Messages

171

General Mach Discussion / Re: Can't deal with XP and old computers any more. Help!

« on: January 28, 2013, 12:56:24 AM »

Makes sense, but sounds like it is getting a little too proprietary for me. I like to be able to upgrade, swap parts, upgrade or change OS, etc. without buying from one source.

If you like to tinker with the guts of the PC, the industrial route isn't for you.  They are small and designed to be embedded inside a machine controller.  Most of the cheaper ones run the Atom processor and are a fanless design.  The fanless design means that there are no cooling fans circulating shop dust through the PC.

You probably won't find 32 bit off the shelf.  When we order the industrial PC's we can choose between XP, Win7 or Win8...32 or 64 bit.

172

General Mach Discussion / Re: Can't deal with XP and old computers any more. Help!

« on: January 27, 2013, 10:03:50 PM »

Embedded is just a stripped down version of Win7 designed to be used in machinery applications.  It has all of the core functionality without any of the garbage that comes on the typical store bought PC.  It's usually faster because there is not as much going on.  You won't find a desktop PC in an industrial CNC application.  That's where the small industrial PC's come into play.  If you open up a ProMotion or Burny controller, you'll find a small brick PC inside, probably running Win7. 

Prices on industrial PC's can range from $400 to just over $1000.  Depends on what you want with it.  The cheap ones work fine.  Tons of ram and huge hard drives are not necessary.  We've been running them for years with XP.  Just now started experimenting with Win7.  I really don't see any difference between XP and Win7 as far as Mach is concerned.  The main reason for going to Win7 is so we can offer the "latest" OS.  I don't think we're going to mess with Win8. 

173

General Mach Discussion / Re: Can't deal with XP and old computers any more. Help!

« on: January 27, 2013, 09:48:42 PM »

We have an industrial PC here with parallel port running Win7 Embedded 32 bit and so far it's working well.  It still needs more testing before it hits the shop floor, but it looks good.

We have a local shop that refurbishes Dell PC's.  I can get a 2.8MHZ tower with a fresh install of XP Pro for $80.  There may be something similar in your area.  Something like that will run Mach3 just fine.

174

General Mach Discussion / Re: Can't deal with XP and old computers any more. Help!

« on: January 27, 2013, 08:44:25 PM »

So is the consensus that the best thing to do if you want to use a new or newer computer is to use Windows 7 32 bit?

If you want to keep using the PP, that's your only option.

My understanding is that a motion controller would be better and more stable than the computer directly running things anyway?
 

That depends on the motion controller.  We're experimenting with the Ethernet smoothstepper now, but didn't have much luck with the USB version.  Just keep in mind that when you use an external motion controller, it's software handles most of the things that Mach3 does for you now...and not everything Mach3 does may be supported by the external motion controller.

I also would like the benefit of faster boot ups and faster operation of other things (besides the actual running of Mach3).

Of the 6 PC's we have running here on a daily basis, the one that boots the fastest (under 30 seconds) is the 2.8GHZ machine running Mach3 in the shop.  Part of that could be the disk image we burn on the machine PC's.  It's a stripped down, lean and mean version of XP.  All that's there is what it needs to run Windows and Mach3.

every machine we have that runs Win7, which is most of them, take 5 minutes or longer to boot.  The exception is an industrial PC that we put Win7 (32) Embedded on.  It is lighting fast.

175

General Mach Discussion / Re: Can't deal with XP and old computers any more. Help!

« on: January 27, 2013, 08:23:57 PM »

The speed of a 32 bit and 64 bit system depends on what you're running on it.  We have CAD/CAM software on both and when it comes to high end 3D modeling and rendering, 64 bit is a little faster.  For things that are not so processor intensive, there is hardly a difference, if any at all.  I doubt you'd see any difference in Mach3 between the two.  All it's doing is pulsing the PP and it doesn't need a super computer to do that.  We have Mach3 running on an old 800MHZ PC with 1G ram and on a newer 2.8GHZ with 8G ram.  Other than the newer PC possibly being a little faster oping files, there is no difference as far as Mach3 is concerned.

Google industrial PC's.  You can buy a brick PC with Win7 32 bit installed that would fit right inside your control cabinet for around $400.

176

General Mach Discussion / Re: Can't deal with XP and old computers any more. Help!

« on: January 27, 2013, 08:22:37 PM »

The speed of a 32 bit and 64 bit system depends on what you're running on it.  We have CAD/CAM software on both and when it comes to high end 3D modeling and rendering, 64 bit is a little faster.  For things that are not so processor intensive, there is hardly a difference, if any at all.  I doubt you'd see any difference in Mach3 between the two.  All it's doing is pulsing the PP and it doesn't need a super computer to do that.  We have Mach3 running on an old 800MHZ PC with 1G ram and on a newer 2.8GHZ with 8G ram.  Other than the newer PC possibly being a little faster oping files, there is no difference as far as Mach3 is concerned.

Google industrial PC's.  You can buy a brick PC with Win7 32 bit installed for around $400.

177

General Mach Discussion / Re: Burny plasma table question

« on: December 25, 2012, 01:16:50 PM »

What you probably have are two wires for the servo motor and two wires for an internal potentiometer.  It could also be in internal tach or they could be steppers with encoders.  When you turn them do the cog or turn smooth.  If they cog, they are steppers.  

It may be easier to just replace the motors and encoders.  Motors are cheap.  Get a BOB, some geckos and motors and you're done.  We've retrofitted a few old tracer tables and found it easier and cheaper in the long run to just replace everything with what we know works rather than trying to make the older technology work.

178

General Mach Discussion / Re: homming with Ethernet SS problem

« on: December 25, 2012, 12:54:32 PM »

The trigger point of any non-contact switch can be effected by outside conditions.  That's not a big deal if you're just detecting an open door, but when you need exact repeatability, a snap action limit switch works best. 

http://www.automationdirect.com/adc/Shopping/Catalog/Sensors_-z-_Encoders/Limit_Switches/Compact_Limit_Switches_%28AEM2G_Series%29/Lever_with_Roller_Actuator/AEM2G42Z11-3 

179

General Mach Discussion / Re: What would cause my limit switches to trip?

« on: December 24, 2012, 10:27:31 PM »

The BOB grounds through the PC via the shield on the parallel cable.  Did you ground the PC chassis or try soldering a ground to the DB25 shield?

180

General Mach Discussion / Re: What would cause my limit switches to trip?

« on: December 23, 2012, 06:40:24 PM »

The noise is being picked up by the parallel cable going from the BOB to the PC...or possibly by the PC itself.  We deal with HF noise all the time working with plasma machines.  Industrial plasma power supplies use an HF arc start.  No different than your HF TIG.  Did you ground the PC chassis to the star ground?  The other thing you can try is soldering a ground wire to the shield on the DB25 cable and grounding that to the star ground.  You would only ground one end of the DB25, which is usually the BOB end.