Hi

I have a WinCC professional V16 update 4 system. It is a simple (Siemens IPC647D) server with three clients. I have no PLC's just a scalance switch and a Modbus source.

Generally I just use the option to download software to the RT device of the server and this has been fine during development.

Do I need to use the "Hardware and software (only changes)" option for download? I have looked at the documentation but it is not very helpful in describing exactly what the hardware download achieves in a simple case like mine.

I have not used the hardware download until now during development but I need to change some things like client and server PC names now and do not know if this is required. 

If I attempt a hardware download Tia Portal gives an unhelpful message "Scanning and information retrieval completed. 1 problem found". I wonder if this is something to do with the IPC server setup, maybe some missing drivers etc that means that Tia Portal does not recognise the server and cannot communicate with it as a Siemens piece of hardware.

Hi Brian W,

Regarding the name of the WinCC server PC, I would not recommend you to change it after the installation of WinCC Professional, as it can cause numerous access errors to the SQL database (which has the name of the current PC).

To download RT Professional, please see this link:

RT Professional - Loading projects

Hope this helps.