Resolving PCS 7 V7.0 SP1 WinCC 1680x1050 Resolution Configuration

When a SIMATIC PCS 7 V7.0 SP1 operator station is deployed on a widescreen LCD (typically 1680x1050 / WSXGA+ panels from EIZO, NEC, or industrial Siemens Flat Panels), WinCC's Project OS Editor does not list the panel's native resolution in its dropdown. The runtime then either reverts to 1280x1024, fails to start, or raises an Error while configuring the runtime system dialog during activation. The root cause is that the resolution is not registered in the WinCC options PDL library and in the project's SSM.cfg layout file. This article documents the exact file set, register entries, and verification steps required to register 1680x1050 as a first-class runtime layout for PCS 7 V7.0 + SP1, including the known failure mode where Runtime ignores the selection.

1. Problem Description

The reported symptom set from field engineering:

• Operator station monitor native panel resolution is 1680 pixels (horizontal) by 1050 pixels (vertical), 16:10 aspect ratio, 60 Hz.
• WinCC Explorer > Computer > Project OS Editor (Cemat library variant) does not offer 1680x1050 in the Monitor configuration dropdown. Only 1280x1024, 1600x1200, 1920x1080, 1920x1200, and a handful of server/projector layouts are listed.
• Selecting any of the listed resolutions causes a runtime layout mismatch: button geometry drawn for 4:3 panel collides with the widescreen edges, and the bottom status bar (alarm line, area overview) is clipped.
• Attempting to manually add the resolution (by copying the closest 1600x1200 PDL folder) and selecting it in the OS Project Editor causes WinCC Runtime to silently fall back to 1280x1024, or raises a WinCC configuration error dialog: An error occurred while configuring the runtime system.

The reproduction is deterministic: it occurs on every boot of the OS server / single-station until the WinCC options PDL directory and the project SSM.cfg are both updated.

2. Root Cause

WinCC V7.0 stores the runtime screen geometry in three coordinated locations. The OS Project Editor reads its dropdown from the file system entries in:

%ProgramFiles%\Siemens\Automation\WinCC\options\pdl\SIMATIC_<Width>x<Height>_<S|M>

Each folder ships a *.cfg layout descriptor and one or more @*.pdl base pictures. The runtime, in turn, validates its launch resolution against the project-local SSM.cfg located in:

<WinCC_Project_Path>\SSM\SSM.cfg

If the resolution selected in the OS Project Editor is not present in SSM.cfg under [Coordinates] and [LayoutInfo], the WinCC runtime start picture (@screen.pdl) cannot be loaded with the requested picture width and height, and the activation aborts with the configuration error above. The dropdown in the OS Project Editor is populated by scanning the options\pdl tree — if no folder named SIMATIC_1680x1050_S (S = server/single-station view) exists, the resolution cannot be selected in the first place.

Additionally, the global Graphic Runtime settings dialog stores the start picture as @screen.pdl, and the picture's internal width/height in pixels must match the panel exactly; otherwise the runtime scales or letterboxes the image, producing the 1280x1024 appearance reported by the user.

3. Solution Overview

The fix is a four-step coordinated edit:

1. Duplicate the closest matching layout folder (SIMATIC_1600x1200_S) under %ProgramFiles%\Siemens\Automation\WinCC\options\pdl\ and rename it to SIMATIC_1680x1050_S.
2. Edit the new folder's *.cfg file: replace every 1600x1200 string with 1680x1050 and rescale the working-area coordinates from 1140 (1600 minus 460 left area) to 990 (1680 minus 690 left area, preserving the alarm/status geometry).
3. Update the project-local SSM.cfg: MonitorWidth=1680, MonitorHeight=1050, ID=SIMATIC_1680x1050, and append a [ProjectEditorFiles] entry pointing to the new @SCREEN.PDL layout.
4. Open @screen.pdl in the Graphic Designer, set picture width = 1680 and picture height = 1050, save, and restart WinCC Runtime.

4. Prerequisites

• Local administrator privileges on the OS server / single-station (required to write to %ProgramFiles%\Siemens\Automation\WinCC\options\pdl\ and to the project folder).
• PCS 7 V7.0 + SP1 installed (entry 26580519 confirms SP1 delivery scope and patch level).
• The PCS 7 Engineering System manual ps7phesb_en-US.pdf available locally for the OS Project Editor reference section.
• WinCC project closed in the WinCC Explorer before editing SSM.cfg (otherwise the file is locked and edits are silently overwritten on close).
• A backup of the original SSM.cfg and the original SIMATIC_1600x1200_S folder, taken with WinCC project stopped.
• Display driver set to the native 1680x1050, 60 Hz, 32-bit color in Windows Display Properties (WinCC validates the desktop resolution against the runtime launch size).

5. Step-by-Step Procedure

5.1 Locate the WinCC options PDL directory

Open Windows Explorer and navigate to:

C:\Program Files\Siemens\Automation\WinCC\options\pdl\

List the contents. On a stock PCS 7 V7.0 SP1 image you will see folders such as:

The _S suffix denotes a single-station (or OS server) layout; _M denotes multi-station / OS client layouts. For a single OS server or single-station system the _S variant is required.

5.2 Duplicate the closest matching folder

The 1600x1200 layout is the geometrically closest match: both are 4:3-derived arrangements with the same screen partition (top = area overview, bottom = alarm line, right = working area). Copy the entire folder:

cd "C:\Program Files\Siemens\Automation\WinCC\options\pdl\"
copy /E SIMATIC_1600x1200_S SIMATIC_1680x1050_S

Confirm the new folder contains SIMATIC_1680x1050_S.cfg and the same @*.PDL base pictures as the 1600x1200 source.

5.3 Edit the layout configuration file

Open SIMATIC_1680x1050_S\SIMATIC_1680x1050_S.cfg in Notepad. Apply the following edits:

1. Rename the [ID] line to ID=SIMATIC_1680x1050.
2. Replace every literal 1600 with 1680 and every literal 1200 with 1050 in the resolution fields.
3. Rescale the working-area width. The 1600x1200 layout reserves 460 pixels for the left area overview; the 1680x1050 layout must preserve the same alarm/status geometry on the right. The target working-area width is 1680 - 690 = 990 pixels. Replace every occurrence of 1140 (1600 minus 460) with 990 (1680 minus 690).
4. Adjust the vertical partition if present: the 1050-row layout keeps 950 rows of working area, so replace 950-derived values consistently.

Resulting key/value skeleton:

[ID]
ID=SIMATIC_1680x1050

[Coordinates]
MonitorWidth=1680
MonitorHeight=1050
WorkingAreaX=690
WorkingAreaY=80
WorkingAreaWidth=990
WorkingAreaHeight=900

[LayoutInfo]
ID=SIMATIC_1680x1050
Resolution=1680x1050
Aspect=16:10
LayoutType=Server

Save the file in UTF-8 (Notepad: Save As > Encoding: UTF-8) to avoid BOM-related parse errors on older WinCC builds.

5.4 Update the project SSM.cfg

Navigate to the WinCC project folder, for example:

D:\PCS7_Projects\CEMENT_PLANT\OS01\SSM\SSM.cfg

Open SSM.cfg in Notepad. Apply the following edits (preserve existing sections and keys not mentioned):

[Coordinates]
MonitorWidth=1680
MonitorHeight=1050

[LayoutInfo]
ID=SIMATIC_1680x1050

[ProjectEditorFiles]
[email protected]
Layout1=SIMATIC_1680x1050

Verify there is no stale [LayoutInfo] block pointing to SIMATIC_1600x1200. If present, comment it out by prefixing the lines with ; or delete the duplicate. Stale layout IDs are a common cause of the Error while configuring the runtime system dialog reported in the field.

5.5 Resize @screen.pdl in the Graphic Designer

1. Start WinCC Explorer on the OS server / single-station.
2. Right-click Graphics Runtime > Start Picture and confirm it is set to @screen.pdl (this matches SSM.cfg).
3. Open the Graphic Designer and load @screen.pdl.
4. From the menu, View > Properties: set Picture Width = 1680 and Picture Height = 1050 (both in pixels).
5. Save the picture. The picture's object tree is anchored to the top-left, so all child objects shift relative to the new bottom-right corner; verify the alarm line and area overview are still inside the working area (WorkingAreaX=690, WorkingAreaY=80, WorkingAreaWidth=990, WorkingAreaHeight=900).

5.6 Activate and verify

1. Close the WinCC Explorer edit session.
2. Launch the OS Project Editor. The dropdown Monitor configuration must now contain SIMATIC_1680x1050.
3. Select SIMATIC_1680x1050 and compile the OS.
4. Activate WinCC Runtime. Confirm via the on-screen geometry or by remote-desktop screenshot that the desktop is 1680x1050 and that @screen.pdl renders at full panel size with no scrollbars.

6. Verification Matrix

7. Troubleshooting Matrix

8. File Layout Reference

The complete file set touched by this procedure is summarized below:

9. Geometry and Aspect Ratio Notes

The 1680x1050 panel is a 16:10 (1.6:1) panel, distinct from the 4:3 (1.333:1) of 1600x1200. Rescaling the horizontal working area from 1140 to 990 is an empirical value that preserves the Cemat library's left-side area overview and right-side alarm column layout. The vertical scaling keeps the working area at 900 rows to leave 80 rows for the top header and 70 rows for the bottom status/acknowledgement bar, matching the Cemat V7.0 reference layout. The exact values for non-Cemat PCS 7 projects (e.g. standard PCS 7 APL) may shift by ±10 rows; the procedure remains the same but the working-area height in SSM.cfg must be tuned against the actual base pictures.

10. Rollback Procedure

If a regression appears after deploying the new layout (for example, OS clients lose the new resolution after a project download), restore the original files from the backup taken in step 4:

1. Delete SIMATIC_1680x1050_S\ from the options PDL directory.
2. Restore SSM.cfg from the pre-edit backup.
3. Restore @screen.pdl from the WinCC project backup archive (or from the SIMATIC Manager project backup).
4. Recompile the OS to re-establish the original (e.g. 1600x1200) layout.

11. Field-Proven Caveats

• WinCC's OS Project Editor caches the contents of the options\pdl directory at first launch of the editor after a WinCC Explorer restart. If the new folder is added while the editor is already open, close and reopen the editor.
• If multiple languages are installed for WinCC, the base pictures in the SIMATIC_1680x1050_S folder may need to be re-translated. The default English labels are sufficient for Cemat V7.0.
• On an OS server with redundant pairing, apply the changes to both partners and confirm the standby takes over without a layout-mismatch event in the redundancy log.
• For OS clients (multi-station), create a SIMATIC_1680x1050_M folder as well, or the client will use the previously cached layout from SSM.cfg on the server.

12. Related Siemens References

The two Siemens-published documents most relevant to this procedure are:

• Siemens Support entry 19688107 — How do you configure a new screen resolution in WinCC? (the canonical KB article for the PDL/SSM.cfg procedure).
• Siemens Support entry 26580519 — SIMATIC PCS 7 V7.0 + SP1 Released for Delivery (confirms SP1 scope and supported configurations).