PCI communication cards

July 2003 PLCs, DCSs & Controllers Information Security

A range of PCI communication cards with speeds of up to 921,6 Kbps is available from ProMicro. I/O addressing is automatically assigned by the PCI plug-and-play capability. The board requires only one PCI slot within the PC and provides independent serial channels. All channels are addressed in a continuous 32 byte I/O block for simplified software access and all channels may share one PCI interrupt. An interrupt status register is available for determining the interrupt source.

The PCI-1601/20 range is supplied as two-, four-, and eight-port configurations with standard 16PCI954 UARTs containing 128 byte FIFOs that greatly reduce CPU load. This makes the cards ideal for heavy-duty, multitasking environments.

Optical couplers offering electrical isolation of up to 3000 V d.c. protects the PC and equipment against ground loops, increasing system reliability in harsh environments. Optional surge protection is available to protect equipment against high voltage surges of up to 2500 V d.c.

A function library provides over 50 easy-to-use APIs especially designed for serial communication. The RS485 network with automatic data flow control utilises the RS232 software which automatically senses the direction of incoming data and switches its transmission direction accordingly, making it look and act like an RS232 network.

For more information contact Elton Prytz, ProMicro, 011 706 7913, [email protected], www.promicro.co.za

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