TOP 10 list of Best and Worst HMI & SCADA

  • Thread starter Luciano Dell'Orfano - RTS Argentina
  • Start date
R

Ralph Mackiewicz

> How about instead of the worst ten, somebody just LIST eleven SCADA packages, period.<

I get the point but:

Rockwell - RsView
Intellution - Fix
Wonderware - InTouch
Iconics - Genesis
GEF - Cimplicity
USDATA - FactoryLink
Siemens - WinCC
Citect
ARC - PCVue
Adroit
Alstom - eTerra
National - Lookout
Software Horizons - OI2000
Nematron - Paragon
Hathaway - TIS4000

That's 15 without a diligent Internet search. If we can identify the worst 10 that will get us the 5 best won't it? We will need to identify 5 more suppliers in order to come up with the 10 best! ;-)

Regards,

Regards,
Ralph Mackiewicz
SISCO, Inc.
 
M
RSView
CiTect
FactoryLink
Fix/Mx32
WinCC
Intouch
Cimplicity
Aprol (Linux based SCADA from PCC)
AutomationX (Windows and Linux based SCADA and control)
Accos
Elipse
Lookout
Monitor Pro
AccesPoint (Linux SCADA)
RView
Modcomp (Linux)
Prodigy

I'm sure there are more I just can't think of any.
 
G

Greg Goodman

> How about instead of the worst ten, somebody just LIST eleven SCADA
> packages, period.
>
> There is a point in there!

Here's a list off the top of my head, in roughly the order I encountered them professionally.

Intellution Fix
Wonderware InTouch
Wizcon
Afcon P-CIM
Scadabase (formerly Accesspoint) - SCADA for Unix/Linux
RealFlex - SCADA for QNX from BJ Software
USData FactoryLink
Iconics Genesis
GE Cimplicity
Citect
Elipse
InduSoft Studio
AutomationX

These run the gamut from current best-sellers and relatively recent introductions to long-in-the-tooth packages still available but whose heyday has passed.

There are plenty more, including general-purpose VB-and-Windows-based offerings from smaller companies like Parijat, and larger (often
industry-specific) products like those from Honeywell (PlantScape), Valmet/Neles/Metso (OSSyS, OpenVECTOR) and ABB (MicroSCADA).

I do not have any useful judgement to offer about which is "best" or "worst". I agree with Joe's assessment that an individual, with expertise in at most a handful of different packages, isn't in a position to make that call. I know I'm not.

Greg Goodman
Chiron Consulting
 
Just a point about SCADA packages which I've failed to read in this thread of any comments on connectivity to different I/O devices!!!

My experience for something different in here, has been heavily with Citect SCADA. I am most impressed that Citect can talk to numerous I/O Devices and have a well documented knowledge base, user list, and online / offline support, which does have issues of its own at times.

If you are trying to integrate many DIFFERENT brand I/O devices somehow and have a common SCADA operator interface, Citect would be hard to pass up as a solution. Yes you can probably use OPC servers for a lot of I/O devices out there and just use an OPC client to collect the information, but if you want reliability, Citect write inhouse Citect drivers for most popular PLCs, THAT ARE BUNDLED WITH THE SOFTWARE! Yes there are bugs that EVERYONE finds as you get heavily involved in the implementation of the project as a whole, but you DO work around them if not have them fixed eventually by Citect support. Yes,licensing is expensive too, but I guess not without reason ;)

RELIABIITY: Only as good as the PC you run the software on and the OS you are using on it! We've tried running Citect SCADA main I/O servers on winNT on standard desktop PCs but that was a joke, not to mention limited HD space. We've moved on to IBM eServer X240 machines, with 140gB storage data drives for trends and reports/eventing, and have never looked back since and now have reliability.

My other experiences with operator interfaces have been Allen Bradley Plant floor terminal T35 and ABB Masterview, siemens OP27 and TD17s. You can't even rate the T35 as it is that old I'd bet hardly anyone in here has heard of it! ABB, the worst of anykind ever, it has to be. Not even a PC based system, implementation is tedious and handling some instances of backups are pathetic.

As a technical officer at a steelworks site, I'm not one to judge like many others in here whats worst and whats best, but alot of the time your job is to make what you've got WORK how you want it to, and to make it reliable.

Yes, I do prefer to standardise and keep one brand instead of building up a "peace-mill" system, each time a new project comes along that needs a HMI on our plant, I always push to integrate it into our existing Citect SCADA system, as there are advantages over buying the latest and greatest "other" HMI packages mentioned in this list.

In a nutshell: standardisation, long term trending/eventing, speed and reliability, ease of maintaining the system (configuration and backups), and open connectivity are what I look for and will always look for in a HMI/SCADA.

> Here's a list off the top of my head, in roughly the order I encountered them professionally.
>
> Intellution Fix
> Wonderware InTouch
> Wizcon
> Afcon P-CIM
> Scadabase (formerly Accesspoint) - SCADA for Unix/Linux
> RealFlex - SCADA for QNX from BJ Software
> USData FactoryLink
> Iconics Genesis
> GE Cimplicity
> Citect
> Elipse
> InduSoft Studio
> AutomationX
<clip>
 
B

Brian E Boothe

Just asking BUT why is RS-View On that LIST and WHY do you rank it a WORST product in ANY Automation??? its the #1 USED SCADA/ Programming software on the planet.. i'd like to hear oppions
 
G

George Robertson

Nicely done!

Don't forget Genesis!
Also, is Opto still giving away free SCADA?

Is Paragon still around?

Sales guys, how about it?


George G. Robertson, P.E.
Manager of Engineering
Saulsbury E & C
[email protected]
(915) 366-4252
 
Two more I can think of are:

Hilco's Monitrol/UX (HP/UX SCADA/Control/MES) - What happened to them?
Advantech Studio

Joe Manns
Arden Environmental Engineering Inc.
3550 Lexington Ave. N
Shoreview, MN 55126
Ph 651-484-5415
Fax 651-484-5568
 
And one more too:

Metso Automation's OASyS (Used to be Valmet, and before that Sentrol)

Joe Manns
Arden Environmental Engineering Inc.
3550 Lexington Ave. N
Shoreview, MN 55126
Ph 651-484-5415
Fax 651-484-5568
 
W

WILLIAM CARRILLO

Add to the list:

Metso Automation Oasys
FlexWin (Realflex's windows NT alter-ego)
Siemens Sinaut Sprectrum
Foxboro Foxscada

William Carrillo
Scada/application Engineer
PDVSA
 
C
Since when does most used or most popular equate to best?
In my experience it seems to be the exception rather than the rule.
Is the X86 line of processors the best?
Is RS232 the best serial interface?
Is proprietary software the best for the user?

Regards

cww
 
I think you missed a beat here, Brian. Ralph was just answering the challenge to list *any* ten HMI's. And we have all noted that that no one has actually used enough current HMI's to make a 10 best or 10 worst list. The trade journals seem to be able to sort this out ( just kidding ).

In keeping with the "Late Night" spirit of this, here is my top ten list of silly HMI features, or the lack there of. ( Not meant to be negative, this list can easily be turned around into a best features list. )

10) The HMI won't let you enter an expression into a field field that animates a tag.

9 ) The HMI vendor makes you buy a comprehensive support package before letting you download the fixes to a product you just purchased.

8 ) The HMI won't let you select subobjects within a composite object without first breaking the composite object.

7 ) The HMI vendor makes you call the distributer, who has little detailed technical knowledge of the product, and couldn't fix a problem even he did, for support.

6 ) Zoom and/or snap-to-grid work in such a bizzare way that they are useless.

5) The HMI won't let you block a point or "take it off-scan" and alter its value for graphical testing or alarm blocking.

4) The HMI sales rep wastes your time showing you how his ActiveX graphics can be pasted into a Word document.

3) The HMI won't let you display and individually acknowledge the most recent alarm.

2) The HMI does not store or document the format of its configuration and historical data files in any user accessible manner.

1 ) The HMI vendor supplies a complimentary mouse pad or CD case. I want a T-Shirt ! ( size: XL, fabric: thick cotton ). I may return your product with these compliments, but I will keep and wear your T-Shirt.

JK
 
G

George Robertson

I don't think he meant it as a worst. He was just answering my challenge to name any ten, not just poor ten.

George G. Robertson, P.E.
Manager of Engineering
Saulsbury E & C
grobertson(AT)si-tx.com
(915) 366-4252
 
First it is a question of the application. For some simple applications probably the listed scadas are too expensive and good.

For some applications like plants, pipelines etc, they are not good enough.

Can anybody give me a site where to find a table-list of scadas with technical details that are relevant in estimating the quality of scada and optional packages like trainers, leak detection package etc, quality and price.

Regards,

H. Zelenka
 
B
Depends on your definition of best. Something that is commonly available, and inexpensive often indeed turns out to best suit the variety of needs. For instance, RS232 is fairly slow and not particularly noise immune, but it is cheap, widely available, and easy to work with. It has its limitations, but within those limitations it could easily turn out to indeed be the "best"
solution of the available options, once all the factors weigh in.

Bob Peterson
 
D

Donald Pittendrigh

Hi All
I just attended a Wonderware presentation, they are very perceptive about their market share and defend it fervently, the figures they quoted to substantiate their dominant position in the market place rather had them ahead of RSview by a long chalk!!!

Personally I dont know the RSview product as it is a little out of my area but it is interesting that you claim it is #1 on the planet.

Cheers DP
 
R

Ralph Mackiewicz

> I don't think he meant it as a worst. He was just answering my
> challenge to name any ten, not just poor ten.

Yes (actually you asked for 11). And, I was being a little sarcastic (as usual) in observing that any list of the worst 10 will inevitably consist of the most popular 10. Therefore, if you pick the "worst" 10 the remaining "best" 10 would likely be the most obscure 10 too. I wouldn't be surprised at all that, with a little work, you could identify 30 or more such packages that are available world-wide. As someone else pointed out previously, using this unscientific method for identifying the worst of these is likely a pointless exercise. Only the most obscure packages will likely not get a vote for the worst. In fact, I wouldn't at all be surprised to find the list of the best 10, the worst 10, and the top 10 in market share to be identical to each other.

Regards, Ralph Mackiewicz SISCO, Inc.
 
B
> First it is a question of the application. For some simple applications
> probably the listed scadas are too expensive and good.

For simple applications there are more economical versions available that allow only a small number of tags. I seriously doubt anyone could create his own SCADA package for anything like what you can buy it for. Even a full version package is less than $10k for the ones I am familiar with, thats only a few weeks of my time at our billing rate, and there is no way I (or anyone else) could ever create all this functionality in that amount of time, nor maintain it economically (an activity that probably costs more than creating it in the first place).

For some simple applications you might be able to cobble up something on the cheap in VB or C (or whatever), but no enduser in his right mind is going to accept it. The long term costs of supporting and maintaining it will just be too high.

> For some applications like plants, pipelines etc, they are not good
> enough.

They run a LOT of plants, and I'd be willing to bet more than a few pipelines. They are not DCS systems, if that is what you are trying to imply, but in combination with appropriate PLCs they do a pretty fair job of controlling just about anything.

> Can anybody give me a site where to find a table-list of scadas with
> technical details that are relevant in estimating the quality of scada
> and optional packages like trainers, leak detection package etc, quality
> and price.

Quality is in the eye of the beholder, but the likelyhood is that any package still around and doing OK after a few years isprobably adequate to the task. All the packages have bugs, and all have quirks.

Technical details, options, and training options are readily available from the rep or distributor, or the manufacturer's website. For pricing you usually have to see you friendly rep or distributor. Keep in mind that the list price is not the price you should expect to pay unless you are after a single license. And most packages have all kinds of web based "view only" options available at dirt cheap prices on a per seat basis. Some packages include drivers in the base costs, some charge extra for some or all drivers. Some include things in the base system, that others charge extra for. You will have to do some digging to find out what is important to you.

Bob Peterson
 
C
Hi Bob

Indeed. But none of those would be better or worse
simply by virtue of being popular. And the common
understanding of popular doesn't even necessarily
apply here because BrandX SCADA is often very
popular in a BrandX shop for reasons other than
intrinsic merit. To say that GM camshafts are
popular in GM cars isn't really saying much.

Regards

cww
 
A

Anthony Kerstens

I've avoided saying anything since Wonderware is the only SCADA package I have any significant experience with. However, I will say having dealt with both WW support and Rockwell support (for other software), I would prefer to stay with WW than even think about using a Rockwell product.
 
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