ctrlX Core X7 Reimaging

[bkautzman]

My colleague was following this How-To for connecting to a SAFEX controller on EoE, when he was disconnected from his ctrlX Core X7 after step 7. He was unable to reconnect to the Web UI, ping or see the controller in Windows Network Discovery. I advised him to reimage the core, and sent him the 1.20.9 X7 image. We attempted to install this by following the instructions listed on page 79 of the XCR-V-0120 release notes. We were unable to reimage and received a “failed to mount boot partition” on the display hooked to the X7. Unfortunately there is no “flash.log” file in the USB after our attempt. I wanted to try a different version of the imaging files but 1.20.9 is the only set available in the collaboration room for the X7 controller. We used two different USB 2.0 flash drives(confirmed by a software tool) that were formatted to FAT32 with a single partition, a 16Gb and 32Gb. We also tried all three of the USB C ports on the controller.

I will likely create a separate post for the initial issue of EoE causing a communication loss, but right now I would like to focus on how to successfully reimage the core. Does anyone have suggestions for an alternative method or something we missed? I've attached the release notes that contained the most recent reference I could find for reimaging an X7.

[CodeShepherd]

To preventing  you to be locked out of the any device when changing IP settings check before doing anything:

• IPs of all devices in the network are unique
• Subnet masks are fitting to your network architecture
• IPs of different network ports at single devices are unique
• When bridging networks all above should be true for devices in both networks
• At last think once from where your data should go via which network participants to your target to check if the data can get through the whole route. (As an example see "Communicate between a ctrlX COREvirtual and other applications [DOCU]")

Did you try to add a USB to network adapter to your ctrlX CORE and connect it to a DHCP server (e.g. a router) so you generate another port for accessing the control?

To know what exactly went wrong at your side more information would be needed like

• all IP settings of all ports of your devices (PC, ctrlX CORE, ctrlX Safety) to check the problem in the network
• picture of the data on the USB Stick to check consitency of the data
• firmware (system app) version of the ctrlX CORE before the update to check for problems while flashing

I will try to check if there something wrong with the image on the collaboration room.

[bkautzman]

I will keep your first list of points in mind when we get back to setting up EoE.

We have not attempted to use a DHCP server. After our unsuccessful reimaging atempt, we switched to temporarily using an X3 to make some progress comissioning the machine.

My colleague is not sure what the IP settings or firmware version were prior to trying the update but I believe the firmware version was 1.20.0 or 1.20.1. I've attached screenshots of the file stucture on the USB drive we used for the image update.

[CodeShepherd]

As there some restrictions of the image reset by software and hardware versions we should check this in a meeting. Could you please send me your contact data and serial number of the ctrlX CORE X7 in a private message, so we can contact you directly?

[bkautzman]

I'm not sure if my PM sent successfully. Please PM me if it was not sent and I will reply to that message.

[MauroRiboniMX · Accepted solution]

Hello,

Try to follow these steps. Take into account that this is not an official guide but just a trace/personal notes.
Let me know.

Mauro

[bkautzman]

Thank you Mauro, those instructions have allowed us to successfully reimage the ctrlX Core X7. I believe the GPT partitioning may have been the fix. This is not indicated in the release note steps we had originally followed.