upgrade, the system automatically deletes the cloud service configurations from the Basic Edition transit router. After the upgrade is completed, you can configure cloud services on the transit router based on your business requirements.
  • If virtual private clouds (VPCs) are connected to the Basic Edition transit router that you want to upgrade, the system converts routes that the VPCs automatically learn from Cloud Enterprise Network (CEN) to custom routes whose next hop is an Enterprise Edition transit router. The conversion does not affect your services.
  • After the upgrade is completed, the VPCs cannot learn new routes from CEN. To adjust network communication for the VPCs, you can add or delete custom routes. For more information, see Add and delete routes.

    For example, after the upgrade is completed, the Enterprise Edition transit router is connected to a new VPC. The connection between the Enterprise Edition transit router and the new VPC uses the default configurations. If you want to connect an existing VPC to the new VPC, add a custom route to the existing VPC. You must set the destination CIDR block of the custom route to the CIDR block of the new VPC, and set the next hop to the custom route that points to the existing VPC.

  • You can upgrade a Basic Edition transit router to an Enterprise Edition transit router only in specific regions.

    Area Region Zone
    Chinese mainland China (Hangzhou) Zone H, Zone I, Zone J, and Zone K
    China (Shanghai) Zone F, Zone G, Zone E, Zone B, Zone N, Zone M, and Zone L
    China (Nanjing - Local Region) Zone A
    China (Fuzhou - Local Region) Zone A
    China (Shenzhen) Zone D and Zone E
    China (Heyuan) Zone A and Zone B
    China (Guangzhou) Zone A and Zone B
    China (Qingdao) Zone B and Zone C
    China (Beijing) Zone H, Zone G, Zone J, Zone K, Zone I, and Zone L
    China (Zhangjiakou) Zone A, Zone B, and Zone C
    China (Hohhot) Zone A and Zone B
    China (Ulanqab) Zone A, Zone B, and Zone C
    China (Chengdu) Zone A and Zone B
    Asia Pacific Singapore (Singapore) Zone A, Zone B, and Zone C
    China (Hong Kong) Zone B and Zone C
    Malaysia (Kuala Lumpur) Zone A and Zone B
    India (Mumbai) Zone A and Zone B
    Indonesia (Jakarta) Zone A and Zone B
    Philippines (Manila) Zone A
    Japan (Tokyo) Zone A and Zone B
    South Korea (Seoul) Zone A
    Thailand (Bangkok) Zone A
    Europe Germany (Frankfurt) Zone A and Zone B
    UK (London) Zone A and Zone B
    North America US (Virginia) Zone A and Zone B
    US (Silicon Valley) Zone A and Zone B
    Australia Australia (Sydney) Zone A and Zone B

Step 1: Schedule an upgrade

You must schedule an upgrade. Before you schedule an upgrade, you must determine the start time and a time window for the upgrade.

  • After you schedule an upgrade, Alibaba Cloud applies for resources for the upgrade within 72 hours. You cannot upgrade a Basic Edition transit router before the resources are allocated. Therefore, we recommend that you reserve sufficient time for Alibaba Cloud to apply for the required resources. If you need an emergency upgrade, contact your business manager.
  • During the upgrade, network connections may be disrupted. We recommend that you migrate the workloads before the upgrade, notify users of network changes, and perform the upgrade during off-peak hours.
  • The upgrade requires 10 to 20 minutes. To ensure a smooth upgrade, we recommend that you reserve an upgrade window of 1 hour.
  1. Log on to the CEN console.
  2. On the Instances page, find the CEN instance that you want to manage and click the instance ID.
  3. On the details page of the CEN instance, you can use one of the following methods to go to the Upgrade Guide page.
    • On the Basic Settings > Transit Router tab, find the Basic Edition transit router that you want to upgrade and click Upgrade Now in the Edition column.
    • On the Basic Settings > Transit Router tab, find the Basic Edition transit router that you want to upgrade and click the ID of the transit router. On the details page of the transit router, click the Basic Settings tab. Then, click Upgrade Now on the right side of Version.
  4. In the Upgrade Transit Routers to Enterprise Edition dialog box, view the features of and billing information about the Enterprise Edition transit router, and click Upgrade.
  5. On the Schedule Upgrade wizard page, select the zones of the Enterprise Edition transit router and click Schedule Upgrade.
    Enterprise Edition transit routers are supported in one or multiple zones within a region. When you create a VPC connection, the Enterprise Edition transit router creates an elastic network interface (ENI) on the vSwitch in a supported zone. The ENI forwards network traffic between the VPC and the Enterprise Edition transit router. For more information about the zones in which you can create an Enterprise Edition transit router, see the Background information section in this topic.

    After you schedule an upgrade, Alibaba Cloud applies for the required resources and approves your application within 72 hours. After your application is approved, the value of the Status parameter on the Schedule Upgrade page changes to Migrated.

    Note Enterprise Edition transit routers are supported in multiple zones within a region. We recommend that you select multiple zones for your Enterprise Edition transit router to ensure service high availability.

Step 2: Prepare for the upgrade

Before you perform an upgrade, you must perform the following steps.

  1. If your Basic Edition transit router is connected to a VPC, you must create vSwitches for the VPC.

    Before the upgrade, make sure that at least one vSwitch is created in each zone of the Enterprise Edition transit router for each VPC that is connected to the Basic Edition transit router. The Enterprise Edition transit router will create an ENI on the vSwitch in each zone. The ENIs forward network traffic between the VPCs and the Enterprise Edition transit router. Each ENI occupies one IP address on the vSwitch. Make sure that the vSwitch has sufficient IP addresses. For more information, see Create a vSwitch.

    For example, Alice wants to upgrade a Basic Edition transit router in the China (Hangzhou) region and the Basic Edition transit router is connected to two VPCs named VPC1 and VPC2. Alice specified Zone H and Zone I for the Enterprise Edition transit router in Step 1. In this case, Alice must make sure that VPC1 has at least one vSwitch in Zone H and one vSwitch in Zone I, and that VPC2 also has at least one vSwitch in Zone H and one vSwitch in Zone I.

    Note
    • When you create a vSwitch, we recommend that you use a subnet mask that does not exceed 28 bits in length.
    • If the Basic Edition transit router that you want to upgrade is connected to a virtual border router (VBR), you do not need to perform other operations on the VBR before you perform the upgrade.
  2. Back up routes.
    Before you upgrade the Basic Edition transit router, we recommend that you back up all routes of the CEN instance to which the transit router is connected. After the upgrade is completed, you can compare the routes to make sure that the routes after the upgrade are the same as the routes before the upgrade.
    1. Log on to the CEN console.
    2. On the Instances page, find and click the CEN instance that you want to manage.
    3. On the Basic Settings > Transit Router tab, find the Basic Edition transit router that you want to manage and click the instance ID.
    4. On the details page of the transit router, click the Route Table tab.
    5. On the Route Table tab, click the Export icon icon to download and save the information about the routes in the current region to your on-premises machine.
    6. Repeat the preceding steps to download and save the information about routes in all regions of the CEN instance.
  3. Prepare test resources based on your business requirements. After the upgrade is completed, you can use the test resources to test the network connectivity.

Step 3: Perform the upgrade

After your application for scheduling an upgrade is approved and the preparations are completed, perform the following steps:

  1. Log on to the CEN console.
  2. On the Instances page, find the CEN instance that you want to manage and click the instance ID.
  3. On the details page of the CEN instance, you can use one of the following methods to go to the Upgrade Guide page.
    • On the Basic Settings > Transit Router tab, find the Basic Edition transit router that you want to upgrade and click Upgrade Now in the Edition column.
    • On the Basic Settings > Transit Router tab, find the Basic Edition transit router that you want to upgrade and click the ID of the transit router. On the details page of the transit router, click the Basic Settings tab. Then, click Upgrade Now on the right side of Version.
  4. In the Upgrade Transit Routers to Enterprise Edition dialog box, click Upgrade.
  5. On the Schedule Upgrade wizard page, click Next.
  6. On the Specify vSwitch wizard page, set the following parameters and click Next.
    Parameter Description
    Apply for Zones The system automatically uses the zones that you specified on the Schedule Upgrade page.
    Delete Default Cloud Service Select Delete Default Cloud Service.
    Notes on Creating Service Linked Roles When you perform the upgrade, the system automatically creates the service-linked role AliyunServiceRoleForCEN. This service-linked role allows the Enterprise Edition transit router to create elastic network interfaces (ENIs) on the vSwitches of the VPC. The ENIs forward network traffic between the VPC and the transit router. For more information about service-linked roles, see AliyunServiceRoleForCEN.
    Select the vSwitch to which the VPC is connected Select vSwitches for the VPC.

    The Enterprise Edition transit router creates an ENI on each vSwitch that you specify.

  7. On the Configure VPC Routes wizard page, select Automatically Switch to Static Routes and click Next.
  8. On the Confirm Settings and Price wizard page, confirm the information about the network instance, view the billing information, and then click Next.
    After you complete the preceding configurations, the system automatically starts the upgrade. Do not close the upgrade message until the upgrade is completed.

Step 4: Configure cloud services

After the upgrade is completed, you can configure cloud services based on your business requirements. For more information, see Access to cloud services and Configure PrivateZone.

Step 5: Test the network connectivity

After you complete the preceding steps, you must compare the routes and test the network connectivity to make sure that the upgrade is successful.

  1. Compare routes.
    You can perform the following operations to view or download the information about routes after the upgrade, and then compare the routes to make sure that the routes after the upgrade are the same as the routes before the upgrade.
    1. Log on to the CEN console.
    2. On the Instances page, find and click the CEN instance that you want to manage.
    3. On the Basic Settings > Transit Router tab, find the Enterprise Edition transit router that you want to manage and click the instance ID.
    4. On the details page of the transit router, click the Route Table tab.
    5. On the Route Entry tab, view the routes in the current region.
      If a large number of routes exist, you can click Export to download the information about the routes in the current region.
  2. Test the network connectivity based on your business requirements to make sure that your business is not interrupted.