I’ve come across a couple interesting devices recently.

• Icop VESA PC, the eBox 2300 and eBox 4300.  These PC’s mount to the VESA mounting holes on the back of most LCD displays.  The Icop models are actually affordable, unlike many mini PC’s. The 2300 is very cheap (starts at about $100), but not very powerful (200MHz or 300MHz CPU).  The newer 4300 is much more interesting, with a 500MHz Via CPU, and a reasonable price (about $250).  If you need a Panel PC, but don’t need a tough industrial case, these can make a great lower cost alternative – just get a regular monitor (<$200 for a pretty nice one) or touchscreen (~$650 for a 17″ Planar touchscreen LCD), and mount the eBox 4300 on the back.  The 4300′s performance should be good enough for HMI use (assuming you’re not running Vista…)
  • The Icop PC’s are availabe in the US from WDL Systems.
  • Linux Devices has an eBox 4300 review.

• The Olympus Micro Four Thirds system could lead to some very interesting cameras – cameras that combine SLR performance, image quality, and interchangeable lenses with digicam size.  Check out the pictures at DPReview.  They won’t replace Digital SLR’s (heck, Leica is coming out with a “super-sized” D-SLR with 30x45mm sensor), but I’m very interested in one as a complement to my D-SLR for everyday picture taking (instead of a pocket digicam).

Comment 8/24/2011: the mirrorless interchangeable lens category is really taking off, with many models from Olympus, Sony (NEX series), Panasonic, Samsung, etc.  However, with a decent zoom lens they’re still a lot bigger than a compact super-zoom.  Sony also has an interesting twist with their SLT cameras: a SLR with fixed mirror that always direct some light for focusing and the EVF (electornic view finder).  The smallest SLTs aren’t much bigger than a Sony NEX. 

I was looking at automation blogs and come across this comment about Beckhoff:

“Europe’s most successful PC pioneer, Hans Beckhoff, has a simple two-part formula for success: 1. Put everything in software, on one platform, and 2. Give the customer everything he needs so he doesn’t have to buy anything else. “

Interesting, since Beckhoff makes its money selling hardware. But, its hardware is all PC connected.

A lot of people view copying the PC industry as the inevitable way forward for the automation industry. This means using PC industry standards, such as OPC (originally based on MS’s OLE technology), Windows XP and CE, Ethernet, PXI, and embedded PC’s.

The big advantage is the lower cost, and theoretically more standardization, but there are many disadvantages, such as:

• The short lifespan of PC technology. A personal example – I have a PC at home with a good Quadro AGP video card. How many new AMD AM2 motherboards support AGP? 1, and it’s not very good. So building equipment designed to last 5 years or more with generic PC technology will have problems with spares down the road.
• PC technology isn’t always so cheap. Sure, generic PC’s, even in a 4U rack mount case, are cheap. But if you need IP67, or fanless, or a PanelPC, or guaranteed spares – well, your performance goes down and your price goes up.
• Innovation is shifting away from PC’s. If an automation company continues to be PC-centric, they will miss innovation based on the new innovation drivers, such as web standards (now much sexier than MS’s COM technology), cell phones, and automotive electronics.
• Commodity OS’s aren’t real time. I know, I’ve tried to do very soft real time with Windows, and it wasn’t pretty. Linux looks like it’s slowly getting there for soft real time, but it’s not mainstream yet in the factory. Yes, there are add-ons, but they cost extra in money (e.g. Venturecom) or time (learning hard RT extensions for Linux)
• PC standards often do not support industrial needs well, and thus need tweaking; for example, the PCI bus morphing into CompactPCI and PXI, and Ethernet being extended with EtherCAT. But the volume goes down, prices go up, and you lose some of what made PC technology compelling.
• Too many standards – think of all the industrial Ethernet protocols.
• Old technology does not go away, so PC automation control needs to be able to communicate with the rest of the world, including PLC’s.

A company can’t be everything to everybody, and Beckhoff is right to focus on PC-centric automation. But if I were running an automation component company, my formula would be “1. Give your customer products that help him build better machines and 2. Understand you cannot meet all of your customer’s needs – integrate easily with the rest of the world.”

Tony