1. EtherCAT Technology

Superior fieldbus performance never harms. Even with slow controls, it improves reaction times and reduces configuration effort, since default settings will do the job. Furthermore, shorter reaction times improve the performance of your application, since the transition waiting times are reduced (e.g. waiting for an input signal before the next process step is initiated). If you do not care so much about performance though, use EtherCAT for its other benefits: e.g. lower costs, more flexible topology or simply ease of use. Or, why use a slower system just before it is more expensive?

For several reasons: Inexpensive slave controllers lead to lower slave device costs. No special master card required, the on-board Ethernet controller is sufficient. No switches or hubs required, therefore lower infrastructure costs. Use of standard cabling. Simple to implement, therefore lower implementation costs. Auto-configuration is supported, no manual address setting required, no network tuning required, therefore lower configuration costs.

No. Like with every real time Industrial Ethernet system, one device (the master) has to be in charge of the network management and organize the Medium Access Control. With EtherCAT, Slave to Slave communication is supported in two ways: topology dependent within one communication cycle ("upstream" device talks to "downstream" device), topology independent within two cycles. Since EtherCAT is so much faster than competing systems, slave-to-slave communication using two cycles is faster, too.

EtherCAT uses standard 100BASE-TX ("Fast Ethernet") on standard CAT5+ cables. For applications that require longer distances, the fibre optics 100BASE-FX is an alternative. Since EtherCAT is also used as "backplane bus" for modular devices, an even lower cost physical layer from IEEE802.3ae was added for such applications: LVDS (also called: E-Bus). Outside such modular devices, the physical layer is changed back to 100BASE-TX or -FX.

Conformance and Interoperability are very important factors for the success of a communication technology. Therefore the EtherCAT Technology Group is taking these topics very seriously. Conformance of the technology implementation with the specifications is the pre-requisite of interoperability, which means that devices of different manufacturers co-operate within the same networked application. To ensure this approach, the Conformance Test Tool (CTT) is published and the first Conformance Test Center (ETC) has been established.