Should I Choose Managed Industrial Switch Or Unmanaged Industrial Switch?

With the widespread application of Ethernet in all levels of industrial automation, large-scale production has been realized from the field signal to the controller and monitoring layer, and the price of Industrial Switches has become more competitive. Improved electronic devices reduce power consumption and heat generation, so that it is not necessary to configure fans that are prone to failure. Designers have greater freedom when choosing network hardware, so that they can easily establish the connection from the site to the control panel and then to the server room according to needs. In this way, there is almost no reason not to use industrial grade switches except for cost savings.

For a typical original equipment manufacturer (OEM) industrial equipment: automation is realized by programmable logic controller (PLC) with I / O, human-machine interface (HMI) and various other intelligent devices. Small unmanaged industrial switches are usually the best choice, and their prices can be very low. These devices are easy to use, provide sufficient network speed, and can be used for copper or fiber media. For simple, low budget projects, they may be the best way.

However, once the number of interconnected devices increases, or once independent automation devices are interconnected with dozens or hundreds of other systems and intelligent devices in the factory and local area network (LAN), more serious network problems may occur. Network, traffic overload and other network problems in the home or office environment may only cause delay in sending e-mail or slow down video playback until the problem is solved. However, in the industrial control network, the flow overload will lead to the abnormal operation of the equipment.

So under what circumstances do we need to choose a managed industrial switch? Generally speaking, there are five most common situations. If one or more of them are met, a managed industrial switch is required:

Enhanced flow filtering; Network redundancy; Comprehensive security guarantee; More in-depth troubleshooting and diagnosis information; Provide better overall network "awareness" for users and automation platforms.

The task of network managed industrial switch is to keep all network resources in good condition. The network managed industrial switch products provide a variety of network management modes, such as terminal control interface (console), web page and telnet remote login network. Therefore, network managers can monitor the working status and network operation status of the switch locally or remotely in real time, and manage the working status and working mode of all switch ports globally.

Compared with simple plug and play unmanaged switches, managed industrial switches really need more user configurations. However, the browser interface and configuration guide greatly simplify this task, which means that OT personnel can complete the configuration and management of industrial networks without it involvement.

For example, a new product recently launched by Houshi Network - HS3000-3210 series IP40 level two-layer agile network management Gigabit industrial switch , it is a two-layer managed Industrial Ethernet switch that meets the requirements of industrial design. It adopts mature technology and open network standards, has a refined and compact shape, Visual Web management, simple and clear operation, supports 0 configuration, and greatly reduces the difficulty of user configuration. For most industrial automation projects of any type, users may find that although the cost of managed industrial switches is higher, they can bring significant benefits to the operation, safety and maintenance of automation systems.