Performance Tuning

OPC is a standard protocol that is widely used in industrial automation systems. OPC is chosen for use to simplify and standardize PLC communication.

The OPC communications solution is based on an OPC DA server called OFS. OFSOPC is a dedicated driver implemented for Plant SCADA that connects the SCADA system to OFS.

Communicating with PLCs through OFS

The performance of the communications between a Plant SCADA system and a PLC through OFS involves many factors other than just the driver, because of the number of components involved.

These components, each of which could be a bottleneck, are:

• PLC: depending on the firmware/hardware, the limitations may vary. The cycle time of the application may also have a large impact on the communications performance, because the PLC will process a predefined maximum number of requests per cycle.

• Network (PLC/OFS)

• OFS server: depending on its configuration and the application, OFS can be very demanding of CPU usage.

• OFSOPC Driver: depending on its configuration, it can affect the speed of communications.

These tuning suggestions only deals with the OFS/OFSOPC driver communications. For tuning other components, please refer to other relevant documents or specifications.

See Also

Tuning Parameters