Deterministic Distributed I/O for NI PACs
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The NI 9144 chassis offers easy deterministic expansion I/O for the CompactRIO platform and NI PACs.
Adding distributed I/O into a real-time control system requires a high-speed, deterministic communication protocol. The ideal solution should provide high I/O counts while optimizing system throughput and jitter-free timing. National Instruments now offers a scalable expansion method for its programmable automation controller (PAC) platform. Additionally, the power of NI LabVIEW software presents a simple, uniform API between the controller and distributed I/O.
With the new NI 9144 chassis, you can easily add synchronized, distributed I/O to PAC systems. This 8-slot rugged chassis for NI C Series modules uses standard CAT 5 Ethernet cabling to communicate deterministically with a real-time controller. Any NI CompactRIO or real-time PXI system with two Ethernet ports can serve as the master controller. You can daisy chain multiple NI 9144 slave chassis from the controller to expand time-critical applications to high channel counts while maintaining hard determinism with minimal processor resources.
You can use this new technology with more than 30 NI C Series analog and digital I/O modules to achieve direct connectivity with a wide variety of sensors and reusability with other NI hardware platforms. Additionally, the out-of-box experience minimizes configuration for the NI 9144 chassis by automatically recognizing all connected slaves and their modules with the LabVIEW Real-Time Module 8.6. With this program, you have easy access to the physical channels using the click-and-drag I/O variable, live test panels, and I/O forcing for troubleshooting.
Watch a webcast on implementing deterministic distributed I/O.
Low-Cost CompactRIO System Offers Larger FPGA, Easier Programming
The new NI cRIO-9073 CompactRIO system with an integrated controller and chassis is the lowest-priced target in the CompactRIO line that supports the new CompactRIO Scan Mode, introduced with NI LabVIEW 8.6. The scan mode is a programming paradigm for CompactRIO that takes advantage of the power and reliability of the CompactRIO FPGA hardware without any additional field-programmable gate array (FPGA) programming. The cRIO-9073 features a 266 MHz PowerPC processor, 64 MB of DRAM, 128 MB of nonvolatile storage, and a 2M gate FPGA – all for $1,999 USD; €1,699; ¥231,000.1
View specifications on the NI cRIO-9073.
1All prices are subject to change without notice.
This article first appeared in the Q4 2008 issue of Instrumentation Newsletter.
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