automation controllerDIN rail mountable package. The controller can be used in a stand-alone configuration or it can be easily networked via its serial and LAN connections. The built-in web server makes Internet or intranet access a snap. For larger applications the Model 5300 supports up to 1024 I/O points and up to 16 axes of motion control.

The 5300 features a proven mufti-tasking real-time operating system with plenty of non-volatile memory. Programming the 5300 is simple with CTC’s intuitive next-generation Quicksilver™ state language or for advanced applications use C/ C++. You can even combine both languages in a single application. To learn more about the 5300 explore the links above or contact CTC for a demonstration.

I am seeking cost effective solutions for replacing my Rosemount System 3 control system.

I have decided that using remote I/O multiplexers for the HART smart analog and 120VAC Discrete I/O provides several significant advantages. "Home run" twisted pair cables from local area junction boxes would be replaced with an open protocol, high speed industrial Ethernet like Profinet, or Modbus TCP/IP to a server/HMI. While researching this over the last 6 months, I have discovered several multiplexer/controller solutions that are are rated for Class I, Group II environments.

The current list that I believe are strong contenders include Delta V, MTL MOST (Now GE Fanuc), Siemens S7 & PCS7 and Yokogawa Stardom FCN. I invite other suggestions. There are numerous features that I would like to see in the "open" system such as OPC or OPC UA, redundant hardware, easy to configure and troubleshoot, an inexpensive historian attached to the company LAN and minimum Licensing fees. I am inviting both pro and con comments, either directly and via this forum, on selection of a new cost effective "DCS" that would be a true distributed control system.

I feel this open discussion could also provide help to others with older control systems. My I/O count is over 1000 points. A spreadsheet comparing features of potential candidates would be of strong interest.

As water and wastewater treatment plants grow in both size and complexity, so does the need to control equipment that make up the unit-operations of that plant. Distributed Control System (DCS) is a control system method that is spread, or distributed, among several different unit processes. These processes may be related, as in a water treatment facility, or unrelated, as in a manufacturing plant where many different products are fabricated.

The DCS is typically a hard-wired system and exists within finite boundaries, such as a process plant or within a factory. Wired systems are reliable and are well suited for the typical process environment where flexibility is not an issue. Wireless systems are starting to become popular and hold the promise of improved flexibility in both physical and logical layout of the facility. An entire process may be retooled to the extent that several parts of the process will be physically moved or removed. Using wireless, system reconfiguration is as simple as disabling the station address or downloading the suitable database.

Whether wired or wireless, distributed control systems offer the advantage of centralized control, while retaining the capability of distributed, or local control. True distributed control systems use localized control, which is in turn controlled by the operator located at a central location. Distributed Control Systems consist of the following:

* Remote control panel
* Communications medium
* Central control panel or facility
* Control, interface and database software

This recently-developed NeoPDP technology has been incorporated into two types of PDPs: a super high-efficiency 42-inch PDP “that achieves triple luminance efficiency while reducing the power consumption to 1/3 of the 2007 models yet achieving the same brightness,” and an ultra-thin 50-inch PDP just 8.8 mm (or approximately 1/3 inch) thick. It also happens to have the world’s highest moving picture resolution of 1080 lines, too.

In another debut, the company’s NeoLCD technology is integrated into a super energy-efficient 90kWh per year 37-inch LCD panel that achieves moving picture resolution of 1000 lines, close to that of PDP. It also has the lowest energy consumption of any LCD HDTV in the world.

This morning I got a chance to sit down with the guys at Samsung Semiconductor, who among other things, specialize in solid state drives. We had a good chat about the pros and cons of SSDs — the cost to manufacture versus the savings in heat production, energy use, and above all, faster performance.

To sum it up: business notebooks will soon be all SSD. Or, to quote Steve Weinger, SC’s senior marketing manager: “SSD-only is the new wave of 2009.”

Why? According to them, business users shouldn’t necessarily need to store music and movies and the like, so they won’t really need enormous capacity. (Technically, they should be saving things to the server.)

To show the differences in the performance between the two, the company had a setup running two Windows Vista machines through various paces — closing and opening Windows, booting up and shutting down, and so forth. It’s pretty clear which machine won:

The new Nikon D90 digital SLR camera has a feature called Live View, which means you can frame pictures using the screen instead of the viewfinder. (This is, of course, dead common on snapshot cameras, but they don't have a mirror blocking the way to the sensor.) And as David Pogue points out in The New York Times, this means it's the first DSLR that can shoot video:

High-definition video, at that. Stunning, vivid, 720p, widescreen, 1280-by-720, 24-frames-per-second video, with the color and clarity that only an SLR can provide.

Evidently, it occurred to some engineer: "Hey, we're already showing a video image. Isn't that, in essence, what Live View is? Maybe we could figure out a way to record it!"



So you buy a DLR and you can do bits of hi-def video on a camera with interchangeable lenses:

With a huge telephoto lens, sitting in my bleachers seat at the Pilot Pen tennis tournament, I was suddenly filming what other people could capture only as still images. (You can see sample stills at

A look at the latest oscilloscopes: the Agilent 9000, the LeCroy WaveSurfer 104Xs-A, the National Instruments USB 5132, the PicoScope 5000, the Tektronix 70000 and Yokogawa DLM6000