It is generally agreed that engineering is about tradeoffs, and that has always been particularly true in regard to measurement machines. There are several types of measurement, and higher performance in one area generally meant less capability, or none, in other areas. And because higher performance typically costs more, choosing metrology equipment entailed tough decisions about where to put your resources. That is no longer true in one key area of metrology, as there are now systems that can combine previously incompatible functions into a single flexible system.
Some of those combined systems still require multiple software packages, but at the highest level of integration, both the machines and the software that manages measurements can be combined into single systems. And while a system may be able to handle touch, optical, and form measurement, the range of sensors it can support—including today’s newer types of sensing like red and blue laser scanning and others that may be introduced in the future—is also critical to its range of capabilities. And, as in many areas, the fewer vendors involved in providing components, the better.