1784-PKTX on Win 2000 - Dell P4

[chavak]

Hi Everybody,

Help needed please.

After setting up Allen Bradley 1784-PKTX on a Dell P4 Windows 2000 System and driver properly installed, RSLinx Professional Ver.2.31, there is no browsing activities on RS-who. No icons on the RS Who browser window.

With out RS Linx running the device manager shows - No conflicts on the resources tab, but when RS Linx is running it shows conflict on

I/O Range DC80-DCFF used by \Driver\RSikit Control
Memory Range FF6F000-FF6FFFF used by \Driver\RSikit Control
I/O Range DC78-DC7B used by \Driver\RSikit Control

Other than RS Linx, the system is installed with RSView 32 Ver 6.3, RSLogix 500 Ver 5.2, followed by Excel 2002, Mcafee viruscan, Diskeeper.

The jumber on the card is set at 32bit position.

Tried to locate what is RSikit control, but unsuccesful. When checked on other devices, none of them showed any conflicts though.

Thankyou in advance for the help

 

[Eddie Willers]

I've seen some strange behavior with some motherboards when the BIOS option for "Using Plug-and-Play OS" is set to YES; try changing that to NO.

RSIKT.SYS is the Plug-and-Play driver for the 1784-PKTX. Be absolutely certain you've configured a "PKTX" and not a "KTX" card in RSLinx; they use the same RSLinx driver but are different products.

 

[Terry Woods]

Hi, chavak

You are welcome, in advance!

Your first problem, and maybe your only problem is, you are using Allen-Bradley.

Sorry chavak, I don't have a solution for you. I'm sure that some of our local AB-wizards can steer you clear.

It's just that sometimes I'm overwhelmed by the fact that our site (if I may be so bold as to say "our", Phil) is constantly overwhelmed with AB operational problems rather than general PLC programming issues.

It has been suggested before that this site be renamed to "WHY THE HELL CAN'T I GET MY DAMNED AB TO WORK??? (or something similar).

Now, why do you think that is?

I will always say... "Those that Love AB haven't tried anything else!"

I really have to wonder, how many AB users, on this site, have actually given another PLC a fair shot?

I dare say that, just like in my case, the AB was their first exposure. They really haven't given another PLC a shot. I, however, have left AB, moved on to GE (Very Good), then onto Omron (OK), and then onto TI (Siemens, now). In general, I have to say, the TI programming philosophy is the BEST! I just lucked-out to move into TI! TI is GREAT!! It ain't a panacea, but damn, it beats the hell out of the others!

Another problem for programmers is, someone, besides the programmer is spec'ing out the new PLC systems. And those non-programmers are spec'ing AB! Where the hell is their rational? And what is it really based on???

 

[Ken Roach]

Chavak, you can also find some local technical support in Malaysia through this website:

http://www.rockwellautomation.com.my/

If you ring them up you might speak with Mr. A.T. Lim. Tell him the guys in Portland say hi.


There is also a site dedicated entirely to Allen-Bradley discussion:

http://www.software.rockwell.com/forum


And of course you can get online support about your specific product directly from the manufacturer:

http://support.rockwellautomation.com



Terry, you don't have to like me, the products I'm expert with, or the Company I work for, but for heaven's sake cool it with the unprovoked multipage rants about how dumb and unfortunate you think my customers are. Post when you can be helpful, otherwise clear the channel so others can.

 

[Terry Woods]

Ken said...

Terry, you don't have to like me, the products I'm expert with, or the Company I work for, but for heaven's sake cool it with the unprovoked multipage rants about how dumb and unfortunate you think my customers are. Post when you can be helpful, otherwise clear the channel so others can.

Ken,

I certainly don't dis-like you. You certainly are one of the AB-Wizards that I referred to. And you certainly do a very good job handling a large number of those AB issues that come up.

I know that I didn't answer Chavak's question, and I said as much.

However, Chavak's question, just as with many other AB questions, makes me wonder "... how many AB users, on this site, have actually given another PLC a fair shot?"

I haven't seen an answer to that question.

Terry said...
"Another problem for programmers is, someone, besides the programmer is spec'ing out the new PLC systems. And those non-programmers are spec'ing AB! Where the hell is their rational? And what is it really based on???"

I realize that "Where the hell is their rational?" was a little harsh and I apologize for that. I should have simply asked, "What is their rational?" I still wonder about this.

 

[kellian]

Giveing other products a shot is often a function of where we work.
Many of us do not have a choice and are not in a position to change what is. I work in maintenance. I take a job and am required to keep it working whatever brand. 5yr ago AB who? Modicon was the go now, Modicon who?, all AB now.
My world is in the context of

Problem,
Situation,
Product,
Solution ??

Don't reinvent or complain fix and improve.

 

[Gerry]

In the interest of being painfully boring and pedantic

Asking A-B users to consider other brands of PLC is what?...oxymoron?...non sequitur?
There is no other
PLC was the name of the unit that A-B produced in the '70's (1774) and is a registered trademark of Allen-Bradley. Twenty years ago, they cared about other manufacturers calling their products PLC's and encouraged the use of the generic term Programmable Controller or PC for short. That, obviously, didn't work out.
It must be a mixed blessing for manufacturers when their brand name becomes a generic term.
How many people refer to their adjustable spanner as a 'Crescent' or 'Stilson' wrench even though it might have 'Fuller' stamped on it?

 

[gokul]

I had xperienced a similar problem which was refered to AB. The reply was if the clock of motherboard is above 1 GHz, the system will not detect the card! The latest machines are working above 1 GHz. The fact is AB havent made any updates on PKTXD since 1998 and there is no revision of the product (if i am right).

I hope you configured the card and selected driver in Linx as per the instructions. If you go to device manager and look into the card details, what does it say? Which OS are you using? PKTXD has different drivers for different OS. If WIN 2000 is not available, you can try with WIN NT4. It should work. Always go for the latest drivers from site, patches are available there

Now coming to the problem, even if the device manager says "unidentified device, check driver.." the card will work provided your linx installation is ok. it can communicate with the PLC you choose over network. I'm not sure if theres any loss of data packets sent or received!

As AB admit indirectly DH+ is a dying network with arrival of ethernet supported processors. so to be on safe side, dont go for DH + n/w or PKTXD card since that will jackup u'r price tooo

 

[JeffB]

I realize the this thread was started by Chavak neeeding help with his laptop, but I've been itching to let off a little steam about the fustrations I have encountered using a PLC other than A/B. My current project spec's out using a Telemecanique TSX Premium PLC. This is the first time I've ever programmed a non A/B PLC, and let me tell you, PL7 Junior programming software is horrible.

As an example, to enter an address comment with this stuff, forget right clicking the address and selecting "description" from the pop-up window. With PL7, the only place to enter and address description is in the variables file. If you're working in a ladder file, which bty you must select the option of veiwing address and symbols EVERYTIME you enter a ladder file, you have to select "tools", and then "application browser" and once there you must select "variables", and then select the type of variable (words, Dwords, bytes, or bits) and once you are finally looking at what you want to see, you click the entry field box, and then click on the address that concernes you at the moment, and finally you are able to add a description for a particular address. You must insert an underscore between every word, and there are certain words I have discovered that it will not accept, such as the word "to" or the symbol "#".

While using this stuff you can forget about "drag and drop". You have to select what you want inserted in each and every segment of the rung, whether it be a straight line or an instruction. Also, you must insert the "%" symbol in front of each address you enter into logic, I am to the point where I HATE that symbol. Although just yesterday I discovered that if I program with address and symbols not selected, it will automatically insert "%" in the address entry field. Who wants to write program without seeing descriptions? Not me.

I compared prices of the software and hardware to A/B. Tele stuff is considerebly higher across the board. I think that the only reason that our costumer is using this stufff (it's been hard for me to use the word "stuff" instead of "****" while writing this) is because the very first PLC controlled machinery installed there, was from a French company. That was about 10 years ago, and they don't have anyone there with enough courage to try something different.

I feel a little better now.

 

[93lt1]

I feel a little better now.

I feel a little better now, too!

 

[Ken Roach]

Thanks for replying on-topic, Gokul !

It's easy to be confused on the different models of DH+ card, though, so I want to weigh in with some clarification.

1784-KT ISA bus card, OK up to PC bus speeds of 33 MHz
1784-KTX ISA bus card, OK up to PC bus speeds of 133 MHz
1784-KTXD Same as KTX, but has two channels
1784-PKTX PCI bus card, no PC bus speed limit
1784-PCMK PCMCIA card for DH+

I do not know of any restriction on the processor or Front-Side-Bus speed of a PC running a 1784-PKTX card; I've run them in machines with 1.0 and 1.4 GHz processors with no trouble at all. I have not run with any Pentium 4 processors or motherboards yet, so that may be the heart of the matter. I wonder what model Chavak's PC is or if it came with Win2K or XP.

I notice he's been scared off....

A very common conflict (Eddie cited it above) is that a Plug-and-Play BIOS on the motherboard will prevent the Windows NT or 2000 driver from working. Turn off the motherboard PnP and let the OS do the configuration and things are usually smooth.

 

[glaverty]

Terry,

When you were a young boy did you have a bad encounter with an AB salesmen? Perhaps he ran over your dog or something. You seem to have a deep seeded hatred for AB. Perhaps you have some repressed memories that are coming to the surface. You should let your keepers know so they can up your medication.

 

[chavak]

Struggling

Hi Ken, Terry and the rest,

I had quite a valuable feedback for the 1784-PKTX card,
Well, I was not scared off Ken, still fighting with the PC to get it work.

I tried all the ways everybody suggested, with no success.
I got support from the local Rockwell group, they are puzzled as well why it didn't work. They plucked it out of my PC and installed in one of their office PC which is running on W2K and it worked good in the very first try - no special setup used, as any normal add on cards.

OK, my PC is a Dell P4 1.7G with 256M RAM. The bad thing of DELL, -just learned from this PC - is that their BIOS had limited setting you can get hold. Definetely, PnP OS is not one of them.

Then I got support from our Company MIS group, they say windows is working fine, So today I am getting both the Rockwell and our MIS group to get together to see what went wrong, come to worse I may reinstall the W2K, with the PKTX on board, (it was not the case initially)

I should touch on the subject of AB hatred and love. I am a AB user for a while, altough I use some Omron, Mitsubishi occassionally, but never tried TI, Siemens, Modicon and the rest of the "Good" stuffs around. As what somebody mentioned, is it within your likings to which PLC you can use? It all depends on the end user. They specify it, and you make it happen.

Sorry to say Terry, I do not know the wonders TI can do, but I know AB helped me a lot in some difficult programming situations, such as making use of their indirect and indexed addressing features, which at times greatly reduce your develop time and program size. And when it migrated from 6200, AI to windows platform the user interface was improved tremendously, which I don't find in any PLC softwares I use. May be some other PLC's have all good features, but it really matters whether you have the opportunity to try them, UNLESS you are the boss who is deciding what you want.

I will post what is the outcome of my PKTX once I get it work.

Ken, altough I live in Malaysia, I work in Singapore,(living in the border of 2 countries) so my Support group is in Singapore.


Thankyou Everybody

 

[Terry Woods]

Glaverty,

No. I can honestly say, "I've never had any bad experiences with any AB Salesmen".

Of course, I can say this only because I've never had any experiences with any AB Salesmen. (I'm gonna hold off on the smart-a$$, "Just lucky, I guess." comment. - I didn't say that!)

The opinion I have was developed through my experiences with various PLC's. The first PLC I learned was AB. That was before I went to college.

It's already been said in this thread, or another, that a lot of programmers program whatever PLC they program because that just happens to be the type of PLC used where they work.

I sure can't argue with that. Especially if someone is in a position where they can't influence the choice of PLC anyway.

As I said my first PLC programming experience was with AB. It was the PLC of choice where I worked. It was COOL! It was control programming, and it was COOL! I loved it! That is, at the time, I said, proudly and loudly,... are you ready for it?....

I LOVE AB!
(Imagine pretty pink hearts scattered all about, above and below.)

I didn't know any better... at the time. I was in a situation where AB was the PLC of choice and that was all I had to work with. I simply didn't know that there were other ways to look at this PLC stuff.

I then left that place and returned to college for EE.

While in college, I focused on Control Processing. I thought that I would have an easy time because of my previous Process Control experiences.

I was wrong... in spades!

I learned to look at Process Control from the Processor's point of view. I had to unlearn what I had learned through PLC Programming.

Through this new point of view, the lights came on and the world looked much brighter indeed!

When I got out of school, I went to work at a place that used GE PLC's. I was a little apprehensive, but remembered the catch phrase, "If you can program any PLC, you can program them all!"

So, I jumped in, with both feet... up to my neck, and then some.

The first thing I tried to do was use this GE-thingee like an AB. Couldn't do it. There was something different. So, I backed off a bit and reverted to what I learned in college. Then the lights started to come on. The more I applied what I learned in EE, the more this GE thing made sense. I found that I was looking at the process more from the processor's point of view!

My former relationship with AB went by the wayside. I had found a new love! GE!

I later left that employer and went to work for an Automated Machine Tool Manufacturer (MTM). There, I used PC control as well as PLC control. The Flagship Controller was a PC. We also used PLC's on request. I LOVED the PC Control in "C". Occassionaly, we did GE PLC's. Not a problem. I enjoyed working with the GE PLC's.

Then we had a few cases where AB was the PLC of choice. I found it very difficult to get back into the AB-Way. I found it painful. I was always glad to get through that AB job and move onto other things.

Time moves on, I leave that place and move to a place where they use an older Texas Instrument PLC; the TI-505. Again, "do one, do 'em all".

This was different... this was really different... this was very close to PLC Programming from the Processor's point of view! This was better than GE! (Sorry, Steve. It is! Or, at least, it was at that time.)

At this point, I look at my initial experience with AB as being somewhat similar to my initial experience with marriage. It sure seemed OK initially.

But then, things changed and I came to know just how NOT OK things were!

Having that bad experience behind me really makes me appreciate my current experience.

And now, having that experience behind me, I would never say "I LOVE AB", because now I know better.

Just one guy's opinion... you can handle an opinion, can't you?

 

[Terry Woods]

chavak,

You posted while I was writing my latest rant. I'm sorry your situation is not getting resolved.

Your situation vindicates my opinion about using Dell, Compaq or the Cow-Guys.

They employ too many restrictions on the user. They use their own BIOS's, which are programmed to suit them. You can only add as they wish or allow. I prefer to "roll yer own system" using generic devices, especially, the standard BIOS.

I wonder if the PC that the AB guys had was generic, Dell, Compaq or Cow-guy.

My wife (I love her dearly and sincerely!) wants to replace our current system with a Cow-guy system. She wants our machine to response like her machine at work does - it's connected to a T-1 line. Ain't gonna happen!

Good luck, chavak

And keep trying other PLC's as much as you can. I understand being stuck using what you have to use. But, keep trying all you can just so you can get to know what is what.

BTW, All of the major brands do Indirect and Indexed Addressing. Some do it better than others.

And, even if you run into a PLC that doesn't have Indirect and Indexed Addressing, that too can be developed in the "Roll yer Own" style through ladder! Not nearly as efficiently, but it can be done!

Good Luck