• High-speed redundancy in the ring with High Speed Redundancy (HSR) or Media Redundancy Protocol (MRP)
  Reliable communication is achieved by closing an optical/electrical line with X-400, X-300 or X-200 switches to form an HSR ring. The SCALANCE XB-200 switches have an integral redundancy manager (RM) which continuously monitors the function of the network. It recognizes the failure of a transmission link or of a SCALANCE X switch in the ring and activates the substitute path.
  In rings with SCALANCE X-200 or OSM/ESM it is possible to integrate XB-200 switches at 100 Mbit/s.
• Redundant interfacing to company networks;
  The XB-200 switches support the standardized redundancy procedures Spanning Tree Protocol (STP) and Rapid Spanning Tree Protocol (RSTP). This enables a subnetwork to be connected redundantly to a higher level corporate network with reduced requirements for the reconfiguration time (in the order of seconds).
• Support of virtual networks (VLAN)
  For structuring Industrial Ethernet networks with a fast growing number of users, a physically existing network can be divided into several virtual networks.
• Load limiting with use of multicast protocols (e.g. querier, video)
  By learning the multicast sources and targets (IGMP snooping), XB-200 switches can also filter multicast data traffic and therefore limit the load in the network. Multicast and broadcast traffic can be limited.

Network topology and network configuration

The network topology can easily be adapted to suit the structure of the plant with SCALANCE XB-200 Industrial Ethernet switches.

The following network structures and combinations of structures can be implemented:

• Fast Ethernet rings with fast media redundancy
• In addition, the SCALANCE XB-200 switches support redundant connection of the ring structure to the corporate network with a rapid spanning tree.
• Star topology with XB-200 switches
  Each XB-200 switch represents a star point which can interconnect as many as 8/16 nodes or subnetworks.

When configuring the network, it is necessary to observe the following boundary conditions:

• Maximum cable length for twisted pair:
  • Max. 100 m with Industrial Ethernet FC cable and Industrial Ethernet FC Plugs
  • Max. 10 m using patches with TP cord
• Maximum line length between two SC connections (note transceiver data):
  • 5 km (100 Mbit/s)
• Maximum line length between two SC LD connections (note transceiver data):
  • 26 km (100 Mbit/s)
• IP address:
  In the case of SCALANCE XB-200 Industrial Ethernet Switches, the IP address is assigned by means of the Dynamic Host Configuration Protocol (DHCP). If no corresponding server is available in the network, the IP address can be assigned using DCP.

Commissioning and diagnostics

PROFINET diagnostic interrupts from SCALANCE XB-200 switches can be displayed with the appropriate SIMATIC Engineering Tools and processed in the controller with an expanded diagnostics function. The engineering outlay for the PLC and HMI have been drastically reduced due to the complete integration in the SIMATIC concept for system error messages.

The SCALANCE XB-200 Industrial Ethernet switches can also be integrated into a network management system through the standardized Simple Network Management Protocol (SNMP). In the event of a fault in the device, error messages (SNMP traps) can be sent to a network system or as e-mail to a specified network administrator.

The integral Web server enables configuration and diagnostics settings to be made using a standard browser (e.g. port configuration). Statistical information can also be read out over the Web server (e.g. port capacity utilization). Further access is possible via CLI, by means of which the device can be parameterized, managed and diagnosed.

The following information is displayed on site by LEDs:

• Power
• Port status
• Data traffic