Can I upgrade Labview 5.01 to 5.1 for free?

[DAlbrecht75]

Hi!

I want to aquire measurement data from a pressure gauge, and the manufacturer gave me dirvers for LabView 5.1 Unfortunately, the most recent version of LabView available at our Institute is 5.01. The people at the manufacturer told me that they don't have VI-files for 5.01, but that these aren't nessecary for us, as an upgrade would be available from National Intruments from 5.01 to 5.1, and that this would be cost-free. My problem is that I can't find this update on NI's website and I am not sure that it even exists, as the colleague to bought the software many years has not cared about the programme since forever. Could someone help me, please?

[Chaos]

You have been misinformed im afraid and there are a couple of things I should point out...

1> LabVIEW 5.1 was not a free upgrade. They did however offer a "grace period". *IF* you had purchased or upgraded to LabVIEW 5.0 anywhere from December 1998 to May 1999 (approx dates from memory) then you were eligible to be bumped up to 5.1 for free. The grace period was put into place to cut down on the chance of upgrading to the, what was then, the newest version only to find out two weeks to a month later yet another upgrade was available. This offer, obviously, expired quite some time ago and I think your colleague took advantage of this not knowing the full details.

2> NI does not maintain older versions of LabVIEW so if you purchased an upgrade now it would not be 5.1 but rather 7.1. This is probably your best bet and you should not have any serious issues importing the older VI code to this version. It might be as simple as just opening up the older VIs in the newest version. My suggestion would be to download a LabVIEW demo and import the VIs to it and if you can get them to work there then upgrade.

[DAlbrecht75]

Ok, thanks. So I need to get creative, as we simply don't have the ~1000 $ available for the update. Perhaps I should ask the manufacturer again for aid. They are not very willing to give it, though. Is there any way to make the 5.1+ VIs useable with 5.01 without acutally owning a newer version of the programme?

[Chaos]

If you post the 5.1 VIs to the board (preferably in a zip or llb) and ask nicely I am sure someone on the board who still has a 5.1 version of LabVIEW could save for a previous version for you. Of course I am making an assumption that 5.1 has a "save for previous" oprion.

[DAlbrecht75]

Ok, I will do that. Thank you for the help.

[altenbach]

You say you're at an "Institute". If this is an academic institution, you should definitely give you NI sales rep a call to get a quote for an upgrade.
Academic software discounts are currently at 75% for new software and 35% for uprades. There are also starter kits that include LabVIEW and hardware at a great prices (e.g. the NI PCI-6221/CB-68LP/LabVIEW combo is less that $1000 introductory price, but limited to one unit per department).

There might even be a campus site license that you don't know about. Good luck 🙂

Even if you're not in academia, you should probably get an upgrade quote from you sales rep. They won't bite. 🙂