October 25, 2013, Issaquah, Washington, USA DATA-LINC GROUP announced today the introduction of four new products in the PlantLinc Family of short-range, industrial-grade modems. These newest, lower priced products support the global market employing the same robust FHSS (frequency hopping spread spectrum) technology as the premium long-range SRM Family modems for both the 900MHz and the 2.4GHz ISM license-free bands.

The new PlantLinc products were developed to provide a price-competitive, high-performance alternative to Wi-Fi technology for data transfer. “Wi-Fi devices have flooded the market and the 2.4GHz band resulting in a traffic 'data highway' comparable to rush hour. As a result, confidence in data integrity and reliability that is so crucial to automation and instrumentation applications has declined for good reason,” said Eduardo Giancristofaro, Data-Linc Global Sales Manager. “Wi-Fi is a technology developed for the commercial consumers, not designed to standup to the challenges of harsh industrial environments much less those environments with the added negative of band crowding. PlantLinc radios can increase confidence that your data will get through in these difficult conditions.”

Where data integrity is critical and 2.4GHz is the only option for license-free wireless communication, the PLR6130 and PLR6330 significantly out-perform Wi-Fi, a DSSS (direct sequence spread spectrum) technology, increasing confidence in the reliability and integrity of the data transfer. DSSS sends data packets down a band. If the band/channel/path is crowded with too many packets from various sources or is being bombarded by electromagnetic interference, for example, the speed can be diminished and/or the data packet fails to get delivered. Using modems in the 900MHz band avoids the crowded 2.4GHz band. When the PLR, using the more robust FHSS technology in either band, sends data packets that meet interference in a band, the packet “hops” to a different channel in the band and will continue to hop until it finds one where successful transfer can occur. Because of its inherent method of dealing with “noisy environments” both 2.4GHz and the 900MHz PlantLinc modems provide increased confidence that critical data will get through. Because the PLR Ethernet, serial, protocol and I/O modems operate in the 900MHz band, which is far less congested than 2.4GHz and because both 2.4 and 900 versions of the PLR use the FHSS approach to data transfer, the PlantLinc Family is the “best choice” for meeting short-range industrial data communication needs over any Wi-Fi option.

For information regarding features, benefits, pricing or for Lunch and Learn webinar overviews or to request information regarding hands-on technical training sessions on any, or all, of these new product, please contact Data-Linc via or call (425) 882-2206 Pacific Coast Time.