Industrial PC

Edge computing has now established itself as one of the most important trends in factory automation. Increasingly powerful industrial computers enable factory planners to keep computationally intensive tasks such as machine and process control, linking automation subsystems, data analysis or graphical visualization close to the factory floor. Industrial PCs are thus becoming a second pillar of factory automation alongside or even may replace classic PLC hardware, offering the additional option of processing sensitive data on site rather than moving it to a cloud. On the one hand, suppliers of industrial PCs can benefit from a rapidly developing consumer PC technology e.g. making use of established tools, user interfacing or graphics capabilities . On the other hand, they need to provide an industrial-grade, robust PC architecture that can withstand harsh environmental conditions, high tempreatures, is immune to interference and runs in a mechanically and electrically stable manner to avoid downtimes. This is in contrast to consumer markets, where extremely cost-oriented requirements prevail.

Industry PCs typically  provide computation power along embedded microprocessors well known from classic PC markets and are sufficiently powerfull for e.g. complex motion control tasks. Formfactors may include panel integrated and types in compact housing to be mounted on DIN Rail. A huge number of various interfaces and slots complement any offering. Longevity of Industrial PCs in operation differs as well from PC use in consumer markets.

All these correspond to specific industrial requirements for PC sub-systems and components. E.g. the power supply part of an industrial PC requires low heating up at small form factor as well as operating for long system lifetime in 24/7 operation in the control cabinet.

Infineon is providing a range of semiconductor solutions that meet these requirements in terms of power supply (CoolMOS^TM,  CoolGaN^TM ; CoolSiC^TM) , data protection (OPTIGA™ Trust ), device protection and wired or wireless (AIROC™ Wi-Fi & Combos) connectivity. Infineon’s selected memory product portfolio includes HyperBUS^TM and synchronous SRAM types reaching out to 9600MB/s data rate idealy suited as high-speed serial buffer memory and applications requiring low latencies. Coping with high temperatures and challenging reiability requirements Semper^TM NOR Flash  provides high-performance, safe, and reliable data or code  storage.

Dedicated application know-how from Infineon to support your system design complements our offering. A selection of proven power supply reference designs supports you in providing a scalable industrial PC series, whether as box, rack or panel PC, depending on the required computing power.