Controller

This Section will show you how to install MCX-OS to the controller using the Motorcortex Clonezilla USB Drive

  7 minute read  

In this section you will create a Motorcortex USB Clonezilla Drive to install Motorcortex to your controller.

Create MCX-Clonezilla USB Drive

Please select the OS you are using:


  1. Login to Motorcortex.io and go to the Motorcortex.io Store

  2. Download the latest MCX-Clonezilla Image by pressing the download button:

    image not found

  3. Insert your empty USB Drive into your PC.

  1. Right-click on the .img file and select Open With Disk Image Writer.

  2. In the following window select the Destination that you want to write the Motorcortex USB Clonezilla image file to.

  3. Press start restoring to create a MCX-Clonezilla USB Drive.

    image not found

  4. When restoring has completed, the system should automatically mount the ImageData partition of the USB Drive.

  5. Copy the MCX-OS Image file (.img.xz-file) that you downloaded from the Motorcortex Store (see Install) into the ImageData folder.


  1. Login to Motorcortex.io and go to the Motorcortex.io Store

  2. Download the latest MCX-Clonezilla Image by pressing the download button:

    image not found

  3. Insert your empty USB Drive into your PC.

  1. Write the image to your USB Drive. There are tools available to Create bootable USB drives in like Rufus.

  2. When done, your USB Drive will be named ImageData, In this folder you can put the image that you want to install onto a controller.

  3. Copy the MCX-OS Image file (.img.xz-file) that you downloaded from the Motorcortex Store (see Install) into the ImageData folder.


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Booting From The Motorcortex USB Drive

  1. Make sure your Controller is powered off.

  2. Insert the Motorcortex USB Clonezilla Drive into your Controller. Make sure the image you would like to write to your controller is in the ImageData partition onto the Drive.

  3. Power on the Controller.

  4. Your Controller should automatically boot from the Motorcortex-Clonezilla USB Drive. If it does not boot automatically from USB check your Controller’s BIOS settings to enable booting from USB.

  5. Log in to the Motorcortex-Clonezilla terminal

    There are 2 ways to access the terminal of the MCX-Clonezilla:


    By attaching a Keyboard and a Display to your Controller you should immediately see a screen similar to below.

    image not found

    1. Connect your controller with your PC using the Ethernet port.

    2. Make sure the ip address of your network adapter that is connected to the Controller is in the 192.168.2.xxx range. How to do this is explained in Configure Your Network.

    3. Open a terminal.

    4. Connect to your Controller by typing:

      ssh admin@192.168.2.100

    5. log in with password vectioneer.

    6. The terminal should immediately show you a screen similar to below.

      image not found

    Select the option:


    The following steps explain how to install a image.

    1. To start the restore procedure type

      mci restore

    2. Now the prompt will ask you what image you would like to restore. Choose the image that you would like to restore.

    3. Second the prompt will ask you to choose the drive where you want to restore your image to.

    4. Restoring the image will take some time. When the process is done, check for any errors in the console

    5. You will get the message Done when the process is finished.

      image not found

    6. Remove the MCX-Clonezilla USB drive.

    7. Now you can reboot or poweroff.

      sudo reboot

    8. Wait for a couple seconds for the system to restart.

    9. Congratulations you have installed mcx-OS onto your Controller!


    Efficient Image Backup

    Follow these steps to create a standard backup of your mcx-OS image:

    1. Start the backup procedure

      mci backup

      Expected output:

      Choose Source Device:
1) sda /dev/sda
...
Choose Target Image Directory:
1) /mnt/usb/2026-01-06_15-44-42_mci-fsa-image   (new directory)
...
[progress output]
Done

    2. Select the source device

      • When prompted, choose the disk you want to back up (usually /dev/sda).

    3. Select the target image directory

      • Choose a folder on the USB drive to store the backup image.

    4. Wait for the backup to complete

      • The process may take some time. When finished, you will see Done.

    5. Safely remove the MCX-Clonezilla USB drive

    6. Reboot or power off the system

      sudo reboot

    7. Wait for the system to restart

    8. Backup complete!

      • You have successfully created a backup of your mcx-OS onto the Motorcortex USB drive.

    Note: This backup image is not a raw image. To create a raw image, please follow the instructions below.

    Raw Image Backup

    To create a raw backup image of your mcx-OS (usable with tools like QEMU), follow these steps:

    1. Verify the USB drive is mounted

      cd /mnt/usb
ls -lart

      Expected output:

      total 1
drwxr-xr-x 2 root root 4096 Jan  6 12:00 .
drwxr-xr-x 3 root root 4096 Jan  6 11:59 ..

    2. Create an empty disk image file

      truncate -s 6G temp.img
ls -lart

      This creates a 6GB empty image file named temp.img. Expected output:

      -rw-r--r-- 1 root  root   6442450944 Jan  6 12:01 temp.img

    3. Attach the image as a loop device

      sudo losetup -fP temp.img
losetup -a

      This attaches temp.img to the first available loop device (e.g., /dev/loop1). Expected output:

      /dev/loop1: []: (/mnt/usb/temp.img)

    4. Backup mcx-OS to the virtual disk

      mci backup
      • When prompted for the source, select the disk containing mcx-OS (usually /dev/sda).
      • For the target image directory, select a folder on the USB drive (e.g., /mnt/usb/2026-01-06_15-44-42_mci-fsa-image). Expected output:
      Choose Source Device:
1) sda /dev/sda
...
Choose Target Image Directory:
1) /mnt/usb/2026-01-06_15-44-42_mci-fsa-image   (new directory)
...
[progress output]
Done

    5. Restore the backup to the virtual disk

      mci restore -d /dev/loop1

      Replace /dev/loop1 with your actual loop device if different. Expected output:

      [progress output]
Done

    6. Verify partitions on the loop device

      lsblk

      Look for your loop device and its partitions (e.g., loop1p1, loop1p2). Expected output:

      NAME     MAJ:MIN RM   SIZE RO TYPE MOUNTPOINTS
loop1      7:1    0     6G  0 loop 
├─loop1p1 259:2    0    34M  0 part 
└─loop1p2 259:3    0     6G  0 part

    7. Detach the loop device

      sudo losetup -d /dev/loop1

      (No output if successful)

    8. Check the image file and its partition table

      cd /mnt/usb
fdisk -l temp.img

      This will display the partition table of temp.img. Expected output:

      Disk temp.img: 6 GiB, 6442450944 bytes, 12582912 sectors
Units: sectors of 1 * 512 = 512 bytes
Sector size (logical/physical): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
I/O size (minimum/optimal): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
Disklabel type: gpt
Disk identifier: 114BDD2A-88E9-4447-9C7B-6A84C294B34F

Device     Start      End  Sectors Size Type
temp.img1   2048    71615    69568  34M EFI System
temp.img2  71616 12582847 12511232   6G Linux filesystem

The next step is to set-up the connection between your controller and your laptop. Connect Your PC