PXIe-1090 has trouble when PXI card is installed

[Gregory]

I just got a brand new PXIe-1090 chassis connected via thunderbolt to my Win11 PC. I can boot up the chassis with no cards installed and view it in MAX with some info about it. 

Next, I powered off and installed an older PXI-5122 digital oscilloscope card into the hybrid slot. I can boot up the chassis without the thunderbolt cable and the two LEDs on the front (System and MXI) are both solid green. But, when I plug in the thunderbolt cable, the System LED goes solid red, and the MXI LED turns off. In MAX, I see the following:

Please let me know if you have ideas to troubleshoot this issue.

[Gregory]

I think the card might be drawing too much power, but I'm not sure. The specs say the card can draw 270mA from the -12V supply, and the chassis can supply 250mA on the -12V supply. All of the NI "oscilloscope bundles" use the PXIe-1083 chassis, which can supply 750mA on the -12V supply, so maybe I need to try that chassis.

I still don't understand why it only appears to have errors after connecting it to the PC. Maybe the thunderbolt power draw puts it over the edge.

[Robert__R · Accepted solution]

Hi Gregory,

It sounds like you've found the problem -- power draw on -12V.

Until you connect the chassis to the PC the chassis/card will be in reset. Cards generally draw minimal power in reset. Sometimes analog supplies aren't even enabled until later when the driver loads, which is what I suspect is happening here since it was functional long enough to be recognized and show up in MAX.

The -12V rail is only available to legacy PXI cards so you won't see this problem with PXIe cards. Hopefully you were just testing with a card on hand and not planning to use the 5122 in that chassis.

- Robert

[Gregory]

Hi Robert, thank you for the info. I have a PXIe-5122 card on order, but it is not expected until March 2024. I was hoping I could use the PXI-5122 until then.

It sounds like the 750mA supply on the PXIe-1083 should be able to handle the PXI-5122 card, is that correct?

[Robert__R]

Hi Gregory,

Yes, the PXIe-1083 can handle the PXI-5122 card. I can't wait till lead times return to sanity.

- Robert

[Gregory]

Thank you, and just to triple-check, the PXIe-1090 chassis will be able to handle the PXIe-5122 card?