Schneider Altivar Drives: Full Range Review

What is the Schneider Altivar range? Altivar is Schneider Electric's variable frequency drive brand, spanning six active series — ATV12, ATV320, ATV340, the ATV600 group (610/630/650/660/680), and the ATV930 — sized from roughly 0.18 kW to over 800 kW and rated to IEC 61800-2. Picking the wrong series means paying for I/O and safety functions a machine never uses, or under-speccing a drive that trips on the first heavy start. This review maps each series to its target duty, control method, overload class, communication options, and the legacy models (ATV61, ATV71) it replaced.

What the Altivar Name Covers

Six letters, six product lines, one naming logic worth learning once. ATV12 is the micro drive: fixed V/f control, minimal I/O, sized for standalone pumps and small conveyors under 4 kW. ATV320 steps up to a compact "book" enclosure with built-in safety (Safe Torque Off) and belongs to the Machine family — OEMs bolt it inside cabinets and equipment skids. ATV340 is the fast-dynamics member of the Machine family, aimed at packaging, material handling, and hoisting where speed loop response matters more than raw power. The ATV600 group (ATV610, 630, 650, 660, 680) is Altivar Process: wall-mount drives built around pump, fan, and utility duty, with ATV630 as the volume model and the higher numbers adding metering and service features. ATV930 closes the range at cabinet power levels, built for the same process applications at higher current.

Two names you will still see on nameplates in the field, ATV61 and ATV71, are discontinued. ATV61 covered HVAC and pump duty; ATV71 covered higher-performance applications. Schneider positions the ATV600 series and ATV340 as their replacements, a point worth its own section below.

ATV12 and ATV320: Micro and Machine-Level Drives

ATV12 does one job: open-loop V/f speed control on single motors below roughly 4 kW, with an integrated potentiometer and basic digital I/O. No fieldbus card, no encoder feedback option worth mentioning. It fits inside an OEM control panel where cost per axis matters more than flexibility — small conveyor sections, exhaust fans, simple mixers.

ATV320 is a different tier. Still book-format and compact, but it adds Safe Torque Off as standard on most references, an embedded Modbus RTU port, and option cards for CANopen, PROFIBUS DP, or EtherNet/IP. Vector control (open loop) is available alongside V/f, so torque holding at low speed improves over the ATV12. What we see in the field: ATV320 shows up most often inside machine builders' panels rather than as a standalone retrofit drive, because the safety and fieldbus options are priced into OEM volume, not into one-off replacements.

ATV340: Altivar Machine for Fast, Networked Motion

ATV340 covers roughly 0.75-75 kW and targets machines where the speed loop has to settle fast — packaging lines changing product format mid-shift, palletizers, hoist mechanisms with duty-cycle starts. Ethernet is native (EtherNet/IP, Modbus TCP, PROFINET options), which matters more here than on the ATV600 line because machine builders standardize on one fieldbus across the whole cell, not just the drive.

One consequence of the fast switching that gives ATV340 its dynamic response: motor cable length becomes a real constraint on hoist and long-conveyor installs where the drive sits in a remote cabinet. Reflected-wave voltage at the motor terminals rises with cable length; see the dV/dt and sine-wave filter guidance before running an ATV340 more than 30-40 m from the motor without a filter.

ATV600 Series: Altivar Process for Pumps, Fans, and Utilities

ATV610 through ATV680 form the Altivar Process wall-mount line, and ATV630 is the volume model most panel builders default to for water, wastewater, and HVAC pump/fan duty. The 6xx numbering above 630 layers on metering, pump-protection logic, and service connectivity rather than changing the core power stage. Sensorless flux vector control is standard, which holds torque through the low-speed range better than pure V/f — useful on positive-displacement pumps that need starting torque before flow builds.

Because most ATV600 installs run centrifugal pumps or fans, the affinity law is the number that actually pays for the drive. Cut the fan or pump speed and power consumption falls faster than flow does.

ATV930: Altivar Process at Cabinet Power Levels

ATV930 extends the Altivar Process line into cabinet-build territory, past the point where a wall-mount enclosure makes sense. Same application focus as the ATV600 group — pumps, fans, compressors, extruders — but at current ratings that push line harmonics into a design consideration rather than an afterthought. A 6-pulse diode front end at this power level draws enough 5th and 7th harmonic current that IEEE 519 compliance often forces a line reactor, 12-pulse arrangement, or active front end, not just a note in the spec sheet.

This is also where an active front end becomes worth specifying for regenerative loads — a centrifuge or test bench decelerating under load pushes energy back to the DC bus, and at ATV930 power levels dumping that into a brake resistor generates real heat in the room. Regenerative capability returns it to the line instead. For the harmonics side specifically, the harmonics and EMC filter requirements article covers mitigation options in more depth than fits here.

Choosing Across the Range

Duty class decides the series more often than raw kW does. A pump running Normal Duty at 22 kW and a conveyor running Heavy Duty at 22 kW are not the same selection problem, even though the nameplate number matches.