Screen grabs; what am I doing wrong?

[Mister Mustard]

Hi guys,

I can find my Oscilloscope using 'National Instruments MAX' and also with 'Agilent Connection Expert'. I've read all the help screens, and I think I have the right "Visa
Resource Name" but when I try to run simple a .vi, I still I get error messages:

    "VISA:  (Hex 0xBFFF0011) Insufficient location information or the device or resource is not present in the system."

I've attached some screengrabs; like I say, I think I'm typing in the right name.

Any tips would be greatly welcomed.

- Pete

[falkpl]

Is it possible that the visa resource is still in use?  did you close the agilent connection wizard and MAX before running the example?

[Mister Mustard]

Hmm, tried that - still nothing. MAX can see it, so can Agilent but Labview has no idea 😞

- Pete

Message Edited by Mister Mustard on 12-21-2007 11:34 AM

[smercurio_fc]

You mention the Agilent Connection Expert. Does this mean you have an Agilent GPIB board, or is it an NI board? If it's an Agilent board, you have to enable VISA Passport, as explained in this KB article, for VISA to work. MAX doesn't use VISA.

[Mister Mustard]

Thanks for the thoughts. It's an NI board I'm using - a USB widget in fact. This one here:

Widget

I was using the Agilent software for a 'second opinion' (and it's an Agilent scope, so I thought it might bring me luck 🙂 ).

So MAX doesn't use VISA... hmm... so maybe the problem is with the way my Labview is using VISA. I feel I'm getting closer but still not quite there.

- Pete

Message Edited by Mister Mustard on 12-21-2007 03:33 PM

Message Edited by Mister Mustard on 12-21-2007 03:35 PM

Message Edited by Mister Mustard on 12-21-2007 03:37 PM

[Matthew_Kelton]

Can you provide a screen cap from MAX showing the device?

[pankaj]

Mr. Mustard,

Let's start at the beginning. The steps to follow are:

1. Install NI 488.2 which will be the driver for your interface. (I would recommend uninstalling Agilent S/w if you aren't using any other controller made by Agilent).
2. Install NI-VISA so that you can use VISA API to talk to your device.
3. Plug in your interface and let windows install the h/w and recognize it as an NI gpib interface.
4. Open MAX and you should see an entry for GPIB0 (most likely, or else some other interface number after GPIB) in your device and interfaces in MAX.
5. You should be able to connect your device to the interface and right click on GPIB0 in MAX and 'scan for instruments', which should find your instrument.
6. If you click on VISA properties, you can see what VISA resource string the instrument is using, and you will also be able to give it an alias.
7. You can use that resource name (or the alias) to communicate to the device. Just to make sure, click the instrument, go to visa properties page and click on 'Open VISA test panel' button. You should be able to send VISA commands to your instrument and read its responses.

Once you can do this much, it should work from LV the same way. Please let me know if you have trouble with any of these steps.

Pankaj

[Mister Mustard]

Hmm, now that you mention it, it does look a little different from the Agilent one - I'll need to think about that.

This is how NI MAX displays the information.

- Pete

[Mister Mustard]

Thanks Pankaj,

Steps 6 & 7 are new to me; this will help a lot! I'll give them a go and hopefully have this thing working by Christmas 🙂

- Pete


Message Edited by Mister Mustard on 12-22-2007 05:04 AM

[Mister Mustard]

Hey Pankaj,

Your tips did the trick allright; turns out I didn't have the VISA software installed. I thought it was included with the GPIB software (why would it not be 🙂 ).

I found the VISA test panel and everything was fine from there - I even have data! Of course, it looks like a different VISA naming convention from the Agilent one - but never mind.

It will be a Merry Christmas after all 🙂

Thanks all,

Pete


Message Edited by Mister Mustard on 12-22-2007 08:12 AM