On October 5 and 6, 2022, OIT will be switching to a new Network Registration system (NetReg). This change will allow us to upgrade the underlying infrastructure and improve the customer experience when registering and managing devices on UT’s network. 

What will be affected during the upgrade? 

• You will not be able to register new computers or other devices on the UT network, neither Wi-Fi nor wired. This includes the guest wireless network.  
• You will not be able to manage or unregister your existing devices in NetReg. 
• Existing wireless connections may be lost if a device does not connect for approximately an hour. 
• Devices connected through a wired network port should remain online, though they may experience issues upon renewing their current 7-day lease. 
• Off-campus & VPN connections will be unaffected. 

When will devices be affected? 

Wednesday, October 5, at 10:00 p.m. to approximately Thursday, October 6 at 10:00 a.m. We will announce this event on the IT System Status Center in September. 

What do I need to do? 

• Avoid scheduling events during this window, particularly with campus visitors.  
• Contact OIT if you have questions about critical systems or are aware of conflicting events.  

• We recommend you confirm that your critical on-campus systems and devices can get online after the upgrade and report any issues to the OIT HelpDesk.  
• If you are an owner of an existing permissions group in NetReg, you will be contacted in May to map your current group to an Active Directory (AD) group. 

What are the technical details of the switchover? 

OIT will set NetReg to a maintenance status with no new device registrations or changes to existing registrations. OIT will then begin copying the existing registration database and DHCP leases to the new NetReg system. During this time, there will be an anticipated 30-minute outage for each of Knoxville’s three DHCP systems—wired, ut-open, and eduroam—as we migrate them to the new DHCP Kea servers. To learn more about the specific feature changes in the new system, visit the OIT Knowledge Base.