During a scheduled maintenance window, a network technician updates the operating system of a primary enterprise router. Immediately after the device reboots with the newly installed firmware image, all recent ACL modifications and custom static routes disappear, causing routing failures across multiple subnets. An audit reveals that recent configuration changes resided solely in volatile memory when the firmware installer triggered the system reload. Which critical pre-patch maintenance procedure was omitted prior to executing the software update?
- Saving the running configuration to non-volatile startup storage and capturing a baseline configuration backupAnswer
- BRestoring an incremental backup set onto the device immediately before restoring the last full system image snapshot
- CReassigning client gateway configurations to point to the physical interface IP rather than the high-availability Virtual IP
- DApplying the firmware update directly in production to test potential causes before establishing a formal plan of action
Answer
Saving the running configuration to non-volatile startup storage and capturing a baseline configuration backup
The correct option correctly identifies that running configurations stored only in volatile RAM are erased upon a device reboot. To prevent data loss during patch management, engineers must copy the running configuration to persistent startup memory and export a baseline backup prior to initiating software upgrades.
Step-by-Step Solution
Key Concept
Pre-patch staging and configuration baseline persistence in patch management lifecycles.