Trouble configuring ethernet FP modules & observing multiple instances of NIMAX.exe.

[Chris_K.]

I am using a single PC to communicate with 4 FieldPoint network modules. The 4 modules are connected through a hub and are all on an isolated network. There are two FP2000's, one FP2010 and one FP1601. I am using LV 7.0 and DSC 7.0, FieldPoint 4.0.1 and MAX 3.0.1.

There are two problems: First, configuration of the modules is very difficult since the communication is dropped with various modules at random times. I have to restart MAX several times to get all 4 to communicate at once. The second problem: Once they are all communicating, I start my LabVIEW/DSC application. Now a Dr. Watson-type error message appears telling me that NIMAX.exe has crashed. This happens twice while run
ning the LabVIEW program. Then checking the Task Manager reveals 2 more instances of NIMAX.exe running.

One possible explanation is that the PC has two ethernet ports. This knowledgebase entry explains why configuration is difficult:
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However, I am not sure that this explains why there are multiple instances of NIMAX.exe and why they are crashing when I run LabVIEW.

The main concern is that communication is sometimes dropped with one or more FP modules after running the tag engine and LV application for several days.

[AndreOliveira]

Hi,

The first question I would have is : do you have multiple network cards in your computer ?

Secondly, make sure you have the latest firmware revision installed on the FP 1601 which can be found and download from the National Instruments web site.
Taking into account that you have the lastest firmware revision in all the controllers and the latest version of FieldPoint software, all the controllers should show under "Remote Systems" in MAX automatically, as long as they have unique IP addresses.

If they do appear in MAX (which I believe it is the case), you said you loose connection when trying to configure the devices, what is exactly the message you get when the connection is lost ? My feeling is that the problem should be treated there.... The f
act that you have to run MAX multiple times to get the module configured might (and is most likely) related to the max.exe crash.

You should be able to configure all the controllers at once in MAX.
Let me know what is the message when you loose the connection and I will try to suggest something from there.

Best Regards


Andre Oliveira

[Chris_K.]

Andre,
The PC has two ethernet ports built into the motherboard. There are no network cards installed.

We have installed FP 1600 Firmware Revision 417 which should be the latest.

I think you are right about the multiple instances of MAX. I would guess that when I closed MAX the window closed, but the process was still in memory doing something. Not exactly desired behavior!

Anyway, I didn't see any pop-up error messages, only the remote system icon appearing as a yellow warning symbol. I went to the Data Neighborhood to monitor some channels on the device and got the message "unable to connect to item" (or something similar) for all channels. The strange thing is that I would restart MAX in an attempt to get the remote system communicating
again, but now the problem would switch to a different remote system. (Usually I would see one of the four remote systems appearing as the yellow warning symbol while the others would appear as the standard blue diamond).

Chris Koehler

[AndreOliveira]

Chris,

At this point based on the behavior you have reported I would suggest you to call NI technical support and have a applications engineer help you over the phone, if they cannot identify the cause they will escalate the issue.

Best Regards

Andre Oliveira