Created Date: June 08,2015

Created by: dieseltwitch

I used to use the DirectLogic line also, I ended up spending a lot of time beating my head in to the table/wall/pole or what ever else was near while trying to get things to work. and simple things at that!

If you budget can take the hit the P3k and P2k are a great way to go. Make sure to take note of the low IO count of the P2k over the P3k.

There are some major benefits over the other models of PLC. Ease of programing being the biggest. Also the fact that you can deliver programs over USB is a huge Plus for me! That alone has saved me many miles of driving/flying! I would suggest you download the software and try some of your standard programing items. For me that AIO and comms. and things like VFD's.

One of the other major things I found much nicer is tag naming. No more trying to remember V numbers and being limited to short un readable tag names.

The help menus built in the the programing suite are 1000x times more helpful!

Created Date: June 08,2015

Created by: jwbaker3

You may want to check out the DoMore PLC also. The software is free so you can play with it. It uses the same I/O as the other 205 systems (so if you stock spares less inventory if you already have 205 systems) but I find it much faster to program and easer to use. than the DL processors. We use all of the AD PLC hardware (except the 305 unless we have too) but on any new projects that we can pick the hardware vendor and needs a PLC larger than a 06 we use the DoMore or a P2000/3000 PAC. We look at the DoMore and the P2000/3000 as tools in our toolbox and pick the one that does the job the best for the customer.

JW

Created Date: June 09,2015

Created by: jwbaker3

We use the Do More most of the time. We would use the PAC if the customer requested any of the following:

Hot swappable I/O, Connections to a SQL/ODBC database, Ethernet I/P remote I/O, If we need more comm's (they are already on the CPU and do not take a slot), If we are doing a SCADA system (we can do it with a Do More but we find it easier with a PAC).

I am sure there are other things but these come to mind.

On projects we can chose the hardware and we use AD, (if the plant has all Rockwell, GE or Siemens and they require networking we use the brand that is already in place) we use about 10% DL06/clicks (small and have to be low cost) 75% Do More and 15% PAC's.

About 65 to 70% of our projects are Rockwell, GE, Siemens or Omron because of customer requirements, (we have a programmer that before using the Do More though when you die you go to Milwaukee) but we see things changing when they (plant management and owners) look at the price and value offered by the AD PLC/PAC's. The larger companies mostly are lock into Rockwell (if their equipment is built in the USA) or Siemens (if their equipment is built in Europe).

I think most projects that you could use the Do More or the P3000 and have a very good system, we have a lot of DL205/260 system in the field so the new installations with the Do More can use the same I/O spare parts, this can be a big thing for the customer.

JW

Created Date: June 09,2015

Created by: BobO

Controls Guy,

What didn't you like about the interface that you liked over the Do more and DS5? I can't stand those and have found the P3k software much easier to use than almost any of the major PLC brands out there. including AB and S

I'm guessing that with your Mac bias, you aren't a keyboard centric user. Do-more is extremely productive from the keyboard...not so much using a mouse. That will be a major focus for DmD 2, but I think a keyboard will always be faster. YMMV...

Created Date: June 09,2015

Created by: dieseltwitch

I'm guessing that with your Mac bias, you aren't a keyboard centric user. Do-more is extremely productive from the keyboard...not so much using a mouse. That will be a major focus for DmD 2, but I think a keyboard will always be faster. YMMV...

On the contrary. I'm very keyboard centric. Remember Macs are Unix based so using things like Terminal (Equal to the CMD Line) is common place much more so than on a PC. I agree the keyboard is much fast than pointing around. But because P3k require overall less programming demand I feel that what ever it lacks in hot keys it makes up for is simple programing.

Created Date: June 09,2015

Created by: BobO

On the contrary. I'm very keyboard centric. Remember Macs are Unix based so using things like Terminal (Equal to the CMD Line) is common place much more so than on a PC. I agree the keyboard is much fast than pointing around. But because P3k require overall less programming demand I feel that what ever it lacks in hot keys it makes up for is simple programing.

I must confess that I haven't done a side to side comparison of apps developed in PxK vs Do-more, but I am a little surprised that a Do-more program would be significantly more complicated. We do find that many experienced DL users write about twice as much as is actually required to do the job. Un-learning is a hard thing.

We chose to granularize some things that PxK does monolithically (process control is a good example) because it makes those parts reusable. That was a design call, and I have never gotten a complaint about it. Feedback on Do-more's instruction set has been nearly universally positive. I would love to hear what you find more difficult.

Created Date: June 10,2015

Created by: BobO

Not off topic at all. The OP asked about moving from DS to to PxK, and someone who has used both Do-more and PxK suggested that he consider Do-more as well. You offered some less than flattering comments about Do-more, and I'm offering the counterpoint.

As for Do-more not being powerful enough, again, that's the first time I 've heard that one too. As the poster who used both suggested, there are definitely some apps that PxK is better suited to, but he uses Do-more for any app that didn't call for those things.

I personally like to have direct experience with a product before offering negative comments publicly.

Created Date: June 10,2015

Created by: kasky

I 've read through all the comments and appreciate everyone's time posting.

I also have spent a little more time with the PxK software and I can see the learning curve is going to be just a matter of getting started and sticking with it.

I must say though things like the idea of not having to keep track of V registers and being able to just name a memory location does not seem like a big deal to me. I can see where something like that might make it easier for a new programmer to get into things, for me it just makes things unnecessarily different.

I'm now going to take a little harder look at the Do-More software as I had only briefly looked at it before.

You know the 'software ' I really like is the Click programming package.

If the more powerful systems had the Click programming interface addressing schemes etc.. that would be nice!

Please any comments on any of the different programming packages are very much appreciated.

Thank you

Joe.