February 21, 2011 - Trihedral’s Phoenix SMS I/O Driver for VTS HMI software captures data from field devices in the form of text messages using the SMS protocol. The driver sends and receives these messages through a central GPRS/GSM modem.
SMS, or short message service, is the text-based communication protocol used by the majority of mobile phone networks worldwide.
South Carolina integrator Collins Controls, Inc. installed the first Phoenix SMS I/O Driver at Valley Public Service Authority, South Carolina in November 2010. Company President Gary Collins is pleased with its performance so far. “It allows your SCADA system to monitor and control low lying sites that you couldn’t reach with licensed or spread spectrum radios,” says Collins. “In some cases you would need a 100 foot radio tower to reach these places which would incur higher installation cost.
Plus, you don’t have to worry about radio path studies, repeaters, weather conditions, foliage or any of the other things that can cause you headaches with radio networks. So long as you have cellular telephone access you don’t need to maintain any other infrastructure.”
About VTS
VTS is Windows-based monitoring & control software for mission-critical applications in numerous industries. These range from OEM machine interfaces and standalone workstations to large, distributed client/server systems.