Adopting a Used Unifi AP

28th February 2020

This is kinda confusing so i thought i would write it down. The AP may also say Managed by Another Network.

Step1: Reset the AP to factory defaults. Do this by plugging the AP in and immediately holding down the reset button for 10seconds+ The ring led will flash Green/Amber/Off. Let it stew for at least 1 minute.

Step2: If the device was in your Unifi Management Console you will need to Forget it by clicking on; Devices (far left), Click the AP in the middle pane, a right pane will appear, click the Config/Gear, expand “Manage Device” (bottom), and click Forget Device.

Step3: Reboot the AP and wait for 2-3 minutes and it will appear again in the Ubiquiti management console, Devices but this time it will be labeled Pending Adoption.

Step4; select your pending device and click Adopt or Upgrade+Adopt

If it still won’t work you may need to use the TFTP method. Be careful as a lot of Ubiquiti gear defaults to 192.168.1.20 I was using a Ubiquiti tough switch as a poe injector and both devices were trying to claim that 192.168.1.20 IP address. ping 192.168.1.20 before powering up the AP to verify the address is not in use. Also my AP did not respond to ping but it did accept the TFTP transfer. strange.

Gettin real deep: if the AP still won’t upgrade, ssh into the AP. You can get the IP address from your DHCP server, should be easy to find since the MAC address is written on the back of the AP. logon ubnt passwd ubnt Find your firmware at the Ubiquiti download page here. you will eventually get to a page with a button to copy the URL to your clipboard. You can upgrade by typing upgrade in the ssh session followed by the URL from the firmware download page. If you get a certificate error replace https:// with http:// they both work.

BZ.v3.2.12# upgrade https://dl.ui.com/unifi/firmware/BZ2/3.9.54.9373/BZ.ar7240.v
3.9.54.9373.180913.2356.bin
Downloading firmware from ‘https://dl.ui.com/unifi/firmware/BZ2/3.9.54.9373/BZ.ar7240.v3.9.54.9373.180913.2356.bin’.

–2020-03-02 00:59:26– https://dl.ui.com/unifi/firmware/BZ2/3.9.54.9373/BZ.ar7240.v3.9.54.9373.180913.2356.bin
Resolving dl.ui.com… 13.226.131.172
Connecting to dl.ui.com|13.226.131.172|:443… connected.
ERROR: cannot verify dl.ui.com’s certificate, issued by /C=US/O=Amazon/OU=Server CA 1B/CN=Amazon': Unable to locally verify the issuer's authority. To connect to dl.ui.com insecurely, use–no-check-certificate’.
Unable to establish SSL connection.
Image short, header truncated.
Invalid firmware.

BZ.v3.2.12# upgrade http://dl.ui.com/unifi/firmware/BZ2/3.9.54.9373/BZ.ar7240.v3
.9.54.9373.180913.2356.bin
Downloading firmware from ‘http://dl.ui.com/unifi/firmware/BZ2/3.9.54.9373/BZ.ar7240.v3.9.54.9373.180913.2356.bin’.

–2020-03-02 03:31:13– http://dl.ui.com/unifi/firmware/BZ2/3.9.54.9373/BZ.ar7240.v3.9.54.9373.180913.2356.bin
Resolving dl.ui.com… 13.225.206.95
Connecting to dl.ui.com|13.225.206.95|:80… connected.
HTTP request sent, awaiting response… 200 OK
Length: 7459934 (7.1M) [application/octet-stream]
Saving to: `/tmp/fwupdate.bin’

100%[======================================>] 7,459,934 1.47M/s in 4.9s

2020-03-02 03:31:18 (1.44 MB/s) – `/tmp/fwupdate.bin’ saved [7459934/7459934]

Waiting firmware upgrade ..
Waiting firmware upgrade ..
Waiting firmware upgrade ..

more info here