Why PC Based Controls

With the number of control systems available, why try PC based controls?  While there are many legitimate reasons to not use a PC as a control system, there are still compelling reasons to consider it.  If using PC’s for industrial controls were such a bad idea, why would so many industrial control products leverage PC’s in the design?  For example, many CNC control systems include a PC as the operator interface.  Most industrial operator interfaces are based around flat panel type PC’s.  Many of them run some version of Windows.  So, if it were such a bad idea, there probably wouldn’t be so many industrial control products using PC’s.

So, why use PC’s?  Some reasons?

  • High quality development tools
  • Processing Power
  • Potential for reusable code
  • Off-the-shelf software
  • Potential for high quality, reliable code
  • Connectivity
  • Data management
  • User base
  • User interface

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