Over the weekend I upgraded the firmware on our Axis 2100 Network Camera from version 2.30 to 2.32. The upgrade process is pretty easy but certainly not user-friendly and can get hairy. Some of the snags I ran into this time:

1. After FTPing the upgraded firmware file to the camera and issuing the arp -s <camera IP address> <camera Ethernet address> <my PC IP address> command on my Windows PC to assign an IP address to the camera, pinging the IP produced only timeouts. I retried the commands multiple times but same thing. I had to cycle the power to the camera 3 times before it started working. That was the hairiest part!
   
2. When I connected to the camera using my Web browser, I could see the initial screen with live video but when I clicked on the link to reconfigure settings I got prompted for a username and password. I understood that all settings got wiped out during a firmware upgrade so I followed the original instructions which is to use root as the username and pass as the password. But NO, that didn't work! I eventually figured out that the camera retains the root password if you had changed it (you're supposed to and I had). Thank God I remembered what I had changed it to!
   
3. So when I finally could access the various configuration settings, the first thing I did was go for the network settings to correct the subnet mask setting which defaults to 255.0.0.0. That incorrect subnet mask causes connectivity with the camera to be flakey — reachable for 10 seconds then unreachable for 10 then reachable again and on and on. I had to change and save the setting — which requires the camera to reboot — 3 times before the correct setting of 255.255.255.0 would stick.
   
4. Lastly, although the usernames for any users I had added previously are retained, the passwords and access privileges are lost. So I just had to reenter passwords and reset privileges.
   

I am hoping that by me documenting all of this here, the next time I upgrade won't be so hairy!