When upgrading the Splunk deployment, can we upgrade replicated indexers first in maintenance mode?

[ankithreddy777]

I have a questions regarding the upgrade

1. Can we upgrade the replicated indexers first in maintenance mode?
2. Can we upgrade the deployment server independently of the indexers to save time?

[nickhills]

yes (as long as you do the cluster master first, and then set maint mode)
and
yes

http://docs.splunk.com/Documentation/Splunk/6.5.2/Indexer/Upgradeacluster