SG-5100: Auto updated to new packages, but still old pfSense

[DrPhil]

I have a simple home setup (3 interfaces, a few simple firewall rules).

My pfSense is still "2.4.5-Release".
Today I rebooted my system, and I think some packages got auto upgraded (I don't even remember installing any to begin with - but maybe I did).

Now

1. My GUI doesn't work (502 Bad Gateway). 10 minutes ago it was giving me a different error (PHP ERROR: Type: 64, File: /etc/inc/config.inc, Line: 51, Message: require_once(): Failed opening required 'Net/IPv6.php')

2. I can root into it (that's how I know the pfSense version - cat /etc/version). But if I choose "Restore recent configuration", I get this error (/usr/local/bin/php-cgi: Undefined symbol "alphasort@FBSD_1.5")

What are my options?

[DrPhil]

On the shell, I tried option 13 (Update from console) and I get this error message update_error.txt

[SteveITS]

@drphil I've never seen packages auto upgrade. I have seen comments that installing a package for a wrong/later version of pfSense can corrupt the package system by installing the later (FreeBSD 12) software on the earlier (FreeBSD 11) OS. See https://redmine.pfsense.org/issues/10464. If you can't update pfSense to 21.2 you may need to get a copy of the installer from Netgate and reinstall/restore. If you're trying to stay on 2.4.5, what I would do is:

• install 2.4.5
• set to Previous Stable Version in System/Updates
• install desired packages
• restore configuration
• double check Previous Stable Version is still set

[DrPhil]

Thank you @teamits.

So, here's what I did

1. Requested NetGate for the image file
2. Reinstalled pfSense using these instructions

It seems to be working fine for now. Three additional comments in case someone is interested

1.1) NetGate support accidentally gave me "21.02-RELEASE-p1" instead of what I requested - "2.4.5".
1.2) I didn't notice it until I was done installing. Now that it's working fine, I don't want to go through the trouble to downgrade

2. I can see that I never installed any packages. The ones that auto updated were likely the default installations - aws-wizard, ipsec-profile-wizard, Netgate_Coreboot_Upgrade

3. My only other action that could've triggered the packages to auto update is that I was testing my config backup. I basically saved config.xml on my local system, and then restored it (I was testing my "backup" process).

[SteveITS]

@drphil said in SG-5100: Auto updated to new packages, but still old pfSense:

saved config.xml on my local system, and then restored it (

That would be what did it. If it tried to reinstall the packages it would pull them from the current repo, so 21.02. Installing later software would install any dependencies for the newer OS as well. https://redmine.pfsense.org/issues/10464 Always select "Previous Stable Version" in System/Update if you want to stay on the older version.

The Netgate version of pfSense does have a few packages preinstalled as you listed.