PROFINET Communications with an In-Sight Vision System

This section describes how to connect a Siemens PLC to an In-Sight vision system, using PROFINET IO communications. PROFINET IO allows an In-Sight vision system's inputs and outputs to be mapped into process memory in the Siemens PLC. Once these values have been established, they are synchronized at an interval defined by the update rate of the PROFINET IO system.

The examples in this section were written assuming that you are using the following components:

Component Description
PLC
  • Siemens S7-300 and S7-400 series PLC with PROFINET option: Supported in both Simatic Step 7 and TIA Portal.
  • Siemens S7-1200 and S7-1500: Supported only in TIA Portal.
Siemens Step 7 programming software
  • V2.3 GSD supports Simatic Step 7 v5.3 with SP3 or newer.
  • V2.34 GSD supports:
    • Simatic Step 7 v5.5 SP4 with reduced functionality*
    • Simatic Step 7 v5.6 SP1 or newer
TIA Portal
  • TIA Portal V15 supports V2.3 and V2.34 GSDs
  • TIA Portal V14 SP1 supports V2.3 and V2.34 GSDs, however Class B has reduced functionality* until Update 5 is installed.
*Reduced functionality: Some PROFINET Class B features are not available. Please refer to the Siemens PROFINET documentation for the features supported by the versions of Simatic Step 7.

The steps for configuring the connection depend on the In-Sight firmware version running on the In-Sight vision system. For more information, see Transferring Data With an In-Sight Vision System via PROFINET - In-Sight 4.x.x Firmware or Transferring Data With an In-Sight Vision System via PROFINET - In-Sight 5.x.x and Later Firmware.