PICS FAQ

PICS FAQs and Troubleshooting

PICS General

I have a system that will be solely dedicated for PICS use. However it is a 386/33 MHz. Will PICS run on this machine?

The CPU on a 386 is not powerful enough. The hardware requirements are a 486/66 MHz with 6 MB of hard disk space. If you have not purchased a system yet, consider a Pentium with 16 MB hard disk space (32MB if running under NT). With this type of machine you will have optimal PICS performance.

I keep getting overflow errors in my ladder logic even though I want to use 16-bit unsigned data.

If you turn the Report Arithmetic Errors Option OFF (File/Options/Report Arithmetic Errors) these messages will no longer appear. However, you might want to find out why you are getting these messages.

Why do I have hatching over my device when I simulate?

If an attempt is made to download a device which is invalid (i.e., it fails project validation), cross hatching is superimposed on the device. Generally this is caused by improper device parameter wiring.

Why do I have a red X over my device?

If a device currently in the solver (i.e., it has been downloaded) is wired to a variable or a device parameter that does not exist in the solver, the device is superimposed with a red X. Usually this is caused by the deletion of a variable or device that one of the X’ed device’s parameters is wired to.

What does Error code: 2 mean when using batch logging?
(Error message: !Could not open TDF file "c:\PICS\FLAT.TDF". Error code: 2)

This error occurs if you try to use Batch Logging without selecting a Batch Variable in the Logger Properties.

My computer does not see the key on the parallel port. I get the message "key not found."

Do you have any other keys on your parallel port? If so remove the other keys and have only the PICS key on the parallel port and try again. If the key can be read, then reinstall the other key, making sure that your PICS key is the last key in the chain (i.e., farthest from the computer) and try again.

If PICS is the only key on your parallel port and it cannot be read, try to determine if your parallel port is working. You can do this by attaching a printer to the parallel port and printing a document. It is possible that the parallel port is not enabled or is not configured correctly. The port modes we suggest using are ECP and IBM/AT or compatible mode. This port mode can be set or modified in the CMOS setup.

If you know that your parallel port is working properly from the above test, call SST customer support and ask them to e-mail you the Find program. It is a stand-alone program written by Rainbow Technologies, the company that manufactures the key you are using, for finding the key on your parallel port. If this program cannot find your key then take the Find program and your key to another computer (different brand and processor would be good) and try the test on the different computer. If the key still cannot be read from the other computer then we must assume that the key is faulty. Contact SST technical support and we will arrange for the key to be replaced. The incidence of bad keys is very low.

I installed the PICS disks with no error messages. When I attempt to open an existing project or create a new one I get the following error message: "LD caused a General Protection Fault in MFC0250.DLL @ 0005:30DD." What do I do from here?

There are a number of things you can try:

Run LD stand-alone (you can find LD.EXE in the PICS\Bin directory).
Run PICS again.
The system file MFC0250.DLL could have somehow become corrupted. Copy the system files back, making sure NOT to replace files with dates greater than ours. You may need to contact SST technical support for this information.
Reinstall your Windows operating system.

What can I do to prevent an application or parts of applications from disappearing when I go from multiple monitors back to a single monitor under Windows 98?

If you have multiple monitors set up and decide to return to a single monitor setup, make sure you move all applications and components from any secondary monitor(s) back to the primary monitor. By taking this step you prevent the applications from opening in the secondary monitor which is no longer there.

What can I do to improve overall video resolution and color depth settings when using multiple monitors under Windows 98?

To avoid possible conflicts with video resolution and color depth settings, choose the same type of monitors and video cards. By using the same type of monitor and video adapters you avoid problems with matching screen area and colors for your computer.

Allen-Bradley 1771 Remote I/O Driver

I get a message that "Card 5136-SD did not initialize properly" when I run PICS in a new computer under Windows 3.1. What do I do?

Check if there is a memory conflict with other hardware or software.

Check the CMOS setup. In a computer with AMI Plug and Play BIOS, in the advanced setup section, you must set the ISA shared memory size to match the size of the area to be occupied by the card; for example, 32K. You must also set the ISA shared memory base address to match the memory address of the card; for example, D000.

Is the card is at the default memory address of D000? Check if you add x=D000-D7FF to the end of the line in your config.sys file that reads: DEVICE=C:\windows\EMM386.EXE x=D000-D7FF. For this example, add: EmmEclude=D000-D7FF in the [386Enh] section of the SYSTEM.INI file.

No communication at all? Questions and Hints

Are you connected to the remote I/O port on the PLC?

Is the PLC channel configured as a remote I/O scanner?

Is the channel set for the right baud rate?

Are the wires the correct way round? Line 1 should be connected to the top pin on the card.

Check for shorts in the cable, shield, fine braid wire shorting to signal wire, etc.

If you do an auto-configure in the PLC, does it see the PICS racks? You must create or assign an I/O status file before you can do an auto-configure successfully and PICS must be simulating.

Cycle power in the PLC and see if the problem goes away.

If you remove the cable from the PLC, the remote I/O error LED should come on. If it doesn't, the PLC isn't trying to communicate with remote I/O.

Make sure that the scan of your simulated rack(s) in the PLC is not inhibited.

Check the addressing mode. For example, if you have ½ slot addressing and a 16-slot rack, racks 0,1,2,3 are local.

Intermittent communication problems?

There is a popular misconception that if the cable is short, you do not need terminators. In fact, the opposite is true. The terminators are there to eliminate reflections from the end of the cable. On a short cable, the amplitude of the reflection from a non-terminated end is actually larger.

Check termination. The physical ends of the network should be terminated. There should be two and only two terminators on the network.
Make sure one of the channels in the PLC isn't configured for adapter mode. If it is, it uses some of the I/O for adapter status.

Some racks are not communicating?

The racks are local. Check the PLC addressing mode (2-slot, etc.).

Make sure the rack is not inhibited in the PLC.

Cycle power in the PLC.

On some PLCs, you have to manually create part of the I/O files. For example, on a 5/25 the default input and output files only go up to rack 3 so you must manually create the area for racks up to rack 7.

Problems with block transfers?

Make sure location and length in PICS match what is used in the BTR and BTW instructions in the PLC. If it is a read in the PLC, it should be a read in PICS.

You cannot use length 0 in the PLC.

You cannot have an output module at the same location as the block transfer. If the PLC is setting output variables at the same place as the block transfer, the block transfer will not operate correctly.

Why are there multiple cards within an Allen-Bradley I/O connection?

You use a different I/O connection for each PLC that PICS communicates with.

Within that I/O connection, you sometimes need to use more than one card because the PLC has multiple I/O channels and will not let you configure all the racks the PLC supports on just one channel. An example would be a PLC-3 where the PLC supports up to 32 remote racks and there are four I/O channels. The PLC will not let you configure more than 16 racks on any one channel, so you need a separate card for each channel. This is also true for some models of PLC-5.

Modicon 800 Series/Quantum I/O Driver

I want to set up my I/O connection for the Modicon S/908 Remote I/O. I want to talk over Quantum I/O but when I try to select it with either real or virtual drops settings the Edit and Delete keys are grayed out. I cannot configure the drops.

When you are simulating Quantum I/O, once you have done the configuration in the PLC and start to simulate PICS loads in the appropriate drop configurations from the PLC. If you want to edit the configurations, you should edit your PLC configuration before starting PICS simulation. (See the Modicon S908 Remote I/O Driver Manual).

What are the various states of the LEDs on the 5136-MOD card while using PICS to communicate with a Modicon PLC?

The 5136-MOD card bracket contains one red and one green LED. The following is a list of events that must occur before PICS can communicate with your PLC.

When everything is working properly

When you power up your computer, the green LED is off and the red LED is on.
Click on the Download button on the toolbar to download the simulation to the Solver.
Click on the Simulate button to start the simulation.
The green LED is on when the software module for the 5136-MOD card has been successfully downloaded and is responding correctly to commands from the driver. The red LED is off when the software module has been successfully downloaded. This should occur the first time you start simulation in PICS.
The green and red LEDs are on when the 5136-MOD card is transmitting to the PLC. The card only transmits while simulating one or more virtual drops. The red LED will appear dim when transmitting frequently or flash with infrequent transmissions.
The word Offline disappears from beside the reference number and the current values appear in the I/O points display window.
You will hear a beep and get a message in the Event Log that says Communicating.

When everything is not working properly

If green and red LEDs are not on at the same time check the following:

If the green light is not on the software module has not downloaded properly. Make sure that PICS is simulating. The Card software should be present in memory. You can check this in PICS Modicon S908 Remote I/O Connection Properties
If the red light is not on the card is not transmitting. Check the following steps to determine why the red light is off.

1. PLC RIO HEAD displays an error light. The error light on the PLC indicates that the RIO head cannot scan the remote drops. To avoid getting the error light:

There must be modules in the traffic cop of at least one remote drop.
The drop must be in the order of solve table and the segment scheduler.
The PLC must be in run mode.
Make sure the cable is attached and in good working condition.

2. Make sure PICS is simulating. The Card software should be present in memory. You can check this in PICS Modicon S908 Remote I/O Connection Properties.

Profibus DP I/O Driver

Is it possible to use the Profibus DP driver to simulate modules in the local rack?

No, but there is a work-around. You can map the I/O modules in the local rack to the Profibus DP network. If your PLC program is based on the local rack configuration, you have to change the PLC program, since addresses of I/O modules in the local rack are different from the I/O modules in the DP network.

If you do not want to change your PLC program, you can delete all I/O configurations in the local rack, write down the address for each I/O module, then configure the same modules in the DP network and assign the same addresses as in the local rack.

When I start simulation using the Profibus driver, I get the message "Station No, in Error state" in the PICS Event Log.

Make sure the configurations in PICS and the PLC are the same.

Make sure the transmission rate settings match in PICS and the PLC.

Check the cable and ensure the terminators are at both 5136-PBMS card and PLC ends (especially important at high baud rates).

When I import a .2BF file into PICS, I get the message "Station ID xxx is a Non-DP Standard Slave (128)... discarding" in the PICS COM PROFIBUS Configuration Import Event Log.

The 5136-PBMS card does not support non-standard DP slaves. If you use PICS simulation, you have to change non-standard DP configuration to standard DP configuration and map all I/O addresses from non-standard DP I/O to standard DP I/O. ET-200U 6ES5 318-8MB11 is a non-standard DP module. You should change it to a standard DP ET-200U 6ES5 318-8MB1 in your COM PROFIBUS configuration.

Using PICS with a DDE Server

I started simulation with PICS and am using a DDE server. But I’m getting time out messages in the PICS Event Log.

If your DDE server configurations are correct and all the I/O points are valid in the PLC, and, there is nothing wrong with the cable, try increasing the Timeout in the DDE Server Control Properties in PICS. Especially when you use a text DDE Server or serial DDE server, the communication network is much slower, and the Timeout setting should be set much higher than the default value of 5000ms.

How can I import variables exported from RSLogix 5 into PICS?
(The following note is only for using PICS 3.3. Some changes have been made in PICS 3.31. Please check the What’s New section in the PICS 3.31 User’s Manual for more information. )

When you export the variable file from RSLogix 5, the export output format should be RSlogix 5, AI or CSV.

Using PICS with DDE Server

When you import the variable file to PICS, you can only use the custom import wizard routine. Since the DDE I/O connection does not check whether these variables are Integer or Boolean and whether they are writable or read-only, you have to change the variable type manually after you import the variables. We recommend you use Microsoft Excel or a text editor to edit these variables before importing to PICS. After editing the variables, save the file then import it to PICS using the custom import wizard routine.

Example 1

The following variable file is exported from RSLogix 5 and edited in Excel:

I:010/01	IN1	input boolean1
I:020	IN2	input integer
O:022/04	OUT1	output boolean
O:030	OUT2	output integer

Edit the above file and add a column after the I/O address, giving the variable type and a space with ‘RO’ if it is read only.

The following variables file is edited in Excel:

I:010/01	B	IN1	input boolean1
I:020	I	IN2	input integer
O:022/04	B RO	OUT1	output boolean
O:030	I RO	OUT2	output integer

Note: B=boolean I=integer RO=read-only

Using PICS with AB remote I/O driver

You can use the Rockwell Software import routine to import variables into PICS. If a variable does not have a symbol name, it will not be imported.

Installing PICS

When I install PICS 3.x under Windows 98, I get a fatal error at the end of the Setup initialization reporting about the file "ISINST30" or "_Ins0433._mp.".

This problem can occur as a result of a conflict between the Setup program and other loaded drivers. In particular, if the MSWheel component of Microsoft IntelliPoint 2.2 is loaded, you will see this error.

You can use one of the following methods to avoid this problem:

Disable MSWheel before running setup. To do this, press [Ctrl]+[Alt]+[Delete], select Mswheel, and click End Task.

- OR -

Boot up the computer in safe mode before running setup.

If you need more help

PICS Technical Support
SST
50 Northland Road
Waterloo, Ontario
N2V 1N3
Canada

Voice: (519) 725-5136
Fax: (519) 725-1515

Email: picsupport@mySST.com

Web site: www.mySST.com

PICS Simulation is a registered trademark of Woodhead Canada Limited. All other trade names are trademarks or registered trademarks of their respective companies.