S7 vs PCS7

I'm getting confused..happens more and more often these days..

Looking for the differences between S7 vs PCS7. Do they both use the same programming software? Does the PCS7 just have more HP? I'm new to the Siemens world and I hope this is not a dumb question. Any help would be greatly appreciated.

I have a small safety application and it looks like the S7-300 would work just fine, but I also have another engineer telling me I should use the PCS7 platform.

I would just stay with Step7 and use distributed
safety
You said small, how much i/o are you talking?

PCS7 is for a decent size process.

PCS7 is designed for S7414 and bigger. You prog. in CFC and use WinCC (NOT FLEXIBLE) as HMI. Some of the PCS7 finesses are based on SFBs that does only exist in the 400 CPUs.

More info here www.siemens.com/pcs7

Kalle

Small is about 75 DI's and 16 DO's

Thats no problem for S7. If you need fast processing you should go with S7-400 but if its less dependant on processing speed you should go with S7-300

Actually, the fastest S7 CPU at the moment is the 319.
The advantage with S7-400 is the ability to make bigger programs, faster comms to CPs in the rack, redundancy with fast switchover, and RIUP.

To me it sounds as if a 315F-2PN/DP suits your application.
(but you havent described it very much though).

JesperMP said:

Actually, the fastest S7 CPU at the moment is the 319.

Click to expand...

I didnt know that, thats good to know

Here is a basic description of how PCS7 works. As mentioned, it is most likely overkill for your application.
PCS7 is more of a DCS system where you have a block in the PLC that has pre-canned faceplates for display in the HMI. You can also make custom blocks if you have a function that is not covered by the standard ones. So basically you have a standard block for a motor interface and it has a corresponding standard HMI object. The normal functions include manual/auto control and process alarming.
PCS7 uses the same software for PLC & HMI as standard S7 & WinCC, but they are at different revision levels. It also comes with the previously mentioned PLC and HMI library of items.