A couple of colleagues of mine used to say the same thing. Maybe still do :) At the moment, we are evaluating the KVM route as well. We used to just run the video cables 75-100' from the Suns to the monitors, but the LCDs aren't as forgiving as the CRT of cable-length-induced timing mismatches between the color signals and they show visible color fringing of the DM screens. The first set from vendor A we tried were absolute junk. The next set we got in from vendor B appear to be better. With robust, server-class hardware, I find this an interesting proposition at least. So I'll ask a few questions if you don't mind. How many GCIOs can one hang off of a P91 (though I hope to use our transition to FV to be rid of these)? How do you handle alarm segregation since all the FVs come from one box and therefore appear as one alarm destination? Thanks, Corey Clingo BASF Corp. "Fitzgerrell, Kevin" <Kevin_Fitzgerrell@xxxxxxx> Sent by: foxboro-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx 02/12/2009 09:59 PM Please respond to foxboro@xxxxxxxxxxxxx To <foxboro@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> cc Subject Re: [foxboro] P92 Quad KVM Extension Yes, absolutely! I really liked the WP30/AP20 paradigm. The major difference here is that the WP30s were getting their data via IPC (if I remember right - I only had a few) and my thin clients will be just an extension of my servers. I'd love to see this done officially too - it's much easier for me to buy "official" solutions. At my site now, I've got around 50 workstations and 167 stations total on our larger network. Doing a committal is a real nightmare - reducing the number of workstations makes committals simpler (although that Windows committal is far worse than a Solaris committal). I've currently had to go back to CP10 style ring-routes (not so good a paradigm as the WP30/AP20) to mitigate IPC connection problems. The thin-client/server model makes most of my IPC connection problems just go away (although merging CP30s to CP270s for fewer controllers and a higher IPC connection limit will really help too). I'm not too worried about the annunciator keyboard. I can run much longer cable to GCIOs in the control rooms than I can to high resolution monitors. I can probably extend those over fiber or even pass through the network if I really need to. For now I'll keep the GCIOs on the servers and continue to put an annunciator in front of each display (or vertical stack of displays). In many cases the annunciator keyboards are really only an alarm silence button - what I'd really like to see is an "official" alarm silence button! Cheers, Kevin _______________________________________________________________________ This mailing list is neither sponsored nor endorsed by Invensys Process Systems (formerly The Foxboro Company). Use the info you obtain here at your own risks. Read http://www.thecassandraproject.org/disclaimer.html foxboro mailing list: //www.freelists.org/list/foxboro to subscribe: mailto:foxboro-request@xxxxxxxxxxxxx?subject=join to unsubscribe: mailto:foxboro-request@xxxxxxxxxxxxx?subject=leave