The Simple and Sophisticated Ways Industrial PCs
Protect Themselves against Shock and Vibration
Inside their hard metal cases, PCs contain an array of components and a rotating hard disk. These delicate parts are all at risk of malfunctioning or breaking altogether if the PC is knocked by shocks or vibrations.
Industrial PCs, however, use a combination of simple and sophisticated solutions to protect themselves from external impacts. These enable them to continue operating reliably in harsh environments, such as in a manufacturing plant or on an oil rig.
The risks posed by shocks and vibrations
A shock is defined as a single sudden impact, whilst vibrations are a continuous chain of varying knocks. Both pose serious risks to a PC’s reliability.1
Shocks can immediately cause plug in cards or connectors to come loose. Whereas vibrations cause gradual damage to the leads connecting components, such as capacitors and inductors, and can cause them to eventually break. In extreme cases vibrations can make screws come loose and motherboards become unseated.2
If any of these things were to occur then the PC will either malfunction or break down altogether, which means lost production time whilst the PC is fixed or replaced.
Shocks and vibrations also pose a severe risk to the data on delicate hard disks rotating at high speed. If the hard disk is knocked then it can cause the spindle to fall out of synch with the platter. Should this occur then the hard disk will be unable to read data or write it to the correct part of the disk, causing it to become corrupted.3
When they’re being used in harsh industrial environments, PCs need to be designed to withstand shocks and vibrations so they can operate reliably and accurately process data.
Simple and advanced solutions
A simple and effective solution for protecting components and leads from coming loose is to attach them to the motherboard with metal springs.4 These provide more flexibility and leeway to the vibrations from surrounding machinery. Spring loaded fasteners can also be used for larger components, such as heat sinks, in replacement of conventional nuts and bolts.5
With hard disks being so complex and delicate, a more advanced solution is needed. Modern industrial PCs now incorporate solid state drives (SSD) instead of a conventional hard disk. SSDs are based on flash drive technology and offer far greater reliability because of the absence of moving parts.7
Originally used by the military because of their superior reliability, SSDs enable data to be read and written at high speed without the risk of it becoming corrupted by shocks or vibrations. 6
The superior stability offered by SSD technology enables industrial PCs to be designed with a much higher tolerance to impacts than conventional PCs, and reduce the risk of production being halted due to a malfunctioning PC.
1http://www.chassis-plans.com/white_paper_shock_and_vibration.html
2http://www.chassis-plans.com/white_paper_shock_and_vibration.html
3http://www.chassis-plans.com/white_paper_shock_and_vibration.html
4http://www.industrial-panel-computer.com/industrial_pc_home.html
5http://www2.electronicproducts.com/Choosing_a_heat-sink-attachment_system-article-advanced-aug2005-html.aspx
6http://blog.pcnews.ro/2008/01/03/raid-ready-ssd-solution/
7http://blog.pcnews.ro/2008/01/03/raid-ready-ssd-solution/
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