GX Developer - Communicating w/ PLC

Hi All.

Occasionally I will run into a problem when using GX Developer and attempting to use a different communications techniques. The problem is that sometimes the system will not allow me to get to the Transfer Setup - the option is greyed out.



In the past, I have been able to work around this by creating a new project and then merging the program and comments, but that technique is quite problematic in that you have to manually go through and modify any processor setting (I/O assignments, network setting, etc). Sometimes I will miss a setting or two.

Does anyone know what is keeping this from being selectable or another way to get to the transfer settings?

Thanks in advance.

Steve

as far as i have noticed, that menu option get's grayed out if any window that could communicate is open (even if they are all offline) or more accurately stays open after you ware online. for example device comments window doesn't affect it but if this happens to be device batch monitor or ladder window (like in your screenshot), you may have to close those windows to gain access to Transfer Setup option.
it is just one of those things that they never got right.
similar thing for example is that every now and then one has to go to Tools, Options and choose "Don't write to PLC...", or the horror of going online/offline with every single ladder or device batch window.

Ahhhhh...

Thanks panic mode. That seems to be it.

The same project from which I took the picture had a Device Batch screen open. As soon as I closed it, the Transfer Setup option became available again. This will certainly make life a lot easier in the near future for me. I have a bunch of machines where the machine maker chose to communicate with the touchscreen via the PLC's communications port rather than using a communications module. For the moment, in the event that I have to troubleshoot or modify a program, I am temporarily installing an ethernet module and using it for my PC to PLC comms. It took me a couple of hours to get the first machine working again primarily because of this problem (fortunately I was working on a machine that was not scheduled to run for a while).

Thanks again.

Steve