7-15 year availability is common for industrial PCs, whereas ~12 months is more likely for consumer PCs.
Long-term availability reduces R&D and maintenance costs, as hardware only needs to be validated once and engineers will only need to learn to support a single platform.
PCI slots or serial ports are a rare sight on consumer PCs these days, but are common on industrial computers.
RS232/422/485 ports are present on the vast majority of industrial PCs (IPCs), making it easy to interface with legacy equipment.
PCI slots allow you to use the same expansion card that you’ve been using for years, removing the need for redesign and revalidation of your solution.
Modern interfaces are commonplace too, with latest generation PCI Express slots, M.2 expansion, 4K DisplayPort and fastest USB ports all supported on IPCs, alongside legacy I/O.
Windows XP, 7 or 8 may be required for compatibility with your software application, but you’d be hard pressed to source a consumer PC with any of these operating systems, as Microsoft are only offering Windows 10 on new PCs.
All of these operating systems are still available on industrial PCs. A Windows XP-based O/S is available until ~2020, with the newer Windows versions being available for much longer.
Comparing total costs of using consumer PCs and industrial PCs for a 5 year program is an exercise worth performing when selecting hardware. Things to consider are:
Hardware validation / R&D: Just once for an IPC, but potentially 5 times for a consumer PC (once a year)
Software redesign: Every time a new operating system and/or hardware platform is released
Maintenance: Multiple different sets of spares are required for the consumer PC, but just one for an industrial PC. Higher quality components used in IPCs greatly reduces the chance of failure in the first place
Support: Service and support teams need to learn multiple platforms when consumer PCs have been used, increasing training costs and slowing customer response. With an industrial PC, support engineers only need to learn a single platform, making them more responsive to the customer and more efficient at diagnosing faults
Initial hardware cost: Consumer PCs generally cost less up front, but the extra cost for an industrial PC is unlikely to be a much as you might think.
To learn more about industrial computing, give one of our team a call on 01527 512 400, or drop us an email at computers@steatite.co.uk
Alternatively you can check out our latest range of industrial computing solutions below:
