Compared with commercial mainframes, embedded industrial computers are more capable of adapting to complex climate environments, adapting to vibration and shock mechanical environments, adapting to complex electromagnetic environments, application industry-specific functions, customized services, and a long and stable supply cycle. . So the future industrial control opportunities will not be replaced? The current application modes of industrial computer are: industrial computer plus customized software and hardware, industrial computer plus expansion card plus customized software and hardware, industrial motherboard plus (expansion card) plus customized software and hardware, Industrial motherboard plus industrial backplane plus (expansion card) plus customized software and hardware. In the existing application mode, the industrial computer is not without substitutes, but the delivery date and demand of the industrial computer do not meet the economic requirements. The delivery date is determined by the technological accumulation of industrial computer manufacturers in the six core advantages of industrial computer, and the demand is the decisive factor that determines the economy.
The application mode of industrial computer in the future may be: standard universal industrial computer plus standard universal interface module plus customized software and hardware, and users independently research and develop software and hardware including industrial computer. Whether to change or not depends mainly on two factors: First, the CPU manufacturer provides a complete set of software and hardware development systems, which does not require the participation of industrial computer manufacturers. The second is the highly standardized I/O interface and the mature application of cloud computing technology in the industrial field. The current situation is that the computer bus and I/O interface are evolving to serialization, and the functional components of the future computer system may not be in the same chassis. This will be a subversion of the existing industrial computer architecture system.
Compared with X86, when ARM processors are used in a certain industry in batches, they must be customized according to the application. The main reason why this kind of application mode has not been promoted in the field of industrial computer is "quantity." In the future, CPU manufacturers can use FPGA technology to customize some functions by themselves, reduce the need for customization of industrial computers, and improve the quality of individual models. At present, this technology has not been applied on a large scale. This shows that the industrial computer industry will not be replaced in the short term.
The bus and I/O interface will develop towards serialization and unification: Because of the higher speed and smaller footprint, the serial bus has mostly replaced the parallel bus, whether it is a commercial machine or an industrial computer. The possibility of retaining the parallel bus standard is the communication between chipsets. In terms of I/O bus, the original display interface and external memory interface have also been converted from parallel to serial. More importantly, the USB Type-C interface standard will unify the power interface, keyboard interface, mouse interface, audio interface, storage interface, network interface and display interface of the computer in the future, and it is non-sticky and has a better user experience. In addition to greatly reducing the types of I/O cables, the unified I/O interface can also greatly reduce the wiring between the industrial computer and peripherals. The main features are: 1. Supports the connection of multiple high-performance peripherals. 2. The data synchronization speed is faster. 3. Support multi-function, single-port connection.
In the future, industrial computers must have information security features: With the continuous improvement of processor capabilities, in addition to high-end network security and server applications, Intel ® ATOM processors can currently meet 70 percent of customers' application requirements. For this type of processor, with a new process, SoC is sufficient, and the technical threshold for making industrial motherboards or industrial computers is lowering.
With the further development of network infrastructure and network communication technology, cloud computing and big data applications will become more mature and common. The goal of Made in China 2025 is to realize intelligent manufacturing, improve production efficiency, reduce resource consumption, and improve product quality. To realize intelligent manufacturing, we must first realize the digitization of manufacturing resources, production process, field operation, quality control and material control, from intelligent equipment, to intelligent production lines, intelligent workshops, and terminal intelligent factories.
Establish an industrial computer cloud platform, whether it is an industrial computer embedded in the equipment, or an industrial computer that works independently for process monitoring, it can provide customers with the following additional services: 1. Cloud storage. 2. Operation log management. 3. Intelligent monitoring and early warning. 4. Fault diagnosis. 5. Equipment safety life cycle health management.
Relying on the cloud platform to connect the industrial computer and the server into a system, the industrial computer architecture can be made more streamlined, the key data is placed in the data center, and the customer uses big data analysis tools to analyze and process real-time and historical data to effectively ensure information Secure transmission. Solve the problem of the impact of vibration resistance and high temperature environment on the reliability of hard disks that cannot be solved by a single industrial computer. What is provided to customers is no longer a separate industrial computer, but "industrial computer plus server plus cloud platform management software plus service".
