Redundancy Approach Protects Smart Wireless

Emerson has announced an approach to redundancy for Smart Wireless monitoring and control solutions. Available with the DeltaV S-series digital automation system, full redundancy protects the wireless network from any single point of failure by allowing primary failover to ensure that data is always delivered, even if there is a malfunction. The enhancements include redundant Wireless I/O, power and communications and a redundant Smart Wireless Remote Link.

The Remote Link can be mounted in class 1/Div 1/zone 0 and easily links the wireless field network into a DeltaV system, which makes an optimised PID available for wireless control. The full redundancy increases the strength of Smart Wireless technology as a complement to wired and bus approaches on capital projects. Smart Wireless is based on the Wirelesshart standard, which is designed for control and monitoring applications. Smart Wireless devices based on the Wirelesshart standard deliver 99.9 per cent reliability because of the self-organising nature of the network.

Devices that conform to the Wirelesshart specification can sense measurements at update rates up to once per second. Wirelesshart also allows exception reporting for network efficiency and devices only communicate a measurement value if it has changed significantly since the last communication or if the time since the last communication has exceeded a required reporting time, optimising battery life.

Smart Wireless Monitors Temperatures In Plant

Emerson's Smart Wireless network using the Wirelesshart communications standard is contributing to process improvements at the Calgon Carbon plant in Blue Lake, California. The network provides continuous temperature measurements from a rotating catalyst kiln, where spent carbon particles are reactivated. Six Rosemount wireless temperature transmitters were installed to monitor temperatures in the kiln and transmit a steady stream of data, giving operators more information for controlling heat levels in each zone.

The wireless transmitters mounted on raised platforms on the surface of the kiln were connected to the existing thermocouples and the Wirelesshart self-organising mesh network was set up with a single Smart Wireless gateway. The six transmitters monitor temperatures in five zones of the kiln and at the outlet, communicating data reliably from the rotating kiln to the gateway, which then integrates the measurements in a host PLC.

Emerson offers a range of wireless field-instrumentation and plant-operations equipment, including Fisher position monitors, Rosemount Analytical and Machinery Health Management devices, and native wireless interfaces to AMS Suite predictive maintenance software, DeltaV digital-automation systems and Smartstart services.

ADI Metering ICs Improve Smart-Meter Accuracy

Analog Devices has introduced four energy-metering ICs (integrated circuits), designed to improve the accuracy and performance of commercial, industrial and residential smart meters. A smart meter accurately measures how much electricity is consumed or generated and communicates with the local utility for power monitoring, billing and other purposes. ADI's energy metering ICs enable smart electricity meters to deliver improved customer-billing accuracy, advanced power-quality monitoring and reduced operating costs for utility companies.

Ronn Kliger, energy group director, ADI, said: 'They are able to measure total active and reactive energy with accuracy and dynamic range exceeding Class 0.2 specifications for energy meters. 'One device also offers capabilities to measure fundamental-only energies, which is critical for power-quality measurements,' he added. ADI has formed a dedicated energy group to address the growing technology needs for electric metering, substation automation and emerging applications such as solar/wind generation and energy storage.

The company offers radio frequency, power-line-carrier communication, power management and digital-signal processing in support of smart-grid applications. ADI's ADE7878, ADE7868, ADE7858 and ADE7854 high-accuracy energy-metering ICs are designed for poly-phase configurations, including three- and four-wire wye and delta services. The ICs feature 0.1 per cent accuracy for active and reactive energy measurements over a dynamic range of 1,000 and 0.2 per cent accuracy for active and reactive energy measurements over a dynamic range of 3,000:1.

The products also deliver 0.1 per cent accuracy over 1,000:1 dynamic range for RMS (root-mean square) current and voltage measurements. In addition to per-phase and neutral-energy measurements, the ADE7868 and ADE7878 are able to monitor energy-quality parameters such as SAG, peak, period, angle measurements and phase sequence. The ADE7868 and ADE7878 are able to detect various tamper conditions and are housed in a 40-lead LFCSP (lead-frame chip-scale package).

Microcontroller Targets Smart Card Readers

Atmel Corporation has announced the Atmel AVR microcontroller designed for the smart card reader market. The AT90SCR050 includes an Atmel AVR microcontroller, 16KB of ROM, USB FS 2.0 and smart card interface with an integrated DC/DC to support cards compliant with the EMV L1 requirement and ISO7816. These features offer designers a complete system solution to help bring their high-volume products to market at cost-effective price points.

The AT90SCR050 is a member of the AT90SCR range. With an Atmel AVR secure microcontroller embedded in these devices, customers can use the free AVR Studio and AVR JTAGICE Mkii that support all AVR-based microcontrollers. An evaluation kit, AT90SCR100MEB-01, is available for this device. AT90SCR050 samples are available now in QFN28 packages and QFN24 packages by special specific request only.

NXP Smart Switches Support HDMI 1.4 Specification

NXP Semiconductors has unveiled intelligent switches supporting the HDMI 1.4 specification. The NXP TDA19997 and TDA19998 smart switches support the Audio Return Channel (ARC) feature, an option introduced in the HDMI 1.4 release, which reduces the number of cables required to deliver audio upstream for processing and playback.

Building on the success of previous HDMI smart switches from NXP, the TDA19997 and TDA19998 include support for all mandatory 3D over HDMI features. NXP is the one of the first semiconductor companies to deliver silicon supporting HDMI 1.4. The Audio Return Channel specified in HDMI 1.4 enables HDTVs directly receiving audio and video content to send the audio stream to an amplification system over the HDMI cable, eliminating the need for an extra cable.

The NXP TDA19997 and TDA19998 smart switches also include built-in auto-adaptive equalisers that can handle up to four HDMI 1.4 inputs, automatically maintaining audiovisual quality over HDMI cables up to 30m in length. Their highly integrated design eliminates the need for external components, reducing the overall Bill of Materials for TV manufacturers, while delivering an enhanced viewing experience. The TDA19997 and TDA19998 are embedded with five EDID extensions for HDMI and VGA, as well as high levels of ESD protection.

The TDA19998 smart switches take advantage of NXP's F3 architecture, which guarantees fast port switching between HDMI devices while keeping a secured HDCP-protected HDMI stream at the output. The F3 architecture also enables best-in-class power efficiency of all systems in active and standby modes.

The NXP TDA19997 and TDA19998 comprise the second generation of NXP's HDMI smart switches, and are part of a portfolio of scalable solutions for the digital home, enabling TV makers to target a broad audience. The TDA19997 and TDA19998 are pin-to-pin compatible with previous generation smart switches from NXP and provide TV makers with flexibility in adapting to end-user demand. Engineering samples of the TDA19997 are available immediately from NXP.

Photonfocus Releases Pixel Professor Smart Camera

Photonfocus, a manufacturer of CMOS industrial cameras, has brought out the Pixel Professor CMOS Smart camera, featuring on-camera image pre-processing. The pre-processing in the camera enables the design of machine vision systems with distributed intelligence. Performing pre-processing on the camera reduces the vision system computer CPU load, meaning the vision system can run faster or use more sophisticated algorithms in the same time period, producing better results. The technology is scalable and can be fitted to a customer's application.

The Pixel Professor supports common image pre-processing operations in pipelined processors, such as convolution and non-linear filters, histograms, erosion and dilation, adaptive thresholding, image buffers, image arithmetic, colour space conversion, look-up tables (LUT), triangulation and others. Setting up the pre-processing unit on the Pixel Professor is made easy with a simple graphical user interface (GUI).

It allows for control loops and multiple passes. Customised operators can be implemented alongside standard operators. Alternating frame capture setups can be realised with an embedded sequencer to achieve maximum frame rates.

In-built pre-processing hardware in the camera removes the reliance on specialised frame grabbers or other hardware accelerators. The Pixel Professor cameras output pre-processed images via USB 2.0 or Gige. No frame grabbers are required. The benefits of the Pixel Professor cameras include: reduction of pre-processing time, which increases frame rate; enhanced algorithms with same CPU-load compared to software image processing; and real-time processing of up to 640 Mega pixel per second (Mps).