Instrument Control (GPIB, Serial, VISA, IVI)

cancel
Showing results for 
Search instead for 
Did you mean: 

GPIB-232CT-A converter with LabView

I am attempting to control a HP 3488A Switch Control Until with LabView
5.1and a National Instruments GPIB-232CT-A ( RS232 to GPIB converter
box on a serial port). I was told by the NI Applications Engineer that
the
Instrument Drivers aviailble with LabView were written for an internal
GPIB card and will not work with the converter. Can anyone help me find
any VI's that were written for the converter that will allow me to use
LabView to control the instrument?

Thanks, John...
0 Kudos
Message 1 of 3
(4,496 Views)
John wrote:

> I am attempting to control a HP 3488A Switch Control Until with LabView
> 5.1and a National Instruments GPIB-232CT-A ( RS232 to GPIB converter
> box on a serial port). I was told by the NI Applications Engineer that
> the
> Instrument Drivers aviailble with LabView were written for an internal
> GPIB card and will not work with the converter. Can anyone help me find
> any VI's that were written for the converter that will allow me to use
> LabView to control the instrument?
>
> Thanks, John...

If the HP3488 driver is written with VISA it may be possible to
use them with the 232CT. It is worth a try before you rewrite the driver.
I dont have any experience with the 232CT but I use the HP3488 all the
time.

Let me know if you need help
K
evin Kent
Message 2 of 3
(4,496 Views)
"John" wrote:
>>I am attempting to control a HP 3488A Switch Control Until with LabView>
5.1and a National Instruments GPIB-232CT-A ( RS232 to GPIB converter> box
on a serial port). I was told by the NI Applications Engineer that>the>
Instrument Drivers aviailble with LabView were written for an internal> GPIB
card and will not work with the converter. Can anyone help me find>any VI's
that were written for the converter that will allow me to use> LabView to
control the instrument?>>Thanks, John...>

John,

I think Kevin my have a good idea. I don't think just using VISA will resolve
your issue because of the 232CT. As you know the NI-488.2 driver for this
is only available for DOS and Win3.1. The only way to use the 232CT on other
Operating Syste
ms is in "S" mode. Looking at the manual this means that you
need to send specific commands to the serial port directly and the 232CT
interprets the strings accordingly to be sent over the GPIB bus.

One thing you could do is look at the "Non-IVI" instrument driver for the
HP34401A, this driver implements support for GPIB and Serial. You should
look at the "Initialize" Vi for details on how you can add Serial support
to the driver you are using. Then you'll need to go through the driver VIs
and add the appropriate S mode command to the beginning of each command string
that is being sent by the driver.

I think this is the quickest way to get things working in your case without
having to re-write the entire driver. I would start off with just trying
to get the Initialize VI working with the ID Query and Reset functions. Once
you can get that working you can edit each VI that you want to use.

Best of luck.
Kamran
0 Kudos
Message 3 of 3
(4,496 Views)