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waynes

Industrial Pc's- Which One Is Best?

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Hi guys, I have now used industrial pc's from several vendors and can not seem to find an industrial pc with the right price and specifications. It seems as if the industrial pc's imported into South Africa are extremely expensive, but lack the true 'industrial' ruggedness!! Do you guys have any good suggestions. The IPC will have to be IP65 rated (at least) on the front panel and not be too deep when mounted into a control panel. The best I have seen so far are the IPC's offered by Phoenix Contact. Any sugestions guys?

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Does anyone use Industrial PC's around here?

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Nope, PCs don't belong in industry If anything my opinion should wake up the PC control guys

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we used few different ones and they are allways expensive (AB, Advantech, Siemens, combination of touchscreen monitor and office PCs...). i'm not sure about IP rating since all our products are installed in dry and clean environment so even Nema12 is just fine (should be equivalent to IP65). http://www.dancon.com/techsup/nema_and_ip_compare.htm

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Yes they do! They just shouldn't be controlling machines. I use Dell computers in a control box. But, I'm in a clean indoor environment.

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Is that in the definition of industrial?

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everything is industrial, entertainment, telemarketing... hot dog stands are part of food industry I guess

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LOL!!! I guess you have a point

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This all reminds me of the question "Is a sanitation engineer really an engineer?"

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Howdy, I've worked as a Software / Firmware Quality Assurance Engineer for several companies and development groups, and Newport (they make Lasers and a ton of related stuff) used Gateway (or Dell) Laptops on their test racks and simply added a GPIB or Digital PCMCIA card to interface with the equipment. It worked out real well because the warrenty went along with the computer when it was re-sold, so if there were any problems, with it, it was fixed or replaced right away. . I also just saw some very groovy enclosures, specifically designed for all kindza industrial applications in the Hoffman catalog... (do a search using "enclosure" & Hoffman") but the stuff is rather expensive... Not as much as a new computer tho... Enjoy life, it's way better than all the alternatives !

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Waynes - Perhaps I should ask this. What do you need the computers for And no, I'm not trying to start a PC vs PLC thread. We have had plenty of them Edited by TWControls

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You might want to try the Panasonic Toughbook. http://www.panasonic.com/business/toughbook/home.asp before Panasonic bought them out these guys were strapping these to the wings of F16's and using them to drive air quality samplers. The were good thru at least 7g's, didn't seem to mind the cold or the rain at 35,000 feet adn 700 mph. You might alsp look a a Hoffman, Hammond or other IP67 enclosure for a standard dell PC. We've replaced the standard display with an IP67 rated ELO Touchscreen and when I get to work on monday night I' ll give you the name of our IP67 rated mouse and keyboard. They survive washdown in a food plant.

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TWControls, The idea of the PC is to be an extension of the existing facility. By that I mean that I can run a SCADA on the IPC and record a lot more information than I could using an HMI. I am even able to go back to a specific point in the process and see which valve| motor opened/ closed/ started or stopped and 'play back' the plants' operation! In most of the installations we do, we install an Industrial PC, not to control the plant as the PLC would, but simply to complement the plants' facilities, and also provide a detailed log of the events that have occured in the plant. There are several benefits over an HMI and there are also the cons. I wanted to know from all players in the field which IPC they prefer? I have had experience with several IPC's and, yes, they are pretty expensive. In most plants, conditions are harsh, the environment is unforgiving and heat is a major factor for all electrical/ electronic parts concerned. Let me rephrase the question: Which IPC, in your opinion, has given you the best 1) value for money, 2) backup service and 3) reliability? I am mostly concerned about using the IPC in the automotive industry for the body shop, paint shop and assembly lines.

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This may be a stupid question, but why can't the PC be put in the office and network cable ran to the machines in the plant?

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I now never install any more HMI if they are above 12". I always install a IPC. I have two type: I use Nematron when I have to install them in a wet environment.(no moving parts not even a fan) I use Dell for everything else. Now for me an IPC is one that can be replaced (exact mirror has backup) within minutes. Heck I have seen some with a few inches of cement dust inside, still working perfectly. The backup is locked in the supervisor's office. Unpowered, just waiting for its 15 minutes of fame.

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I have my panel shop build an industrial PC case for me, then I just buy a little motherboard and harddrive with the ports and connectors I want and mount it inside the case with grommets, etc....very inexpensive $

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Advantech has a huge line of industrial PCs, some in small, enlcosed packages for embedding, others in 19" rack mount, others "on the back" of industrial LCD panels, usually a touch screen, others with touch panel buttons, like Nematron. Advantech appears to be all Asian manufactured. Support is sketchy, usually leave a messge, next day call back (when you're not at your phone). Documentation is translated and minimalist in nature. All industrial PCs in their line use processors (usually Intel) that receive an 'industrial' rating from Intel, which means that the processor was successful enough to have survived a year's market drumming, and consequently Intel intends to keep it in its catalog for 5 (?) years. This means that the "hottest" processor they have is last year's processor. Not necessarily a drawback. PCs are custom configured to what you spec. I have received devices with the wrong amount of memory and missing components. They've made good, but correction after the fact is always a hassle. In fact, I'm not sure that my distributor didn't actually buy the Compact Flash card that was missing in an Advantech web-box. He claimed he didn't, but I could tell something wasn't going too well in that case. One panel PC had its PS2 (the circular DIN connector for a mouse or keyboard) vertical, facing down in a difficult to access location (meaning buried). Periodically, vibration would loosen the keyboard connection and it was a contortion hassle getting it re-installed. In one case, purchasing an Advantech took a big hassle out of trying to retrofit an office PC with multiple serial ports. They offered it routinely, something for which there's not a demand in the consumer market. Like a lot of products, it comes down to how well the middle man, the distributor, works with you. Personally, I'd never buy Advantech on-line direct. Who's gonna take your side when the box comes in and isn't all there? I keep buying Advantech because my distributor backs it up. I can't answer for yours. Dan

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Omron have just released a new "DyaloX" IPC product with small form factor and no moving parts IP65 rated. Check out this related post-> Omron's new Industrial PC - DyaloX, What do you think ?

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I have always used the Dell Optiplex systems for test rigs. Just buy a good warranty and expect downtime... If you want 100% uptime, it is usually not the hardware, but the software that causes issues IMHO.

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Just added an AB VersaView TouchScreen to a Dell PC in one of our washdown enclosures. Cost $4500 plus about $500 for the PC. Don't inow what the enclosure cost.

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I have used two Advantech IPCs in one application. They were 486-100MHz PCs with OS/2 Warp. They are working without any problems for last 9 years, 24 hrs x 365 Days. Faced problems with Monitors which were not industrial. Didn't have to reload OS any time. These are connected to Omron C2000H Redundant PLC. In another application we have used Dell low end P3 Servers in redundant mode with Redhat Linux 7. These are also working flawlessly for last 4 years, 24 hrs x 365 days. Only the memory was increased once for better performance. SVN

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Hello Gentlemen, I have read these post and would like to add my comments. As I am new to forums I hope I use proper etiquette. First off a good PC offers repeatable accurate performance. I agree with the other comments that software running on an industrial pc is usually responsible for most disappointments. However years of avoidable neglect will result in failure as well. I feel a simple pm like cleaning and inspecting can be very valuable. 1)Buy or build your pc to suit your software use what the people that are running and developing the software use, don't just assume a chipset is a chipset or an os is an os or sp1 is identical to sp 2. 2)Minimize any additional software lurking in the background, Be aware of silent killers such as auto update programs or utilities that can conflict. One mans enhancement is another mans disaster. 3)Backup,Backup,Backup The next best thing to a system that works forever is one that can be restored properly. A good old fashion disk image is best. If you have to reinstall an os then your application then your updates to the application then your application specific backup this can get into hours. A hard disk image of last weeks pc can be restored in minutes if your procedures permit. Pc have become reliable to the point of almost being an appliance but there are still purist such as I that know A PC is only a system of components designed to work together. Thanks for stimulating thought.

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Don't know if this helps, but I really like Hope Industrial displays. They make good NEMA 4X rated touchscreen LCDs for really cheap with a 3 year warranty. The problem becomes the PC and enclosure. We use Dell PCs (also with 3 year warranty) in enclosures, which works well for most applications. May not be applicable since we use web based HMI terminals that are totally disposable. If the Dell box crashes, just put another computer in the enclose and launch the HMI from a web page without losing any data. If the client computers had either important data or needed installation/configuration, I might be a bit more worried about better protecting them. That said, client computer crashes aren't a common occurance. I did see some awesome integrated Industrial PCs at ISA 2006. I don't remember any of the vendors off the top of my head, but I do have their promo around somewhere. Edited by Nathan

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Try with versaview rockwell lanches new variety of Industrial Computers and Monitors which suites the Hazardous location http://e-news.rockwellautomation.com/t/329...64480/401340/0/ http://e-news.rockwellautomation.com/t/329...64480/401342/0/ http://e-news.rockwellautomation.com/t/329...64480/401344/0/ http://e-news.rockwellautomation.com/t/329...64480/401346/0/

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