OSAI-UK Product Compliance

General Statement

In 1997 / 1998 OSAI issued general statements that described in detail the impact on our product range at the transition to the new millennium. The statements showed that our products fall into 3 categories: -

1. Controls unaffected by date change (i.e. they have no date dependant features or functions);
2. Controls that will require modification to become Y2K compliant;
3. Current products, that have Y2K compliance included in their specification.

They stated that software and / or firmware fixes would be devised to address issues with category 2. systems, and that these fixes would be made available to OEM’s and end-users.

Please Note: None of the OSAI CNC products have functions or features that are date dependant, other than the display of the current date on the screen, and when creating files. The operational functionality of any OSAI system as a CNC is unaffected by date change and the system specification is unchanged by any year 2000 update.

All relevant fixes and updates are now available to be installed in those control units that require them.
All new OSAI systems, and all systems that have had the relevant Y2K updates installed either by OSAI engineers, or as directed by the company, will be Year 2000 compliant to the BSI Standard PD 2000:1998, i.e. they obey the 4 basic rules laid down by the standard. These rules are as follows :-

Please note: OSAI supply control systems to OEMs who install the product as part of a larger machine tool, robot or other application.
OEMs may also introduce features or functions that may be affected by the year 2000 problem.

For any given system, end users should contact the Original Equipment Manufacturer to confirm that the specification for the overall installation is year 2000 compatible. This is particularly important where the OEM, or any other third party, has developed and installed special software for your application.

Following are criteria for the implementation of fixes and updates for the three families of control units in our product range that may fall into category 2. above.

1. 10/series CNC

10 series controls fitted with version V5.1, or later revisions of software will be fully year 2000 compliant.
Systems with version V5.0 software must be updated to V5.1 to be compliant.
Some controls with earlier revisions of software cannot be updated to V5.1 due to hardware restrictions. These units will need to be updated to revision V4.3 + fix-up 9. to be compliant.

A combination of the following software and firmware versions, dependant upon the hardware and application specification of the system may need to be updated to maintain functionality and to achieve Y2K compliance.

Note: congruence between existing and updated software and firmware revisions is critical.

To verify the software level of any given system, use the following procedure: -

• Press the "diagnostic" softkey on the menu displayed at the bottom of the screen
• Press the "security" softkey on the next menu displayed
• Press "product info" on the next menu displayed
• The release level is shown on the left of the display

Updating controls involves stripping the workstation and / or the processor unit to replace firmware, and, as can be seen above, there are critical compatibility issues between the firmware update and the type and revision of the system software. For these reasons we strongly recommend that customers commission OSAI to install the relevant update and to verify and demonstrate year 2000 compliance.

2. CNC 8600 / 8601 "AT" & "AT90"

CNC 8600 / 8601 "AT" & "AT90" can be identified as having colour monitors and integrated PC front ends. These controls require a BIOS firmware update to make them Year 2000 compliant. MC/TC - AT applications need updating to F49 V5.1.

When the BIOS firmware update is installed, dates will still be displayed in the dd / mm / yy format, (i.e. with a 2 digit year number), but with a dedicated ASCII character replacing and representing the first character of the year number for 21st century dates, in order to differentiate them from 20th century dates.

The ASCII characters used are as follows :-
0 displayed as :
1 displayed as ;
2 displayed as <
3 displayed as =
4 displayed as >
5 displayed as ?
6 displayed as @
7 displayed as A
8 & 9 stay as 8 & 9

For Example :-
01/02/1998 will be displayed as 01/02/98
01/02/2000 will be displayed as 01/02/:0
01/01/1965 will be displayed as 01/01/65
01/01/2065 will be displayed as 01/01/@5

GP - AT applications need updating to F62 V5.1. The date will be displayed with a corrected four digit year format.

The update involves replacing firmware located on the M250 motherboard inside the Intelligent Workstation console unit. As the update procedure involves having to strip down and reassemble the workstation, we recommend that customers commission OSAI to install the update and to verify and demonstrate year 2000 compliance.

3. 8650 "IWS" (Intelligent Work Station)

"IWS" systems were the first OSAI CNC systems to be sold with colour monitors and an integrated PC front end. The PC was based on the Olivetti M240 computer.

Early M240 computers were found to have a date anomaly in the early 1990’s, and a software fix was devised and issued to overcome the problem.

To the best of our knowledge most IWS systems in the UK were updated in or around 1992 to overcome the early date anomaly.

Systems that have the 1992 fix installed are Year 2000 compliant

As a rule of thumb, any systems that did not have the 1992 fix installed will not be showing the correct 20th century dates. If a system is currently displaying the correct date it requires no further action for year 2000 compliance.

You should also be aware that this product has dedicated battery backup for date retention. This battery must a) be present and b) be operational for the date feature to be functional.

If there is any doubt as to whether or not your system contains the 1992 fix, we can provide an engineer to either,

a) demonstrate Y2K compliance if the 1992 fix is present,
or
b) install the 1992 fix and demonstrate Y2K compliance if it is not already present.

Other OSAI CNC Systems

All OSAI CNC controls other than those described above can be assumed to be category 1. and as such need not be included in any year 2000 action plan.

These systems will, without exception have monochrome c.r.t. displays, either green screen or gray, (black & white) screen.

Conclusion

Please contact us with details of any OSAI CNC system, or installed base of systems that you suspect may require updating to achieve year 2000 compliance. We will be pleased to quote to attend site to investigate and address any of your year 2000 concerns.

Site visits to inspect, and test systems, and to install fixes and demonstrate year 2000 compliance will be charged at the prevailing standard OSAI service rates, (tariff available on request).

Materials required to update systems, (firmware and software) will be free of charge if and when supplied as part of a chargeable OSAI service visit.

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