Yet anoter quick mock up, but this is a 10/100Mbps Ethernet module that is doable both in M12-4 version and J45 version.
This uses a smaller MCU (still a M33 at 250Mhz) and W5500 that comes with TCP/IP on chip. The disadvantage is that I can’t do Profinet og EtherCAT with this one due to lack of access to MAC Layer – or lets see what I can do. As for performance I am not worried + the BOM cost on this is decently low + it is straight forward to do a PoE modification here.
I had a dig into details on ProfiNet & EtherCAT and must admit I was dissapointed. The Layer 2 protocols work on a request/Answer principle + using my Dual Ethernet module you add latency for every switch. But, the worst is that real latency is actually the loop speed you query with – so all in all – UDP is maybe a bit slower, but it can be event driven (lower bandwidth usage) and if can be transported outside the local network. I will support EtherCAN & ProfiNET, but I will not use it at core myself – I think we can do better.