Multiple Stations vs Multiple Controllers

[scotcarl]

Hi guys,
I am working on a project that involves 1 HMI and 4 PLCs. All PLCs are Mitsubishi FX3GE. I am using MELSEC FX3GE protocol for communication.

Whilst setting this up, I find I have 2 options for configuring the controllers in IxDev. The first option is to configure 4 separate controllers and use the default station. The second option is to use a single controller and configure 4 stations.
I should point out at this stage that I have the project working OK using multi-stations, though I can make it work using either approach.

My question is - Can anyone tell me what the advantages/disadvantages of the two different approaches are. The only real difference I can see so far is that I cannot perform data exchange if I use the multi-station approach? Is there a preferred or recommended approach?

Any feedback would be welcome.

Thanks
Sc.

[Gargy]

I would guess station Indexing. I'm not sure if it's possible with several controllers.

In my case I have several stations which are completely identical. Each station has around 180 - 200 tags. But the license is only for 250 tags. Now I can make the screen and with indexing call only station which I'm interested in... Of course in case of trends (and Data Loggers) you still need separate tags for each value...