We are considering upgrading from 10.1.600 to 10.2.3 (or there abouts) to resolve some issue with Intercompany processing and some other minor annoyances. We have had Epicor quote us an eye watering amount. With our previous ERP system we performed the upgrades ourselves following guideline documentation. Reading some of the upgrade posts here, it sounds like the documentation leaves something to be desired. I thought that we could have training on how to do the upgrade and I figured that this would take 1 - 2 days (say 20 hours). They are quoting 170 hours. Does anyone have experience in doing the upgrade themselves? Is this feasible for one to do oneself? Dos anyone know whether the upgrade pocedure docs have been updated to allow for the failures reported in this forum? We have reasonable technical team here though no specialist DBAs.
Rob;
We are still going live with E10, and had Epicor do the first installation at 10.2.600 for us. Since still in our testing phase, I decided to figure out how to do the upgrades myself, as I have always done.
I agree the documentation takes a bit to figure out, especailly since we have an Application Server and then also a Task Server, but the instructions all refer to them as one in the same.
I went from 10.2.200.6 to 10.2.300.7 then to 10.2.300.12 on my own.
What I experienced was a lot more work than in E9, but doable. Found that Epicor Social still does not have an upgrade working so you have to re-install it and then start over with your data, but they eluded to working on an upgrade path and I had heard some have upgraded their DB to a new version after re-install, so if you rely on that data, check into that process.
I also found that Service Connect needs to be re-installed and had it fail on me. We don’t use it so I am not too concerned with getting it updated at this point, but again, something to consider.
I ran into several glitchy things in IIS that I had to call support and get help wtih, where it was having issues with SSL.
We are on Virtual Machines, so it is nice that I can clone them, play with the upgrade and keep trying things until I get it right and document the steps and issues along the way. I highly recommend virtualizing your server(s) if not already and then you can play with the process without risking your LIVE environment. Others have more experience than I do of course, but that is what I have encountered thus far. I also recommend backing up everything and also using the Solution Workbench to export EVERYTHING, Customizations, Reports, BAQ’s, Directives, etc. so you have a backup.
Good Luck!
George
P.S. If at the conference, ask, ask, ask at the Pavilion.
It does appear that something has changed with regards to the Task agent install. The documentation did used to match in 10.1.600, but for 10.2.300 it appears that the task agent uninstalls and reinstalls itself, you just have to add the agent back in…, a bit disconcerting.
Thanks for reminding me to log a case. I have seen this issue in the last 3 upgrades I have done (10.2.300.9 - 14)
The costs add up if you have CSG customizations and you don’t the SDK (not many customers do). There are a lot of things to consider, but if you are organised and have a good plan and a business that is behind you, you can do it. As @visionaire mentioned virtualization is a godsend for testing this stuff out.
10.1.600 to 10.2.300 you will want a good couple of practice runs to try it out. The Admin console does get upgraded and whilste it should be as simple as in the guide, I know I had some permission issues, which caused a few issues. That’s what can happen if you inherit others systems.
Like you @visionaire we too are in the implementing phase.
Don’t forget to use the Epicor ERP Analyser, that’s a useful tool. If you don’t have the URL then ask your CAM…and ask for the link to the Upgrade Analyzer.
Of course this is all On Prem talk, if you are on Cloud the walk over and have a chat with Mr @Mark_Wonsil he has a fair bit of Cloud experience…(sorry for dropping you in it @Mark_Wonsil) 
If you have the capability, I’d say do it in-house. It isn’t that scary in itself.
What we’ve concluded is that if your system is fairly standard then there’s no reason not to do the upgrade yourself, and if your system is heavily customised then nobody knows it better than you do so it’s better to do it yourself. A big chunk of the amount you’ve been quoted could well be for people to dig into your system and find out the things that you may already know.
If you’ve paid others to customise your system for you then the calculations are different, of course, and you may be stuck with having to pay someone again.
If you have a dev system on a separate server or VM then there’s nothing stopping you having a trial run, which would tell you what you’re going to need to deal with. When we upgraded from 10.1.400 to 10.2.200 we did four trial runs, I think, to work out the kinks, before doing it for real. We did also pay Epicor for some work, but that was because we were changing the set-up at the same time, and their fees were very reasonable for what they did.