What is an IPC?
An IPC (Industrial PC) is a computer based on standard PC technology, usually x86 or ARM, that is built to run 24/7 for years in industrial conditions such as vibration, dust, moisture, electromagnetic interference and high or low temperatures. An IPC runs software that a PLC cannot handle and that an office PC on the factory floor would not run reliably: SCADA, HMI, a soft PLC, image processing or edge applications. That makes the IPC one of the building blocks of industrial automation and a junction where IT and OT meet.
🧠 What makes a PC an industrial PC?
Inside, an IPC looks much like an ordinary PC, but it differs in five ways:
- Rugged mechanics - passive cooling without a fan, no spinning hard disk but an SSD or CFast card, and housings tested for vibration (IEC 60068-2-6) and shock (IEC 60068-2-27)
- Industrial electrical requirements - usually a 24 V DC supply from the control cabinet, and EMC immunity to IEC 61000-6-2 and emissions to IEC 61000-6-4 for industrial environments
- Wider temperature range - a panel PC typically operates from 0 to +45 or +55 °C; extended-temperature versions go further
- Long availability - the same hardware revision stays available for years, so you do not need to revalidate a machine after every model change
- Industrial interfaces - serial ports, multiple Ethernet ports for EtherCAT or ProfiNET, and sometimes fieldbus cards
A dust-tight front is common: panel PCs often have an IP65 front and an IP20 rear, because the back sits inside the cabinet.
🔧 What types of IPC are there?
| Form factor | Mounting | Typical use |
|---|---|---|
| Box PC / DIN-rail PC | On a DIN rail or back plate in the control cabinet | Soft PLC, motion control, edge gateway |
| Panel PC | In the cabinet door or operator panel, with touchscreen | HMI at the machine |
| Rack PC (19 inch) | In a server rack in the technical room | SCADA server, historian, virtualisation host |
| Embedded IPC | Built into a machine or device | Fixed function, such as vision inspection |
| Ex version | In or near an Ex zone | Operation in chemicals, oil and gas |
Manufacturers such as Beckhoff, Siemens (SIMATIC IPC), Phoenix Contact, Advantech and B&R offer several of these families. An ultra-compact box PC such as the Beckhoff C6030 fits on a DIN rail with an Intel Celeron up to a Core i7 and is mainly used as a controller.
In potentially explosive atmospheres only specifically certified models (ATEX/IECEx, usually for zone 2 or 22) may be installed. A standard IPC is not one of them, however rugged it is; see ATEX.
🔄 What is the difference between an IPC, an ordinary PC and a PLC?
| Characteristic | Office PC | IPC | PLC |
|---|---|---|---|
| Environment | Office, 20–25 °C | Factory, cabinet, panel | Factory, cabinet |
| Duty cycle | Designed for office hours | 24/7 | 24/7 |
| Model availability | Often 1–2 years | Usually 3–6 years plus a spare-parts period | Often 10 years or more |
| Operating system | Windows or macOS, frequent updates | Windows IoT LTSC, Linux, sometimes an RTOS | Vendor firmware |
| Real-time | No | Only with a real-time extension or RTOS | Yes, cyclic and deterministic |
| Flexibility | High | High: any PC software | Limited to IEC 61131 programs |
An IPC is therefore not real-time by default. It becomes so only with a real-time layer: TwinCAT from Beckhoff and CODESYS Control RTE run a real-time kernel alongside Windows, and since kernel version 6.12 (2024) Linux has the PREEMPT_RT patches in its mainline. With that layer, one IPC can run PLC logic, motion control and an HMI at the same time. CODESYS and TwinCAT are the best-known platforms for such a Soft PLC.
🕰️ How did the IPC come about?
In 1986 Beckhoff built one of the first PC-based machine controllers: a DOS PC with an in-house real-time extension for a double mitre saw. TwinCAT followed in 1996, a real-time extension of Windows NT programmed to IEC 61131-3. Since then the IPC has grown from an alternative to the PLC into the standard platform for operator stations, SCADA servers and edge applications. Modern IPCs often run a hypervisor or Docker containers, so that control, HMI and analytics are kept separate on the same hardware.
🏭 Where are IPCs used in OT environments?
- Operator station - a panel PC as the HMI at the machine or as a workstation in the control room
- Machine control - a box PC with a soft PLC and motion control, for example in packaging machines and robotics
- SCADA and historian server - a rack IPC at level 2 or 3 of the Purdue Model
- Engineering workstation - the PC on which PLC projects are written and downloaded; a favourite target, as Stuxnet showed
- Edge and gateway - collecting data via OPC UA and forwarding it via MQTT to IT or the cloud, often as an edge device
- Industrial AI - image processing and AI models close to the line, with GPU acceleration
🔐 How do you secure an IPC?
Because an IPC runs a standard operating system, it also inherits that system’s vulnerabilities. At the same time you cannot simply reboot it every month. A practical approach:
- Choose an operating system with long support - Windows 10 IoT Enterprise LTSC 2021 receives security updates until January 2032, Windows 11 IoT Enterprise LTSC 2024 until October 2034. Plan the service life of the installation around this.
- Apply hardening - disable unnecessary services and accounts, give operators no local admin rights, close unused ports.
- Restrict what may run - with application whitelisting and USB control, often more effective than antivirus alone on a system that does not always receive updates.
- Protect the boot chain - Secure Boot and a Trusted Platform Module prevent tampered firmware or a different operating system from starting.
- Segment - place the IPC in the right zone according to network segmentation and IEC 62443; IEC 62443-4-2 has separate requirements for such host devices.
- Organise patches and backups - test updates first through patch management and keep an image backup, so you can replace a failed IPC quickly.
For manufacturers of machines containing an IPC, the reporting obligation of the Cyber Resilience Act for actively exploited vulnerabilities applies from 11 September 2026; the full obligations apply from 11 December 2027. Users who fall under NIS2 and the Dutch Cybersecurity Act must include their IPCs in their risk management.
🧭 How do you choose the right IPC?
- Lifecycle - ask about availability and the spare-parts period. For most SIMATIC IPC families Siemens supplies spare parts for five years after the phase-out announcement, for some compact families three years. Record this in your lifecycle management.
- Environment - temperature in the cabinet, vibration, dust, and whether the IPC will be in an Ex zone or a hygienic area.
- Computing power and I/O - CPU class, number of Ethernet ports, a GPU for AI, and whether a fieldbus is needed.
- Software - which operating system, which real-time layer, which licences.
- Management - how you manage the IPC remotely without opening up the OT network.
Watch out for legacy: many plants still run IPCs with Windows 7 or XP because the machine software works on nothing else. Isolate them strictly and budget for replacement.
❓ Frequently asked questions
What does IPC stand for in automation?
In automation, IPC stands for Industrial PC. An IPC is a computer using standard PC technology that is built for 24/7 operation in factories and control cabinets. Outside automation, IPC can also mean inter-process communication or the electronics standards body IPC.
Can an IPC replace a PLC?
An IPC can replace a PLC when it runs soft PLC software with a real-time layer, such as TwinCAT or CODESYS Control RTE. This is common in machine building, where motion control, HMI and data processing need to share one device. For simple or safety-critical tasks a hardware PLC or safety PLC is often still preferred.
Which operating system runs on an IPC?
An IPC usually runs Windows IoT Enterprise LTSC or Linux. The IoT Enterprise LTSC editions receive ten years of security updates without feature updates, which suits the long service life of industrial installations. For hard real-time tasks a real-time kernel or an RTOS is added.
How long does an industrial PC last?
In practice an industrial PC often stays in service for eight to fifteen years, much longer than an office PC. The hardware model usually remains available for three to six years, after which the manufacturer supplies spare parts for several more years. The limiting factor is often the operating system: once support ends, no more security updates are released.
Does an IPC have a fan?
Many modern IPCs are fanless and cool passively through an aluminium housing with cooling fins. This keeps dust from being drawn in and removes a moving part that can wear out. Powerful IPCs with a fast CPU or GPU sometimes do have fans, often with filters and monitoring.
Is an IPC the same as an edge device?
An IPC and an edge device overlap strongly, but they are not the same. An edge device is defined by its function, processing data locally close to the source, whereas an IPC is a hardware category. An IPC running edge software is therefore an edge device, but an IPC used only as an HMI is not.
📌 In summary
An IPC is a rugged industrial PC that runs 24/7 in factories and control cabinets and combines the flexibility of PC software with industrial reliability. IPCs run HMI, SCADA, soft PLCs and edge applications. Because they use a standard operating system, they call for deliberate choices on lifecycle, hardening, segmentation and patching.