PXI-6534 replacement by PXIe-6537

[X.]

I am currently controlling and receiving data from a custom-made device using the PXI-6534 and LabVIEW and DAQmx on Windows.

Can I replace the PXI-6534 by a PXIe-6537 without having to modify anything to my hardware (in other words, will the cable connections and board specs be compatible)? If yes, will the code written to communicate for the PXI-6534 be reusable with the PXIe-6537?

Thanks for any feedback or pointers.

X.

[Efrain_G]

Hi there,

In answer to your question, the 6534 and 6537 have different pinouts unfortunatley, therefore you will have to account for that on your application. However, becasue both cards use the same set of NI-DAQmx drivers, you should be able to reuse most of your code.

[X.]

I actually noticed that this is not the only difference. In particular, the two boards show a different number of ports in MAX: 6 for the 6534 and 5 for the 6537.

Regarding the pinout difference, I read the following here about the 6537: 

"The NI 653x cable adapter allows you to convert the pinout of this 68-pin VHDCI connector to the pinout of the 68-pin SCSI connector that is used on the NI 6533/6534 products so that you can use NI 6533/6534 fixturing with NI 6535/6536/6537 devices. The adapter also features a removable hood to access terminals to connect PFI lines.
To use the NI 653x cable adapter, place the adapter on the end of C68-C68-D4 or SHC68-C68-D4 cables to connect to SCSI connector accessories."

This is a misleading statement, as it won't work in general (probably because of the different number of ports). At least it does not work in my case...

What I don't understand is that the schematics of the 6543 (manual page D-1) show the board using only 5 ports (32 data lines + 8 control lines)...

X.

[Efrain_G · Accepted solution]

I am very sorry, but I forgot to mention on my previous post that there is in fact a cable adapter that will allow you to use the same terminal block that you were using with the PXI 6534. You will find more about this cable adapter on this link:

http://www.ni.com/pdf/manuals/374435a.pdf

[X.]

That's a different product from the 653x Cable Adapter, 68-pin D-Type to 68-pin VHDCI (P/N 195846-01), correct?

X.

[JuanCarlos]

Hi,

There are a lot of applications where the PXIe-6537 can be a drop-in replacement to the PXI-6534. Using the addapter mentioned before the 4 data ports are a 1-to-1 match. The pinout differences are in the control lines: the PXIe-6537 has 6 control lines and the PXI-6534 has 8. The addapter allows you to manually route the control lines from the PXI-6534 pinout to the PXIe-6537 pinout. In other words, if your application uses les than the 6 control lines, there is a good chance that it can be easily ported. Another imporrtant thing to consider is the number of timing engines, the 6534 was designed with 2 somewhat independent timing engines, allowing you to acquire/generate data with 2 separate clock in the same device at the same time; the PXIe-6537 allow only 1 timing engine for generation and one for aquisition to run at the same time. Most applications require only a single timing engine, however you must check if your application uses both timing engines at the same time.

My recomendation would be to talk to your sales engineer for your area and get a loaner PXIe-6537 with an addapter and a cable to try it out. In my experience 80% of application work with no changes at all.

By the way the PXI-6534 lists 6 ports: 4 data ports (8-bits wide) and 2 control ports (4-bits wide) that can be used as data with some limitations.

Let me know if you have any further questions.

Regards,

JC

[X.]

Thanks for the info, Efrain and Juan Carlos. It turns out that I have the adapter (that's the item I cited above) but I did not realize that it did not come with the PFI's connected inside. I'll have to do that (and maybe modify my code slightly) before I can hope to get the 6537 to function as the 6534 did.

I'll post a summary of my experience once this is done.

X.

[JuanCarlos]

Great, let us know if how it goes.

Juan Carlos