Gigabit Ethernet interface aids industrial imaging

Edited by the Engineeringtalk editorial team Sep 16, 2005

The new GE-series Gigabit Ethernet cameras from Prosilica are designed to conform to the AIA GigE Vision standard.

Prosilica will introduce its new line of Gigabit Ethernet cameras for machine vision and industrial inspection at the Vision 2005 exhibition in Stuttgart Germany (8th to 10th November 2005).

The new GE-series Gigabit Ethernet cameras from Prosilica are designed to conform to the AIA GigE Vision standard.

Prosilica will also be showing their broad line of DCAM-compliant firewire cameras including the popular ultra-compact EC-Series.

GigE Vision is a new interface standard for machine vision cameras such as Prosilica's GE-Series.

The GigE Vision standard includes a hardware interface standard (Gigabit Ethernet), communications protocols, and standardised camera control registers.

The camera control registers are based on a command structure called GenICam which seeks to establish a common software interface so that third party software can communicate with cameras from various manufacturers without customisation.

GigE Vision is exciting because it provides many features that have been unavailable in a single camera interface until now.

The combined features of high datarates, universally available computer interface hardware, low cost cabling, and standardised camera controls make Gigabit Ethernet an attractive interface option for machine vision cameras.

The following are a few of the compelling benefits of GigE Vision cameras.

Gigabit Ethernet ports are becoming common on PCs and laptop computers.

With GigE Vision there is no need for specialised interface hardware or complicated frame grabbers in order to interface to a GigE camera.

GigE provides enough bandwidth to transmit uncompressed image data in real time at speeds required by machine vision applications.

The high datarates provided by Gigabit Ethernet are more than double that achieved by other camera interface standards.

Gigabit Ethernet cameras can have long cable lengths up to 100m long using standard Ethernet cables (Cat5 or Cat6).

Such long cable lengths are ten times the maximum lengths offered by CameraLink, FireWire or USB2.

The Ethernet cables can be easily manufactured on-site using low cost cabling and tools.

This feature is especially useful for outdoor installations where cables must be routed as the site demands.

GigE Vision works with standard Gigabit Ethernet network hardware which is especially useful in situations requiring multiple views and opens up new applications in intelligent traffic systems (ITS) and public security imaging.

The GigE Vision standard is analogueous to firewire's DCAM (IIDC) and provides ease of integration and use similar to Prosilica's 1394 cameras.

"Prosilica's new GE-Series Gigabit Ethernet cameras represent a new level of performance and ease of use unrivalled in the machine vision market", says Marty Furse, Prosilica CEO.

"GigE Vision represents a significant advance in camera technology for industrial imaging".