NI-DAQmx Measurement-Ready Virtual Channels and Configuration Services

Developing a test and measurement application involves more than just writing the software; you must also set up, configure, and troubleshoot your hardware. In the past, the process of configuring and troubleshooting hardware could take a huge portion of your total development time. With the introduction of NI-DAQmx, the entire application development process has been dramatically simplified. NI-DAQmx features measurement-ready virtual channels and configuration services that reduce overall application development time by simplifying both hardware configuration and measurement troubleshooting. More specifically, with NI-DAQmx you can perform the functions described in the following paragraphs.

Configure Each of Your Hardware Channels for Specific Measurements Using Virtual Channels.

DAQ Assistant, which can be accessed through LabVIEW or Measurement & Automation Explorer, prompts you to select the measurement type based on the sensor/signal you are acquiring, and automatically linearizes and scales the configured channel to the engineering units of your choice. In four easy steps, DAQ Assistant walks you through configuring your virtual channels:

Step 1. Specify whether your measurement is analog input, analog output, counter input, counter output, or digital input/output.

Step 2. Select the measurement type for your virtual channel.

Step 3. Select the specific sensor/signal for your virtual channel.

Step 4. Specify the physical hardware channel to use for your new virtual channel.


When used in your application development environment such as LabVIEW 7 Express, the resulting virtual channel will automatically scale your measurements to the engineering units of your choice.

The scaling and configuration information stored in each virtual channel drastically reduces the complexity of your application code. For example, a LabVIEW thermocouple monitoring application was simplified from four sub-VIs to one.

NI-DAQmx features DAQ Assistant, a menu-driven application that walks you through configuring a measurement and automation application and automatically generates the corresponding LabVIEW code. This dramatically reduces your time to first measurement and simplifies even the most complex programming tasks.
Measurement & Automation Explorer (MAX) features a tree display with which you can quickly find and configure the measurement and automation devices and interfaces installed in your system. For example, terminal blocks can quickly be added to your DAQ device or SCXI module, as shown below.

Under NI-DAQmx, you can perform self-calibration on those devices that offer that feature (such as E Series DAQ devices) within MAX . This capability ensures that your hardware will provide the most accurate measurements possible over time. In addition, MAX keeps a record of the last external and self-calibrations done on each device; informing you of the expiration date of the last external calibration.

NI-DAQmx provides an easy reference chart of all the internal routes available within your device, which can be accessed from MAX and used to quickly determine the optimal route for a trigger or synchronization signal.

NI-DAQmx features test panels in MAX with which you can take basic measurements from your hardware devices without any programming. You can quickly and easily troubleshoot your hardware.

Reader Comments | Submit a comment »

Not a tutorial.
This doc is an advertisement for LV, not a tutorial. I don't need to be sold, I already have a copy of LV7.1.
- Sep 30, 2004

The figures should be in a higher resolution (can be done with popup-windows) for better reading
- Aug 19, 2004

need better screen resolution on figures
I can't make out the detail on the figures.
- Feb 11, 2004