The potential for designing Human Machine Interfaces (HMI) with graphical user interfaces (GUI) and SCADA terminals in factories has evolved significantly in the past few years. This potential is being driven by the increasing availability of multi-touch displays suitable for industrial use, as used in tablet PCs, for example.
Completely new forms of user interaction have emerged, like turning screen content using two fingers, zooming into content by spreading fingers or scrolling by simply swiping.
New operating concepts
It is even possible to implement two hand operation in order to facilitate switching motors on or off, and even the mechanical dead man's switch could be replaced.
But whatever concrete solution needs to be created, the most convincing form of operation is one which is simply carried out by hands. It is only natural for people to want to work with their hands rather than type with their fingers. But even typing is simpler with multi-touch displays. In comparison to one-finger operation the Shift-key can be activated.
The 16:9 format provides more room for gesture control or for virtualizations. If the display is used in portrait mode, a complete keyboard can be blended in on the lower part of the screen which does away with the need for a physical keyboard - both space- and cost-saving.
Projected-capacitive or resistive
Which touch technology is the right one though?
If thick work gloves do not have to be worn, the projective-capacitive version of the glass touch surface is the most comfortable choice for the operator. It is especially touch-sensitive thus achieving a high level of operation precision.
A further practical feature is that the field which is projected on the glass surface can already perceive the proximity of the hand, so that it is only necessary to lightly glide over the glass surface. The operating haptics are consequently completely different from resistive touch, which requires physical pressure on the screen.
But resistive touch has its advantages too. It is recommended for those applications in which thick gloves have to be worn. For industrial applications the 5-wire technology is appealing. It can be operated by every type of glove and offers – in comparison to the 4-wire version - a much higher level of precision. Compared to the 8-wire technology it comes at a much lower price and offers a longer lifecycle, which significantly reduces the Total-Cost-of-Ownership.
New Look & Feel
Improved ease-of-use though is not the only aspect why HMIs should get a new look and feel. Glass touch displays are also setting a new design trend which optically excels with its smooth and seamless glass surfaces.
At the same time though this is where the challenge begins: Where robust designs are concerned, the glass panel cannot just be stuck on the back with an assembly kit, like, for example, is the case with ceramic cooking areas, in order to create a shock- and vibration-proof hold. Especially not when the opening of the housing on the machine or equipment has to offer comprehensive protection against dust and spray water.
One good way to solve this is to embed the glass display of the touch panel into an aluminum shell, which at the same time protects the edges of the glass displays from knocks and bumps. In this way, mounting equipment can be integrated into the shell, which fixates the Panel-PC in the case front with the appropriate sealing. This results in an industrial-purpose product solution featuring a completely flat glass surface on the front.
Two new Panel-PC families
At the SPS/IPC/Drives in Nuremberg, Kontron introduced two such new Panel-PC families which target this application area and offer a convincing price-performance ratio. The major difference between the two families is their target application area: The Micro Client 3 family has been designed for surveillance and control of individual production lines and the new OmniClient family for managing production lines and supervising whole manufacturing facilities.
Focussing on process industries
Application areas for the new Panel-PC families will be in shopfloor systems in process industries such as chemical and pharmaceutical, food and beverage or the power industry, or in complex machines and equipment of numerous other branches or in the factory or facility management. Both familes have highly reliable and near-to maintenance-free operation in common. Only high-quality and long-life components, like gold-caps, are used, so that the need for swapping batteries is eliminated. The LED back light offers a long lifecycle of at least 50,000 hours. The front panels are IP65-protected against dust and damp and even in the resistive-capacitive version can be operated reliably with surgical gloves.
Lots of variants
The design and configuration of the Panel-PCs can be configured to meet the requirements of the application area. Within the families, the major differences are in terms of performance, the available dipslay sizes and the range of interfaces.
The first Panel-PC of the Kontron Micro Client 3 family which is completely fanless is available with a 15.6 inch display with glass and projective-capacitive touch technology. Further models are available with 10 to 17 inch screens with resistive 5-wire touch technology.
Based on the Intel Atom Dual-Core processor D2550 with 2x 1.86 GHz and up to 4 GB DDR3 memory, this model covers the requirements of the mid-performance class. It is equipped with all the standard interfaces and optionally also includes WLAN and RFID support.
The new OmniClients are scalable in configuration and feature 15.6 to 22 inch screens while offering a more complex array of interfaces. They also deliver much higher multi-core performance based on the second generation of the Intel Core i5/i7 processors and up to 8 GB RAM can be integrated.
A wide scope of connectivity
Both lines of Panel PCs have a projected capacitive touch widescreen made of glass and a range of interfaces matched to industrial needs.
The Kontron Micro Client 3 features 2x Gigabit Ethernet, 2x USB 3.0 and 2x USB 2.0, 1x RS232, a graphical output (DVI, DP) for a secondary display and several further options, e.g. CAN, WiFi and RFID.
The Kontron OmniClient comes standard with a larger feature set which includes: 3x Gigabit Ethernet, 2x Display Port, DVI-I and 6x USB 2.0. Optionally, the OmniClient can be extended to include: eighteen GPIOs, as well as two serial ports that can be configured as RS232/485/422 or CAN Bus. Further options include WiFi, WiFi with Bluetooth and RFID. For application-specific expansions the Kontron Micro Client 3 offers a single mini PCIe socket while the Kontron OmniClient features two mini PCIe slots and one PCIe x16 slot.
Data storage media may be connected using a SATA connector suitable for 2.5” media. The Kontron OmniClient also integrates up to two 3.5 SATA hard drives. Both the Kontron Micro Client 3 and OmniClient lines additionally support rugged and small-sized flash memory devices by way of a mSATA connector. Besides being fitted with a projected capacitive touch widescreen made of glass, the Kontron Micro Client 3 is also being produced in a 4:3 format with resistive touch technology for display sizes 10.4” to 17”. Windows XP, Windows 7, and embedded Linux operating systems are all supported. Windows 8 is available on the Kontron OmniClient.