Power backup for Panel PCs

Hi,

I am thinking of using a 10" Industrial Touch panel PC in one of my products. This is a fanless design, with Intel Atom processor, and running on Debian (or equivalent) Operating System.

The problem is most of the Panel PCs on the market at least the Intel Atom ones do not have in-built battery backup.

The battery backup is essential for PCs as it allows the computer to shutdown safely and in a well ordered manner.

I know there are battery backed UPS units available in the market, and these could be used to power the PC.

What is the current practice in the factory shop floor for powering such devices. I know PLCs are more common, but PCs have also become popular, are there dedicated power lines used for such devices??

My worry is that operators should not just switch OFF the power to the device, having a UPS will enable the battery mode, then the PC could detect the power failure and start the shutdown process.

thanks
a

Note: I know this may sound like a newbie question, but this is the first time I am using a PC for a control system, otherwise I mostly use dedicated micro-controllers that do not require power backups

I have used an AB industrial power supply on a support computer that worked well for my application. It had some I/O on it that would allow it to know when power was shutdown on the machine via an auxiliary switch on the main disconnect. It also had a USB that could be run to the computer. If I remember correctly, there was also software that came with it that could be put on the PC to monitor the UPS. If the machine was shutdown you could get a signal to the PC that would initiate a shutdown before power was removed from it by the UPS. You will have to double check the info, but this would be a good UPS to look into.

Depending on how critical or what the hazard anaysis indicates we typically use a Liebert UPS (On-line) with a APC automatic transfer switch for critical needs. The UPS is the primary source to the ATS providing filtered UPS power and the 2ndary feed to the ATS is normal house power. The ATS allows us to service the UPS and if necessry replace it while on line. The 2ndary power will carry the load if the UPS fails. I've used this on several critcal load and knock on wood they have rode thru a variety of power blips.

I have seen a number of systems that use a standard UPS and sit it in the bottom of the cabinet. I believe, that some of the manufactures also make a more industrial UPS, if it is a particularly harsh environment.

I don't use computers in machine panels very often, but the main reason, that computers need to be shut down, and not just powered off, is so they can park the disk hard drive. With solid state hard drives becoming more available, I would highly recommend looking for a computer with this option. If you are doing a lot of data logging however, you may want to look into writes on a SSD. They may not like this type of system.

Sola Hevi-Duty has a DIN rail mountable UPS. Backup time is not long, but should be enough to shutdown computer.

For Windows computers, the market leader is APC and their PowerChute shutdown software.

For a Debian-based system, you can also use APC and use the apcupsd daemon to perform a controlled shutdown.

In systems where I use uninterruptible power supplies, I use Phoenix QUINT battery-backed 24V DC supplies. I prefer not to use the "simulated AC" output of a consumer-grade 120V UPS.

I've never implemented a software-based shutdown; I just use dry contacts to the PLC, and use the PLC to perform a safe shutdown of the HMI computer.

thanks everyone for those inputs.

thanks
a

Beckhoff CX-series with integrated capacitive "one-second"-UPS performs very well.