Help with USB Instrument Control Tutorial

[amgish01]

Recently, I was directed to the USB Instrument Control Tutorial.  I was at the point where you use the driver development wizard and got stuck.  Windows XP won't stop installing the generic driver for my USB device (a game controller) and won't allow me to use my newly created driver so I can use NI-MAX.  My goal is to communicate with Labview using the game controller as an input device, by the way.  After looking around at some websites, I tinkered with the services in the system by adjusting the Plug and Play service and the Shell Hardware Detection service and somehow got it to be recognized as an NI-Instrument.  Now I can't get back to that point.  Basically, I'm asking if there is any way to access the wizard in XP or override it so that it won't automatically install the generic driver.  Any other suggestions are appreciated.  Thanks.

[MXI Master]

amgish01,

First, you need make sure all instances of drivers for your device in Device Manager are deleted. Then if you get a the Plug and play installation wizard for the generic driver, you should cancel it. If it is installing without even a wizard coming up, you should be able to click the task tray icon to abort the process as well. Then, you should be  able to use the driver you created.
Cheers,

[amgish01]

Thanks for your help MXI Master.  I found another way to get around it.  Would you or anyone be able to give me a link on how to interface a USB device with LabVIEW to acquire data?  I have this project where I need to send and receive data to a PIC Microcontroller via a USB cable between an interface and the computer.  Presently, I am learning how to simply "talk" to the computer with an input device, in my case, a game controller.  So, like I said, I've got the driver updated so it can use VISA.  (I've experimented with the Call Library Function node, but I want to avoid using .dll's, so the input device control subVI's are out of the question)  Are there any good websites or forums/threads that someone could recommend so I can learn how to use VISA in my situation, or let me know otherwise if there is a better method?  I've got LabVIEW to recognize the device, but I don't know how to see or interpret the data that is sent over.  Thanks.

[Dennis_Knutson]

Why do you want to not use the built-in device control VI's? It seems to me that you would avoid a lot of unnecessary work just by using what someone else has already written and debugged. I consider the VISA driver wizard as a last, desperate chance to make something work. In order to use USB RAW, you may have to get detailed information from the vendor of your controller. You could also try http://www.usb.org/developers/hidpage/#Class_Definition to see what information is available on interfacing game controllers to the HID driver that is in windows.

[amgish01]

I think there may be some confusion.  My end goal is to create a USB interface for a PIC Microcontroller or a similar device using one.  I'm merely using the game controller as a simple input device and as a tool to assist my learning of VISA.  I've already used the Input Device VI's, but I'm pretty sure that I won't be able to use .dll's via the Call Library Function node to create a custom USB interface.  I'm new to this VISA material, so please correct me if I make any erronous remarks.  Do you know where I can find good example programs?

[Dennis_Knutson]

I'm not sure that whatever you might be able to learn about communicating with a game controller will apply to your pic and usb interface. The USB protocol could be completely different depending on what USB controller you might be using or the the firmware you implement. There are USB interfaces that you can make appear as a simple RS-232 port, as one example.

[amgish01]

Considering that I abort using the game controller, what would you suggest for my case?  And by the way, is it even possible to communicate with the controller by using LabVIEW through VISA controls?


Message Edited by amgish01 on 02-06-2008 03:41 PM

[Dennis_Knutson]

In theory, it should be possible to communicate with the game controller if you have detailed information on the USB protocol it uses. This might be documented somewhere since it probably conforms to one of the HID classes.

As far as where to go from here, I'm not sure. If you have an idea of which USB chipset you will be using, then you can see what information is available for that and whether anyone has used LabVIEW for it. I've used hardware with USB from FTDI and they make two drivers available. One is a serial port emulator and the other is a DLL. I've used both. The serial port is easy with VISA. The DLL was a little harder to use but is probably faster.

[Lord Chaos]

Hello all,

Hello MXIMaster, hello amigish1,

I have the same problem, that I have installed the driver, before reading the tutorial, and now I can't see the usb device in zhe Measurement and Automatisation Tool. I have deleted it from the device manager and also the created .inf file, and tried it again, but wihtout success. If I plug the device into, the name of the device is recognized, but not the driver. If I conect the usb device to another computer, where i haven't installed a driver before, it just says "USB device" (unfortunatelly I am not able to run Lbview on this other computer). So what have you done amigish1, to get it working? Or does anybody know, what exactly i have to delete?

Thanks in advance

Lord Chaos

[MXI Master]

Load Chaos,

What happens when you get the Add New Hardware Wizard?Are you unable to use inf file that you created? Does it error, or do you not go through the wizard at all?