Labview : No USB communication with the DLN-2 adapter board.

[hypnozodiak]

Hi,

I am trying to use a Diolan DL2-N USB to I2C/SPI/GPIO adapter (https://diolan.com/dln2). This manufacturer provides Labview drivers for the board as well as example VIs. I just want to use them to access to all interfaces via Labview. After that I will design a test setup for our last product line using this adapter board.

What i did:

1) Fresh install of Labview 2014 (evaluaton version). System: DELL Precision M6800 (i7) , Windows 7 Professional SP1.

2) Install NI VISA drivers and NI-488.2 drivers (14.0).

3) Install manufacturer drivers as explained in NI website.

4) Run Labview.  I can see instrument driver VIs under the Function Palette and run example VIs. So far, ok (I guess)

5) Run NI MAX. No USB ports listed. Only COM1 and LPT1 (printer port).

6) I ran some windows test apps provided by the manufacturer to access to all the interfaces of the NXP microcontroller in the DLN2. Everything works. I can read analog/digital inputs, force digital out values and use the SPI and I2C (I see the SPI/I2C frame sin a scope).

I have spent one day going through different links in NI website (have watcheing almost every demo video on the site) and still are not able to guess why Labview can't see my USB device.

Any hint?

Regards,

Jose

[Dennis_Knutson]

Duplicate - http://forums.ni.com/t5/LabVIEW/How-do-I-install-instrument-drivers-contained-in-LLB-into/td-p/78452...

[hypnozodiak]

Sorry, I assumed it was more correct to open a new thread with the topic rather than to use another users thread.

[Dennis_Knutson]

It would have been but I responded there before I saw this new post. You can answer my questions here and the other thread can be marked as moved.

[hypnozodiak]

Great, let's do that. Answering to your questions:

1) I see the printer (LPT1) and COM1 in NI MAX even though nothing is connected there. Therefore my assumption. 

2) The device is shown in the Device Manager. No warnings reported (see dev_man_diolan.jpg)

3) For example code from the vendor to read ADC (channel 0) , (see ADC_diolan.jpg). No idea on what is using, I am fairly out of fit in Labview (>10 years ago that I dont use it). I can't run this VI (run/pause/stop menu shaded), therefore, no errors.

When I go to Find instrument Drivers why is not this Diolan device listed under Installed Device Drivers? (even though I have the LLB and .DLL files provided by the manufacturer in the Labview .instr folder) .

Jose

[Dennis_Knutson]

don't believe llb drivers are supposed to be listed and on any case, that is just irrelevant. You don't have a problem with the installation. You don't have a problem with MAX either since your device is not supposed to be listed.

It would be nice to see the block diagram of one of the subVIs but it seems it is using ActiveX as the interface. Click on the run arrow to get a message as to why it is broken. Post that image. You picked a weird device as your first experience with LabVIEW, unfortunately.

[hypnozodiak]

Hi,

Please check the file attached. No error messages when I try to run.

Why you call it a "weir device"? It is just a PCb with a 32 bit ARM NXP processor, an I2C , an SPI and 42 GPIOs. I am an FPGA engineer myself (working with VHDL/Verilog/MATLAB for quite some time) and can't think of a more standard HW than that.The reason why we picked this device is that before its less than 100 USD and we might neet to scale up to several of them for our test system (We could not afford doing that using NI DAQ modules , which are several times more expensive) Also, the device manufacturer provides example Labview code for all the peripherals, so my hope is that with a little bit of tweaking i ll get through.

Regards

Jose

[Dennis_Knutson]

When clicking on the broken arrow, you should not be getting a message that there are no errors. That makes no sense. Sorry, without the device and the Windows driver, I'm not sure anyone here can help. Really more of a problem for the vendor that wrote the VI.

It's weird in that the actual Windows driver is somewhat proprietary it seems.

[hypnozodiak]

Hi again:

I' m putting pressure on the manufacturer to provide support, but still I have some very basic questions that I think a Labview expert should be able to answer.

Attached are the driver files provided by the manufacturer along with install instructions (which I do not fully understand). I assume the iinstall description is based on a standard procedure to install third party instrument drivers , but still don't know what to do with the dln.net.dll file (I just copied it in the /Labview 2014/instr folder). Any hint?

The manufacturer website says that the driver has been developed for Labview 2012 . I' m using Labview 2014, and assuming backward compatibility. Is that correct?.

One more question: Is there a way of seeing within Labview which third party instrument drivers do you have installed? 

Regards

Jose

[hypnozodiak · Accepted solution]

Hi,

Problem solved. After contacting with Diolan (the manufacturer of the adapter board) they updated the driver library. Now the USB communication and all microcontroller peripheral work. With that I have SPI/I2C (master and slave), 48 GPIO , 8 analog inputs (10 bits @ 1 MHz) and a UART . All accesible via USB and for less than 200 USD (that's way less the equivalent NI HW).

It can be used with Labview without any problem. Not a weird board at all, if you happen to know something about hardware.

Kudos for Diolan!

Jose