10+ Reasons to Be Excited about the New CR300 Datalogger

In this short interview, Kevin Rhodes, the product manager for the new CR300, tells us how this new data logger will be helpful to Campbell Scientific customers and why he thinks the CR300 is a great value. Kevin is the Director of Product Management at Campbell Scientific, Inc. He was interviewed by Robin Deissinger, the blog editor.

Interview Q&A

How does the CR300 help our customers?

The CR300 Datalogger is the result of listening to our customers, especially those who embed our data loggers in their own products. We heard that these customers desired the functionality and versatility of the CR1000 Measurement and Control Datalogger with a lower cost and smaller form factor.

Like the CR200X Datalogger, the CR300 is a lower-cost data logger, but it is a better solution for these customers for several reasons:

• The CR300 has a much richer CRBasic command set and serial communications capabilities.
• The CR300 can store larger, more complex programs.
• The CR300 has an onboard compiler.

By combining CR1000 functionality and versatility with the CR200X form factor at a comparable price, our customers now have the best of both worlds.

Why are you excited about the CR300?

I am excited about the CR300 Datalogger because it overcomes all of the limitations we have heard about from our CR200X customers. The CR300 is the best-value data logger we have ever built. The operating system of the CR300 is based on the CR1000, but I call it a “light” OS; it has almost all of the CR1000 functionality in a small form factor. In addition, the CR300 processor is much faster than the one used in both the CR200X and the CR1000.

Here are some more reasons why I’m excited about the CR300 and hope our customers will be too:

1. The CR300 has great Internet and serial communications capabilities.
   
   
2. With full PakBus capability, the CR300 can do routing. (The CR200X supports leaf node only.)
   
   
3. We added more final storage memory, and because it’s flash memory, you don’t need an internal lithium battery for backup.
   
   
4. A 24 bit ADC was added to provide incredible analog measurement accuracy.
   
   
5. By including a USB Micro-B Male 2.0 port, the user setup and experience for direct connection to a PC has been simplified. This means that the serial port is available for you to use with communication peripherals or serial sensors.
   
   
6. The CR300 supports popular protocols such as Modbus and DNP3.
   
   
7. Because the CRBasic instruction set resembles that of a CR1000, you don’t have to learn new instructions.
   
   
8. The CR300 is fast enough to send mail through a number of popular email services that require SMTPS (TLS-encrypted SMTP).
   
   
9. Because the CR300 is the same physical size as a CR200X, you can use the CR300 as a direct, drop-in replacement.
   
   
10. The CR300 is the first Campbell Scientific data logger that can measure 4 to 20 mA sensors natively.
    
    
11. You can charge your battery through the CR300’s integrated charge regulator.

What makes the CR300 different from other products?

Actually, the nice part about the CR300 is that it is not so different from our other data loggers. This means that the learning curve is very small. Integrators can capitalize on their knowledge of CRBasic and our popular CR800, CR1000, and CR3000 dataloggers for use with this lower-cost data logger.

How does the CR300 fit in with our other Campbell Scientific products?

If you think of our data loggers as a family, the CR300 is positioned as the little sister. But she is definitely growing up. This product was designed to replace the CR200X dataloggers. It fills the lower-cost, high-configurability niche.

When is the CR300 available?

Released on March 14, 2016, the CR300 is available for ordering. This data logger is the first in a series of low-cost, high-value data loggers. You can look forward to new built-in wireless telemetry options in the future.

More Information

Do you want to learn more? Visit our CR300 web page.

To ask Kevin a question about the CR300, post a comment below.