PC/104 based wireless diagnostics module

A diagnostics systems module based on PC/104 computer platform standard has been developed. A wireless diagnostics module is battery operated and connected to a diagnostics access point using IEEE 802.11b wireless local area network (WLAN) link. The diagnostics module performance is evaluated in the means of power consumption and wireless link capacity. The results show that the power consumption of a PC/104 diagnostics module is high for battery operating systems. However, it can be significantly reduced by component selection. The IEEE 802.11b wireless link performance is adequate for enabling diagnostics applications, but transfer delays can be significant with high network traffic load. The PC/104 architecture is found to be suitable for industrial use. The architecture can be easily implemented and changed for other types of applications.