Siemens and Allen Bradley on Same Laptop

Hi Guys,

Do people still recommend keeping A/B and Siemens software on separate laptops? I know we used to do this because software packages would occasionally conflict with eachother.

I'm upgrading my laptop and want to know if I can consolidate to 1 laptop, or if people still recommend keeping Siemens and A/B separate.

Specifically I'll be using the following software:
Allen Bradley:
RSLinx, v2.54
RSLogix 500, v7.10
RSLogix 5000 v17.00,
PanelBuilder32, v3.82.01

Siemens
SIMATIC Step 7 Pro, v5.2 SP1

As long as I'm asking, any laptop recommendations? I've heard some good things about the Toughbooks, but don't have any first hand experience.

If you're getting a new laptop then you'll presumably be getting Windows7 with it. With Windows7 Professional or higher you get a free copy of MS VirtualPC including Windows XP pre-configured (ready to run). In addition you can create you're own virtual machines using whatever OS you choose, however, in this case you'll have to do the configuring yourself.

Then all you need to do is allocate one virtual PC to AB and the other one to Siemens and you've effectively got them on two different PCs. I'm not sure if you can run Step7 V5.2 on XP (it's pretty ancient!) but if not you can create your own virtual PC using Windows 2000 or whatever the necessary OS is.

Make sure to get a machine with plenty of power (Intel i7) and in particular memory - at least 6 GB! If you do you'll find working on the virtual PC no different from working directly.

Good call on the VM! Not sure why I hadn't even considered that. Thanks!

I have both Siemens and Rockwell on the same laptop.
Only issue that I know of is the PIC driver. Not a problem if you are aware of it.
edit: The DF1 driver is also a problem. But at least that one can be disabled without a reboot.

However, there are so many possible variants of Rockwell software, Siemens software, and Windows - that I cannot guarantee that there are no further issues.

Your STEP7 is quite old. Could be a problem with recent Windows versions.

However, there are so many possible variants of Rockwell software, Siemens software, and Windows - that I cannot guarantee that there are no further issues.

Click to expand...

The problems with WinCC Flex were what prompted me to go the VirtualPC route, although I must admit it didn't become reality until I got my new laptop last month with Windows7 - I'd given up trying to understand how to configure VMWare!

So you have had problems with WinCC Flex and Rockwell software on the same PC ?

JesperMP said:

So you have had problems with WinCC Flex and Rockwell software on the same PC ?

Click to expand...

No, I had problems with different versions of WinCC Flex screwing one another up - sorry, should have made that a bit clearer!

PS Is just me or is plcs.net very slow for everybody else today - it's taking me ten or twenty seconds to open a new thread! Maybe it's our local Deutsche Telekom high-speed (ha-ha!) DSL node that's overloaded.

Not slow for me at the mo.
Usually very slow early in the morning. To the point that you think the site has crashed. I guess the server undergoes maintenance in US night hours.

I have had both installed on the same PC with no issues. I find that when I installed S7 it slowed everything down. I now use VMware for all my programming software. One for AB, one for Siemens...Eliminates the issues and allows for a quick re-install when your computer dies.