 HIGH SPEED LINK
November 1st 2003
Industrial process engineers can now extend plant-wide control applications to include Ethernet capabilities with the new National Instruments FBUS-HSE/H1 Fieldbus high speed Ethernet (HS) linking device.
Using the linking device, engineers can fully integrate sensor, process, discrete, hybrid and batch control subsystems with higher level supervisory applications.
The device connects 31.25kbps H1 segments to an HSE network running at 10Mbps or higher, making it easier for engineers to build high performance, integrated applications, such as in manufacturing, refinery, chemical and pharmaceutical plant applications. With this device, engineers can implement an open architecture for process automation systems.
The company has also introduced the NI PCI-FBUS/2 plug and play PCI board that can be used to connect Foundation Fieldbus devices to new desktop pcs. This is said to eliminate the challenges of configuring AT-FBUS boards with new computers that no linger offer ISA slots as standard. Engineers can plug the new board into any new desktop with a PCI slot and run software without using a complex interface card. More articles from National Instruments UK Limited: | 
