basic install & measurem. questions... (I've read tutorial)

[Mathias Goldau]

Hi,

I've some, problems with my measureboard. I don't understand how should it
work. I thought:
1. Step: I installed the hardware driver from the boardseller for WinME.
(It's a plug and play pci card from "Meilhaus me 2600".
2. Step: I've tried to install the LabVIEW driver from the boardseller
(only VI's???) and copied them to .../LabView6/instr.lib/new_folder
3. Step: I've tried to configure the card, with MAX, but nothing to do,
because the board didn't occure in the device-list.

I use WinME, Labview 6i.

In the system-properties the device-manager says no problem with the
hardware driver. If I try to make a new VI, and want to use the Meilhaus
VI's no problems occure. But I cannot add an new item in t
he "data
neighborhood" (only a virtual instrument wherefore I the configured
daq-hardware need)). On ni.com/support/install they say I should see my
device in the "devices and interfaces"-list, if i correctly installed my
driver. But I don't see my driver only the serial & lpt-ports.

thanks for any advice

mathias

P.S.: if someone can explain it in german, please mail me.

--
mail: funuser@web.de

[Dennis_Knutson]

You can configure only NI drivers and devices in MAX.

[Mathias Goldau]

Dennis Knutson wrote:

> You can configure only NI drivers and devices in MAX.

BTW, an NI driver is a collection of basic VI's for the Hardware? (command
sets and stuff?)
How do I get a new device (my pci card) into MAX?
(And I'm not sure: a device means a real existing hardwaredevice like my
soundcard, doesn't it?)
I only want to make a new item in my data neighborhood, for daq., but
therefor i need an existing device, that isn't shown in "device and
interfaces". I thought if the driver is correctly installed, i shouldn't
have any problems, by configure my board.

--
mail: funuser@web.de

[Dennis_Knutson]

I should have been a little clearer. MAX shows GPIB/VXI instrument and hardware from NI (i.e. DAQ boards). Yo cannot add non-NI boards to MAX. It is similar to your video card or network adapter - these don't show up in MAX either. You configure your board with the software provided by the vendor. Part of the confusion lies in what is a driver. At the low level, there is a driver that communicates directly with the hardware. This is usually a dll. For NI cards, the driver is NI-DAQ. Other vendors provide there own. Then there is higher level drivers such as a set of LabVIEW VIs. These don't interact directly with the hardware - they make calls to the dll that does. If the vendor provided VIs are communicating with the board, then the hardwa
re driver is installed and configured correctly. But, because it's not an NI board, you won't be able to take advantage of MAX.

[Kamran S.]

When you install a board and use it in LabVIEW there are two things that you get. The first is a hardware driver (generally a dll or set of dlls) that allows applications to interface with the hardware. The other "driver" refers to the VIs you find in LabVIEW. These VIs provide an interface to the hardware driver (dll) that you can use to programmatically configure/control the hardware.

NI-MAX is a configuration utitlity which is used to configure NI hardware. The support for this is built into NI-MAX and into the drivers provided by NI, to make configuration of NI boards and use in LabVIEW and other development environments easier. This is more than likely why you can not add the device from another party into NI-MAX.

The VIs in LabVIEW work fine as they a
re interfacing directly with the hardware driver (dll) provided by the manufacturer.

In summary, the VIs will work but non-NI hardware (apart from GPIB instruments) will not be available through NI-MAX.

Best Regards,
Kamran

[Mathias Goldau]

Hi,

> In summary, the VIs will work but non-NI hardware (apart from GPIB
> instruments) will not be available through NI-MAX.

My Card has an GPIB interface. So it can't be used in MAX, too?

mathias

--
mail: funuser@web.de

[Kamran S.]

Only NI boards (GPIB, DAQ, etc) will show up in MAX. MAX is a configuration tool that allows you to configure, test and manage National Instruments hardware. It is provided for free with NI hardware drvier and application software.

So the third party GPIB board will not be visible as a device in MAX. If you have an NI GPIB board and have instruments connected to it then those instruments should show up ... is this the difficulty you're seeing?

Regards,
Kamran

[Mathias Goldau]

Kamran S. wrote:

> So the third party GPIB board will not be visible as a device in MAX.
> If you have an NI GPIB board and have instruments connected to it then
> those instruments should show up ... is this the difficulty you're
> seeing?

In other words, I can't use my board with the GPIB, in MAX, only the VI's
I've downloaded from the board seller? This sucks :-(.

But thanks, for your advices too.

mathias

--
mail: funuser@web.de

[WeiC]

Hello,

I have a related question about drivers.  I have an CCD camera that comes with a PCI card (non-NI), the PCI card

has been installed correctly.  I also have high-level VIs for this camera installed, which I can open from LabView

User library, and place them in the block diagram.  I wonder if all this is what needed for me to communicate with

my camera.  If so, how do I know that LabView is able to talk with the PCI card for that camera.  Thanks!

Wei

[T-Route]

Hello Wei,

Measurement and Automation Explorer will not show third party devices so unless the 3rd party vendor has a utility that can test the communication to the camera you will only be able to use the VI's that came with the camera.  As long as the VI's are built to communicate with that specific frame grabber and you have the driver for that frame grabber installed then it should work.  If the VI's use our NI IMAQ driver to communicate then it will not work because the NI IMAQ driver will only communicate with National Instruments hardware.  I would contact the camera/frame grabber manufacturer to see if this is the case.

Regards,
Mark T
Applications Engineer
National Instruments