National Instruments Introduces New Line of HMIs for LabVIEW
Description
Engineers and scientists now can use National Instruments (Nasdaq: NATI) new flat-panel touch-screen, touch-panel computer and panel PC human machine interfaces (HMIs) with the NI LabVIEW graphical development environment to develop user interfaces. LabVIEW offers a rich user interface development environment with royalty-free deployment for the interfaces with the LabVIEW Application Builder and each touch-panel interface includes a LabVIEW PDA Module deployment license. In addition to delivering a user interface development environment for the new interfaces, LabVIEW can target a wide range of distributed programmable automation controller (PAC) products, including high-performance PC-based I/O with PXI or industrial PCs, distributed I/O with Compact FieldPoint, FPGA-based high-speed I/O with CompactRIO and distributed vision systems with the Compact Vision System.
The National Instruments FPT-1015 is an industrial 15-inch flat-panel touch screen that offers a color LCD with a resistive touch screen. The NI FPT-1015 HMI connects through a standard VGA port and USB. It offers a large display area and touch screen for high-performance PXI test applications with any embedded PXI controller or for machine vision applications with NI CVS-145x systems. Engineers can easily deploy this HMI with PXI functional test systems on the manufacturing or factory floor.
Engineers can use the National Instruments TPC-2006 industrial touch-panel computer for embedded or machine control applications. The NI TPC-2006 delivers a 5.7-inch LCD monitor with resistive touch screen that runs the Windows CE .NET operating system that engineers can program with the LabVIEW PDA Module. It features low power consumption; a high-performance 266 MHz Intel ARM9 processor; and a rugged design with no rotating media, a fanless cooling system and NEMA4/IP 65 industrial ratings. Engineers can create HMI applications using this LabVIEW PDA-certified device, and the LabVIEW PDA Module automatically compiles LabVIEW VIs for Windows CE and optimizes them for maximum performance.
The National Instruments PPC-2015 is a 15-inch color panel PC with a resistive touch screen and a 2.0 GHz Pentium 4 processor. The panel PC runs the Windows XP operating system with a 40 GB hard drive and provides connectivity through Ethernet, USB, two PCMCIA ports and two half-length PCI slots. It provides a fully functional HMI for all NI PAC hardware through an Ethernet port and offers five USB ports and two PCI slots for connectivity to a broad range of NI hardware such as industrial PCI-based data acquisition boards or external USB-based data acquisition modules. The two PCI slots offer integration with motion or vision cards. It is ideal for PAC hardware platform machine control.
Engineers can deploy LabVIEW applications on these new HMIs and then connect via Ethernet to a wide variety of PAC hardware from NI. LabVIEW also provides open connectivity to other hardware through industry standards including Ethernet, USB, PCI and PCMCIA. With LabVIEW, engineers can create systems that connect HMIs to PLCs from Allen-Bradley, Siemens, GE Fanuc and many others using OPC (OLE for process control) servers from NI. Engineers also can connect to factory networks using Modbus TCP/IP via Ethernet, DeviceNet and CAN hardware. For additional networks such as PROFIBUS, Ethernet/IP and PROFINET, gateways from a wide variety of vendors provide connectivity for these HMIs to industrial networks.
About National Instruments
National Instruments (www.ni.com) is a technology pioneer and leader in virtual instrumentation – a revolutionary concept that has changed the way engineers and scientists in industry, government and academia approach measurement and automation. Leveraging PCs and commercial technologies, virtual instrumentation increases productivity and lowers costs for test, control and design applications through easy-to-integrate software, such as NI LabVIEW, and modular measurement and control hardware for PXI, PCI, USB and Ethernet. Headquartered in Austin, Texas, NI has more than 3,600 employees and direct operations in nearly 40 countries. In 2004, the company sold products to more than 25,000 companies in 90 countries. For the past six years, FORTUNE magazine has named NI one of the 100 best companies to work for in America.