Replacing 2 stacked MS425-16 with 2 stacked C9300X-24Y

[Colin-D]

Hello, hoping someone can point me at the right documenation to come up with a plan here. 

We have 2 stacked MS425016s for our core switching, I need to replace them, and it shows the C9300X-24Y-M as the replacements, so we have 2 of those I want to deploy as a stack. The documentation for cloning and replacing stacked switches doesnt apply to the C9300s, and I can't find any walkthroughs of the best way to do it with the least amount of downtime, and the least amount of rebuilding configurations by hand. 

I'm new to the Meraki world and everything else has been really straightforward but this jump looks like a pain. 

[alemabrahao]

You can certainly clone the settings, but my suggestion is to create a new Network, reproduce the same settings for the new stack of switches, perform tests to validate that they are working properly, and then schedule a maintenance window to replace the equipment.

This will be much safer.

[Colin-D]

So, I'm right in thinking that I can't clone the settings then replace one switch at a time in the stack? Our main reason for having the stack is the redundancy because it is used for emergency services. When I started reviewing the documentation for replacing switches in a stack I was excited, now I'm pretty much dreading it 🙂

[Mloraditch]

No the models are not compatible for stacking. That's pretty much universal in switching. Only like models can be in a physical stack together. The only part of the settings that you can just move are the Layer 3 settings (and they would need to be in the same network for that to work). Everything else has to be cloned either manually or via the API.

[Colin-D]

Ok I'll start researching that then, Thanks to all!

[cmr]

I think you'd be best to build them alongside, for a 24/7 operation I'd set the 9300s up as pure layer 2, with a transit VLAN between the stacks.  You can then move each physical connection and also each VLAN interface from one stack to the other with minimal downtime until there are no more connections of either type on the MS425s.

[Main10ence]

I agree with @cmr.

However, first and foremost, bring the C9300s online individually and allow them to connect to the M.Dashboard before building the stack.