6 Reasons TIA Portal DOMINATES Simatic Manager: A Comprehensive Step 7 Comparison in PLC Programming

[@simxschl]

Cool video and definitely worth a Like! Also, after a few years working with TIA I'm finally at the state where I don't want to go back to SIMATIC any more - mostly because of the missing intelliSense :D Still I'd disagree on a few points there: #2: in my opinion it's a huge drawback that we can't download a single block by itself without downloading the others any more. Working in the process automation it's crucial to not lose information in the data blocks and now I have to constantly ask my customer to stop the production for small changes in FBs oder UDTs (even renaming a variable!) where with SIMATIC manager we would have ignored that one DB as long as the new structure still has the same length and would download it the next time there's a downtime anyway. #4: you totally could to Debug\Operation -> activate Test Operation and then again under Debug\Call Environment select the path you'd like to watch. Even more: back in the days one could monitor both akkumulators, both address registers and both DBs, now in TIA only akku 1 is showing which makes debugging way more complicated sometimes. Some other things I miss coming from SIMATIC: - watch table can't be detached from the TIA portal and hovered over other windows (like my PCS) any more, - can't open two or more projects next to each other and copy blocks both ways, - can't easily work with projects that were created with a different version of STEP7 , - can't create a bunch of dummy variables in my DB and rename them later as needed to keep my DB "watchable" any more, - can't see the offsets in my UDT any more so need to go between UDT and DB over and over again to adjust offset starting addresses in DB header, - can't simply delete a line of code to make the OB/FB/FC "watchable" again - change is change and I need to perform a download first, ... yeah, there's a few more. So, TIA is still far from perfect but there are some improvements. And have I already mentioned IntelliSense? xD Crazy how that's not a default feature in so many PLC IDEs

[@PLCskilltree]

Awesome response Maxim 🤘

[@PLCskilltree]

#2 why do you need to download a single block? TIA automatically shows you which blocks are inconsistent and only downloads what is necessary. With Simatic Manager, you had to keep track of those things yourselves so much easier to forget a download and make the program online incorrect

[@PLCskilltree]

Why do you need to stop production? 😃 a download does not require a PLC cycle. If you’re worried about multi-instances and a small change affecting more blocks, then use single instances instead

[@PLCskilltree]

#4 you are correct but this is much more complicated than in TIA Portal and your cycle time is not being monitored in test operation as far as I remember, so I would feel a bit hesitant to use this during production

[@PLCskilltree]

You can definitely open 2 TIA projects next to each other and copy blocks. I do this all the time. I do think they need to be the same TIA version but else there’s no caveats 😀

[@Red_Pill_Matrix]

Very easy to follow your teachings. Thanks!

[@PLCskilltree]

Thanks, I try my best 😃

[@davidmurray1878]

you have an on delay time in your function block but you want to try a different value maybe from 75ms t0 5 seconds. then keep those changes when you find a comfortable fit. but temporary at first and on a live system.

[@PLCskilltree]

Sure you can do that online without PLC going into stop

[@elnursucayev6625]

thank you . very gooood explanation

[@GeorgeMan_1981]

I agreed but I would add 7th and important: In the Tia portal you can configure PC/HMI also, which is not possible for manager, there you have to configure it in wincc explorer

[@PLCskilltree]

Thanks for sharing 🙏

[@kabilslimen4701]

Thanks

[@davidmurray1878]

does the online program continue to run during the download? is it a live edit

[@PLCskilltree]

Depends. For small network edits (e.g. extra instructions in your ladder logic), PLC does not go in stop. When you start changing UDTs or DBs, it might go in to stop. But it will always tell you before it does. So you can decide not to go through with it.

[@davidmurray1878]

i have a floating license for v16 but one of my customers has v14. I have 2 days left on a v14 trial. cant my v16 run v14?

[@PLCskilltree]

It will update the V14 to V16. Afterwards it will stay V16. Normally you should use the version of the customer.

[@Nur_Md._Mohiuddin_Chy._Toha]

👍👍👍👍👍👍

[@ralphmcguire7668]

*Promosm* 🙋