How to set up communication between my laptop and Agilent 8164A?And how to write the source code?

[Dennis_Knutson]

I agree that all of the functions seem to be in the driver. The examples from Agilent though, seem to refer to older functions. There are linking problems. The LabVIEW examples from Agilent seem to be very old.

[Lance49]

Ok, if that is the case, since I can't refer to any examples, may I know how do I convert the driver for my use in LabView 8.0? I understand that I would need to make the driver into a SubVi in order to communicate with the 8164A in LabView. In my Agilent 8164A manual, it suggests me to use the LabView Solutions Wizard. However, I think that only exists for older versions(LabView 5.0).

Thanks

[Dennis_Knutson]

There should be no conversion required. If you placed the driver in the correct location, all of the functions should be in the Instrument I/O>Instrument Drivers palette. As far as how to use the specific functions, I'm afraid I can't help much. You mioght have to experiment with running the different ones and seeing what they do to the instrument.

[Lance49]

Hi,

it seems like by opening the driver in LabView 8.0 and saving it, I can use it afterwards. However, I dropped the agilent functions(e.g. initialize.vi) onto the block diagram and run it, my computer system gets abnormally slow till the point that I could not control anything any more. This was only solved when I managed to end LabView on my Task Manager. My laptop is connected to the Agilent 8164A when I tried the functions. Is there something I do wrongly with the connections or could it be I am still missing some files?

Thanks

[chris_amadasun]

Hello,
Is the Agilent 8164A folder inside your LabVIEW 8.0 Instr.lib directory?
Do you get this exact issue running the example files?

[Lance49]

Dear Mr. Christian,

Thank you for responding to my questions. Yes, I have installed the drivers in the instr.lib folder. I am able to view the functions of the driver in the "Function Panel"  under the column "Instrument I/O->Instruments Driver->hp816x(name of the driver)". However, it seems like I have a problem when I drop the "Initialize.VI" onto the block diagram and run it. Could it be a case of incompatibility of the driver's version and that of LabView 8.0? Could you help me check on this? Thank you.

Regards,

Lance

[Dennis_Knutson]

You can open the initialize VI and run it alone. You shuold then click on the little arrow on the right side of the resource name control. Your instrument should be listed there if you did a scan for instruments in MAX after installing the GPIB controller. I don't have a controller and I don't have the instrument and when I run the VI, it does take a while to return with an error (about 20 seconds) but that could be simply because the developer set the VISA timeout to that. That's as much as I can test.

One last question - are you using an NI GPIB controller?

[Lance49]

Dear Mr Dennis,

Regarding the "Initialize.VI", I had tried either to use it alone or with other functions. However, it seems like the program "hangs" whenever I run the thing. From my Agilent's LCD, I can see that the values are slowly being reset to its default factory settings. I believed that the "Initialize.VI" is doing it and also polling my Agilent at the same time. I can even hear sounds from the Agilent which normally means that instructions are being written to it. However, as LabView always hangs whenever I start to use the "Initialize.VI", I am unable to set up communication properly and have to forcefully terminate the program on my laptop.

For your second question, I am not using a NI GPIB cable. I am using Agilents Technologies's 82357A USB/GPIB interface.

Regards,

Lance

[Dennis_Knutson]

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For your second question, I am not using a NI GPIB cable. I am using Agilents Technologies's 82357A USB/GPIB interface.

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Well, that explains all the problems you are having.

The use of an Agilent controller should, in theory, not make a difference but you will want to look and see what version of drivers you have installed. Certain versions of Agilent VISA will have problems with certain versions of NI-VISA. There are numerous posts on getting Agilent controllers to work with LabVIEW and a few knowledge base articles as well. Do a search for 82357 and see what you come up with.

You can also test basic communication with teh instrument. The initialize function should not do more than issue a *IDN? and *RST (or their equivalent if the instrument is old and non-standard). You can use the VISA interactive utility in MAX or the Agilent config program and see if they work. If they don't, then you know it's not a problem with the driver.

[Lance49]

Hi,

I have already tried using Agilent's IO Connection expert to send simple commands and poll from the 8164A. I have also tried to use the MAX's VISA utility. Both methods of communication worked. I have tried to search for 82357. One of the results I found was "Note: This method only applies to Agilent/HP's IEEE488 interface cards. Although the Agilent I/O Libraries are required to use your device, version 14.1 and 14.2 is incompatible with NI-488.2.". Hence, I am checking with Agilent about the version of the interface card on my 8164A now.