Best Laptop Setup for Controls

CLanford

Member
Join Date
May 2017
Location
Charlotte, NC
Posts
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Hi everyone.

I am starting out on my own and am searching for the best laptop to use for my newly formed controls business. I've been doing industrial controls for a while, but it's always been with company laptops.
I told myself that when I struck out on my own, I'd go with a VM set up for all of my software and licensing so I wouldnt be suffering from the "golden laptop" syndrome. I could just clone the VM and spin it up on another machine if something ever happened on my physical machine.
I have a few questions pertaining to this endeavor:

1) What's the best laptop thats durable for factory use and still has enough physical ports to work with lots of peripheral devices? It seems that native ethernet ports are disappearing on newer machines, and even USB A ports are going the way of the dodo. With so much stuff out there that still uses serial, I need a good serial to USB adapter as most of the reliable ones are only USB type A to serial.

2) What are your thoughts on the best VM software to use? I'll need to be able to pass through all of that physical IO easily, including the USB to serial.

3) Any ideas on good cloning software for the laptop? My thoughts are that since I'll have the VM, I'll have its image stored on a backup SSD to dump onto another machine if needed. But some software may not be VM compatible so I may need to install directly on the PC. Hence the potential need to clone and recover quickly. Any suggestions for software here?

Thanks for your insight!
 
my laptop is a Dell Latitude 5420 Rugged
win 10 pro, 64 bit
16 gb ram, I5 cpu @ 1.9 ghz
15 inch screen
2 batteries so no cd player.
3- usb ports
usb - c port
memory card port
Serial port
HMDI port
Ethernet port
Bluetooth capable
WIFI installed
My personal laptop is a Toshiba 855.
they quit making laptops, too bad - i love mine!
regards,
james
 
It is indeed hard to find sturdy laptops with several physical ports nowadays. I can't really recommend any, as mine is average (standard Lenovo thinkpad with 1 RJ45, only 2 USB, unfit for dusty environments). If you plan on using VMs, make sure you have enough RAM (16GB is good).

As for the VM software, I'm using Oracle VirtualBox. Assigning physical peripherals to a VM is easy (a dropdown menu is available in the VM toolbar).
VMware is another popular option that most-likely includes this feature. Regardless of what you choose, many tutorials and help topics are available online.

I use VMs with Rockwell (Logix v17 to v32, FTView v7 to v12) and Siemens (TIA Portal v13 to v15.1) software. So far I haven't encountered any issues. It works with both brands whether I physically connect to the PLC or do it remotely (by using a VPN service I launch on my host computer).


Hope this helps (y)
 
I am starting out on my own

Congrats! its fun, scary, joyful, stressful and every other kind of emotion all before lunch

I got this about a year ago and have been happy, running a VM on it

Dell Precision 5540 15.6" laptop i9-9880H, 32GB RAM, 512GB SSD, Quadro T2000

I also got these https://www.bestbuy.com/site/samsun...encryption-titan-gray/6408296.p?skuId=6408296

Now that said... I got a new desk top not that long ago and it has two CPU's one run the OS and the other runs all the app and I love it, from full shut down it take less than 20 sec to boot up, so if you can get one with two CPU's get it
 
My last couple have been Dell Precisions and I like the 17" screens for ladders and CAD.

After mucking around with other brands I stick with Dell and have only once needed to use the warranty service.

I purchase a new one every 3-4 years with the old ones becoming backups, I have 2 right now, and donate the ones older than that.
 
Thanks for the information, everyone! I have been leaning toward the Dell Precisions or Latitudes, so it sounds like I'm on the right track. I also use the Samsung portable SSD's for image and file backups so I'll be sure to get my hands on one of those as well.

I have some experience with VirtualBox, but it's been mainly to run old Windows XP VM's to make changes to old VB6 Scadas. I'll probably stick to that. Haven't passed physical IO through it but it looks pretty straightforward.

Thanks
 
It seems that native ethernet ports are disappearing on newer machines, and even USB A ports are going the way of the dodo.
Both of these are absolute requirements in my book.

2) What are your thoughts on the best VM software to use? I'll need to be able to pass through all of that physical IO easily, including the USB to serial.
We are using VMWare Workstation.
Attaching USB devices is generally not a problem, except for USB3 devices that can be temperamental. Forcing them to work as USB2 by plugging in a USB2 only port usually works. The behavior of USB3 devices seems to change with every VMWare version change.
 
My last company laptop was a Dell Precision M4800 that served me very well until Windows 10 (no drivers for the older hardware). My current one is an HP zBook. I'd be happy with either, though the battery did better on the Dell. And the Dell has an internal CD drive.



I strongly second the idea of using VMs. I use VMWare but have used VirtualBox personally before. Keep in mind that Rockwell officially supports VMWare but not VirtualBox. As far as I know, Siemens supports neither but I never had issues with Simatic Manager or Portal in VMWare. At least, no issues due to them being inside VMs...



Max out your RAM. Seriously. 16GB is good, more is better. I have 32GB in mine. 16GB works very well if you're running a VM, but 32 lets me run 3 at a time while also running AutoCAD.


Get a SSD for your OS and a second internal SSD for your VMs. Get a big one. For the OS, "normal" size is fine but you want at least 1TB of space for your VMs, more is better. However many VMs you think you need, you'll end up using more once you realize how flexible they are. If you can't get 2 drives in there, get one really big one. On my HP, the OS is on a 512GB PCIe SSD; second unit is a 2TB SATA SSD. Neither should be a super expensive upgrade. In the Dell, I originally added an mSATA drive until water damage killed it. I then ported the OS over to a 2TB SATA drive that's still in there and going strong.


Bottom line: Lots of RAM, Lots of SSD, at least a reasonable processor. And, of course, the ports you need. More USB ports is better, on both sides of the laptop if possible.



So far, the only automation programs I've had to install on my host PC are the license managers (Rockwell and Siemens) so multiple VMs can access the licenses and Red Lion Crimson when I have to use USB to transfer to a G3 HMI with a firmware update (bricked one once when it had trouble re-connecting to the VM after rebooting during flashing, which was a pain to recover...and also needed their utility installed on the host). Everything else lives in VMs that are backed up to an external HD.
 
So far, the only automation programs I've had to install on my host PC are the license managers (Rockwell and Siemens) so multiple VMs can access the licenses

Can you elaborate on what you have to do to use the license manager on the host PC? Is it difficult to point FT Activation Manager and the License Manger for Portal to the host PC outside of the VM for licensing?
 
Can you elaborate on what you have to do to use the license manager on the host PC? Is it difficult to point FT Activation Manager and the License Manger for Portal to the host PC outside of the VM for licensing?

I believe Ken Roach has covered how to do this, but was unable to find his post. I am sure someone who is more search savvy could find it or maybe Ken could share it again.
I believe it involved making a network connection to the host that was only used for getting the activations, and a second network for connecting to the outside world.
 
I don't think I have used a native ethernet port in years. My StarTech.com USB to Gig Ethernet adapter has been my go to for years.
I sometime have to be on 2 LAN networks at the same time. In that case I use the integrated port and a USB-to-ethernet adapter.
Also, I have had at least one USB-to-ethernet go bad. I am imagining (maybe without reason) that the integrated port is better protected against voltage peaks. It is good to have both options. If one goes bad you have the other as fallback.
 
Can you elaborate on what you have to do to use the license manager on the host PC? Is it difficult to point FT Activation Manager and the License Manger for Portal to the host PC outside of the VM for licensing?




Quick and dirty:
1a) Install Factory Talk Activation Manager on the host and inside each VM. Try to get the latest version you can, just so you don't have to worry about versioning for a while. They'll say they need to match, but I've had the VM version be much newer than the host's before with no issues...until there are issues. Then upgrading the host would sort it out.

1b) Do whatever you have to do to get your licenses hosted to your host PC and visible in the host's FTAM.

2) Inside VMWare, go to the Virtual Machine Settings.

3) At the bottom of the dialog box, click "Add..." and select "Network Adapter" and "Finish".
4) In the list of hardware devices, find that network adapter and set it to Host-only. Check "Connected" and "Connect at power on".
5) Close the settings ("OK" button) and run your VM.
6) Get to the network adapter settings inside Windows. Identify the IP address of the host-only adapter. I generally rename it "LAN-Licenses" too, just so I know which adapter is which.



The following steps may look a little different, depending on your version of FTAM

7) Open Factory Talk Activation Manager inside the VM
8) Open the "Manage Activations" tab.
9) Above the "Path to Activations" box, click the "Update Activation Search Path" link
10) Click the "Add Server" button. In the new line, type in the IP address of the host PC on the host-only network. In VMWare, it will be the same IP address as the VM's local adapter but with "1" as the last octet. For example, on my current setup, my VM is 192.168.75.254 so the search path is 192.168.75.1.
Note: if you have multiple VMs on the same host, each with a host-only adapter, they will all be on the same subnet and can ping each other. The host will always be at x.x.x.1 with the guests set to DHCP.

11) Click "Save" to close the "Update Activation Search Path" dialog box
12) Click "Refresh Activations". The licenses you have on the host should show up in the list.



Steps 1-6 will be the same for Siemens Automation License Manager. The steps within the license manager are a little different but pretty straightforward. I don't have access to that software any more so I can't help you there.
 
I sometime have to be on 2 LAN networks at the same time. In that case I use the integrated port and a USB-to-ethernet adapter.
Also, I have had at least one USB-to-ethernet go bad. I am imagining (maybe without reason) that the integrated port is better protected against voltage peaks. It is good to have both options. If one goes bad you have the other as fallback.


Likewise. I have a small 4-port USB hub with an external power supply that I carry with me as well. And a USB NIC that I use most of the time, leaving the built in port set to DHCP for the company LAN since our wifi isn't reliable here.
 
Thank you for the information, joseph_e2. It was the NIC settings between the host and VM that probably would have kicked my butt had I not had this information up front. I appreciate the explanation.

As far the the USB NIC's go, I've had tons of issues with getting constantly kicked offline on some older CompactLogix processors while connected to ethernet over USB, so I'm kinda skittish about having it. But yall are right; in the instance that I need to be connected to multiple LAN's physically, I won't have much choice so I better get used to it :)

Thanks again
 

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