We are continuing our series on Information Technology Equipment Design Standards. We have been talking about, UL IEC ANSI 60950 – 1 and it seems needed to bring up that this standard is going to be replaced by IEC 62360 – 1. In today’s blog and video, Steve Barcik Amstel talk about the differences between these two standards and how you would go about determining the right one when designing your equipment.
Link to video also available here: https://youtu.be/OJcd5g0AjqE
We are continuing our series on Information Technology Equipment Design Standards. We have been talking about, UL IEC ANSI 60950 – 1 and it seems needed to bring up that this standard is going to be replaced by IEC 62360 – 1. There is a similar scope and many other similarities in the two standards….62368 came out in 2010…. So we have an implementation time that is already well past. So you can look at either standard and see which way you want to go.
The primary differences between 60950 and 62386 are:
The 62368 standard has more detail on all of these protective and safety sections and it seems to be more consumer focused than the 60950 standard. There are significantly more details about the enclosures and the materials of construction. Here the primary focus is on preventing fire in the enclosure.
The next difference is temperature…over temperature devices, and more detail on those and requirements.
Also, internal transformers get a serious working over to improve safety performance, and there’s a lot more detail in the new requirements.
Since this is more of a consumer-oriented standard significantly more detail is required on the safety labels and markings.
A lot of time is spent on the new standard on safe power supplies (SELV types). These protective power supplies are given a lot more requirements and detail as well.
This just reinforces our idea that the 62368 standard is more aimed at consumers.
Also, there’s a lot more detail and grounding protection from electrical shock. Significantly more depth on protective earth grounding is provided in this new standard.
Further there is more detail on access-controlled environments versus ordinary people interacting with equipment. This is really getting more and more into the differences between something that would go into an industrial commercial environment and something that may be going to consumer environment…homes, retail, public spaces, and details on how to prevent those people getting into the equipment or damaging it or themselves.
There truly is a lot more detail on prevention of fire including protecting from dropped conductive materials like a screw or wire or something like that being dropped in and then faulting equipment or causing a short. This next change is not as critical, and the drop-testing requirement went from 5 kg to 7 kg.
The old standard 60950 did not really have a lot of detail on the use of chemicals; typically we would need to bring in a different standard. In the new standard, there is a significant amount of new detail and requirements on the use of materials and chemicals.
Additionally, there is a focus on pressure and pressurized systems. Anything that uses pressure in pressure vessels… any pressure piping will get a lot more scrutiny under the new standard.
It’s great that this new standard puts more emphasis on areas that may have been causing difficulty in the consumer environment.
If you’re moving a product from 60950 to 62368, we can certainly help you do that.
Here’s what we typically see as a product development path:
1) You and your team will come up with product, idea or concept
2) We will help you do initial risk assessment, scope and document the product safety and listing requirements for your product
3) You can add this to your product requirements document
4) We will help you understand all the regulations and compliance in order to get your product to market
5) You then can provide your team with the standards and regulations so that the requirements can be designed into your product
6) Then we can help you with the test, verification and validation…. Or you can do some of it… we can do some it… we can share the burden and share between those two.
Hopefully this quick overview helps you with the differences between IEC 60950 and IEC 62368. If you have any questions just give us a call. And if you see anything you’d like to know more about, let us know. We really like to help out. Get into touch with us here at High Tech Design Safety. https://hightechdesignsafety.com/.
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Thanks again. Have a great week
