Which version of step 7 and licensing should I propose?

Hi everyone,

my manager asked me to give him the requirements for getting connected and go online with Siemens PLCs, on our site we have s7 300, 400FH, what's your suggestion? I know that I need a PC adapter and step 7 professional, but it really helps me if you could suggest to me which version of step 7 and licensing should I propose.

Kind regards,

Amir 

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Split from difference between TIA portal, Simatic manager and PCS7.

There are many licenses and many options. It depends not only on the controller article number: the S7-300 can be programmed in both the Simatic Manager and the Tia Portal. You can unload a project from the version in which it was originally programmed.

Better to try to find the source projects. The code is unloaded from the PLC without comment. If the program is written in SCL or CFC, uneditable STL code is uploaded.

If there is a PCS station, then usually there is a separate PC with the necessary licenses to service the entire system.

You also need to keep in mind that the controller may have a password.

Hello  amir;

Note that a S7-400H CPU can only be programmed with Simatic Manager (Step 7 v5.6, latest version) if there is a redundant pair of processors in your system, or with PCS 7 (for process control, but that is a totally different beast and we will not discuss it further for now):

https://mall.industry.siemens.com/mall/en/WW/Catalog/Products/5000139?tree=CatalogTree

If you are using the F-CPU capabilities of the S7-400HF (using it in a Safety program, with Safety I/Os) you will need an additional package F-Systems:

https://mall.industry.siemens.com/mall/en/WW/Catalog/Products/10038715?activeTab=ProductInformation&tree=CatalogTree

Since S7-300 CPUs can also be programmed with Simatic manager, I think it would be interesting for you to look at the different packages of Step 7 v5.6 :Basic, with only LAD, FBD and STL programming languages, or Professional, which adds other programming languages and a PLC simulator program to the Basic package. These are described in the first link proposed above.

Hope this helps,

Daniel Chartier

The standard protocol for programming S7-300/400 with STEP 7 V5 is MPI.

If you use a field PG, a MPI/DP interface is built in.

If you use a normal PC:

• When you use the CP5711 (6GK1571-1AA0) you should always be able to communicate to the CPU. To use it, a USB port is required at the PC.
• If you have a PCI slot free, you may use the CP5612 (6GK1561-2AA00)