New PC with Serial Com Port for Communicating with SLC 5/03.

[AutomationTechBrian]

"But they will ONLY work with DH485 protocol (either RS232 or RS485 electrically)"

Geeze, that's right. I got my 485s confused. I really should know this stuff by now. I'll get a little burst of SLCs, then I won't see any for a year. Most of the time all I do is hook up to the PLC to troubleshoot.

So let me ask the question this way: You walk up to a SLC 5/03 connected to a PC through the DB9 connector on the PLC, and the same on a card on the back of the PC, about 25' away. The PC is a Windows 7 machine, and it is old and abused and the customer wants to replace it with a newer, more reliable machine. You don't have to worry about the driver end of things. The machine's manufacturer will install the driver remotely. You just have to pick out the card to put into the PC to insure the communication with the SLC will be possible. How would you go about making a recommendation of which card to purchase for the new PC?

(Btw, I have a whole backpack full of Mark's adaptors, along with a bunch from TW Controls)

 

[mad4x4]

If I needed Serial in a modern PC (laptop) or something I would either use an FITI Rs232 to USB Adapter or one of these Adam Serial Device. Although if it was inside a cabinet I would spec and IPC with a Serial port if I could, or use the ADAM mounted on a din rail .


problem with some serial devices is they need DTS support and the cheap UARTs don't support DTS correctly, with industrial you also need 433 or 485.

 

[mad4x4]

I need to recommend a PC to replace a customer's old Windows 7 computer. The only thing I need to think through is the serial com port to communicate with the SLC 5/03. The old PC is connected to the DB9 connector, so I'm assuming just a standard serial com card, and the cable is probably wired as a null-modem.

A quick scan of the internet... it's hard to find a PC with a DB9 Serial com port. Any recommendations? This PC is located in an office, so going with a fan-less industrial computer might seem a little odd (like the ones at OnLogic.com). Any better sources? The only other consideration is having a 2nd ethernet card.

Thanks.

Speak to Distec ( Distec Ltd ) they can do you a small windows 10 IPC with serial or if you want expensive german build quality speak to Beckhoff they can do you similar with like of i7 CPU large SSD's etc.

 

[geniusintraining]

So let me ask the question this way:

Why not just go back with the same? Can you find the same thing but in better condition? it was maybe a year ago I had something similar and ended buying a new old stock from flee-bay (ebay)

Odds are its just the 1 million Windows updates that have made the PC unreliable

And thank you all for the mentions

 

[AutomationTechBrian]

I showed the StarTech, PCIe serial card to the machine manufacturer, and he gave it the thumbs up. Its on order.

2-Port Serial PCIe Card, RS232/422/485 - Serial Cards & Adapters | Add-on Cards & Peripherals | StarTech.com

2-Port Serial PCIe Card, Dual-Port PCI Express to RS232/RS422/RS485 (DB9) Serial Card, 16C1050 UART, ESD Protection, Windows/Linux, TAA-Compliant

www.startech.com

Thanks for all the input. I consider every post.

 

[mad4x4]

from flee-bay (ebay)

Wouldn't trust anything from eBay in industry, unless there was no other option and I had exhausted all other avenues. But just an opinion.

 

[AutomationTechBrian]

Update: The serial card worked great. I set the DIP switches to "RS232", then downloaded RSLinx Classic to check communication. DF1 Communication was established. I closed down RSLinx and they remotely took over from there.