controlling AGILENT E4448A with GPIB

[zs]

Hi,

I want to control the Spectrum Analyzer Agilent E4448A with Labview (through GPIB) and I am running one of the example available when in NI instrument driver. I am getting the error Error -1074003951 occurred at Agilent ESA PSA Series.lvlib:Initialize.vi which is The ID Query failed. So, I disabled ID Query; but, I am getting another error Error -1074000000 occurred at Agilent ESA PSA Series.lvlib:Error Query.vi, which is Instrument reports: -113,"Undefined header".

I'd really appreciate it if anyone can help me.

Thanks,

Zahra

[BerkO]

Hi Zahra,

What is your firmware revision on the instrument?

I checked the ID query problem and the instrument is definitely supported.

Could you please pass *IDN? to the instrument using MAX (GPIB Communicator or VISA Interactive Control Panel) and paste the response you are getting?

[BerkO]

Also,

It would be great if you could tell me which example you are running or better yet in which VI in the example the undefined header error occurs...

[zs]

Hi Berk,

Thanks for your quick reply.

I am running the Example Agilent ESA PSA Series Configure and Query Marker and the Undefined Header happens at Configure Level.vi.

How should I find the firmware revision on the instrument?

How should I pass *IDN? to the instrument using MAX (using GPIB Communicator) ?

Thanks,

Zahra

[zs]

Hi Berk,

I found the firmware revision. it is : A.09.19 RELEASE

Thanks,

zahra

[BerkO]

Hello again Zahra,

Your firmware revision is quite old and they currently have 10.08 A.  You should really upgrade the firmware because they have introduced a lot of new capabilities since then and some of those commands introduced are being used by the driver.  If your instrument is old enough that those commands are not defined, it would cause undefined header errors.

You can find the new firmware and instructions as to how to load it to your instrument here.

To pass the command to your instrument through MAX you need to configure it first. Please refer here as to how to configure your instrument in max.

After the configuration is done, you have to click on the instrument and click on "Communicate with Instrument" button that appears to the right.
That pops a new window through which you can directly query or write and read commands.

If you can't upgrade to the new firmware for some reason (such as missing required options etc.) you can refer here where another person had a similar issue with the same driver using a different instrument and I outlined what to do in that case.

Let me know if it helps.

[zs]

Hi Berk,

attached is the screenshot of the reponse of *IDN? to the spectrum analyzer. The string received is:

Agilent Technologies, E4448A, US44020366, A.09.19.

I have uploaded the update program, but I haven't installed it yet on the instrument (waiting for my advisor approval for that!).

From the above response, is the problem with the firmware?

Thanks again for your help,

Zahra

[Dennis_Knutson]

It looks to me like there is a bug in the driver. Open the initalize function and you will see an array of string that is used to match what is returned by the *IDN? command. Item 20 in the array is 'Agilent Technologies, E4448A'. However, if you right click on this and select 'Size to Text', you'll see that the item is really 'Agilent Technologies, E4448A E4448A'. Remove the ' E4448A' (including the leading space) and see if the function works.

Since the driver was tested with just the E4404B and E4407B, there may be other bugs and could account for your other error.

Message Edited by Dennis Knutson on 03-28-2008 10:38 PM

[zs]

Hi Denis,

How can I  open the initalize function to remove the ' E4448A' ?

Thanks,

Zahra

[Dennis_Knutson]

It's just a VI that you can open like any other VI - File>Open. Assuming that you installed it where you were supposed to, it will be in instr.lib\Agilent ESA PSA Series\Public.