I have some experience with the Elvis I and Elvis II, but not with the Elvis III. I must say that I found the Elvis series of limited value in a teaching situation, particularly if the Instructor did not have a good idea of how to use the Elvis and its various (expensive) components in a teaching environment.
Be that as it may, one of the first "rules" in "exploring" any Data Acquisition ("DAQ", for short) equipment with LabVIEW is to "play with it" using NI MAX, the Measurement and Automation Explorer.
Open MAX. Plug in (and turn on) your NI Elvis III. Look for it to appear in Devices and Interfaces. If you do not see it, you may be missing the Drivers for it.
If you do see it, click on its Icon and see if anything "expands" from it, that is, are there "sub-components". [I don't know what to expect here, but you are learning what the Elvis shows you]. If it shows up, you should see information about the Device appear in the Pane on the right, including the Model and Serial Number. You should also see a Menu appear that includes Test Panels. Click "Test Panels".
This should pop up a screen with Tabs to test out the capabilities of your device. For a Thermocouple, you probably want Analog Input. I'm not sure how the Elvis handles the various types of "analog input" devices, so I don't know what you should expect. I know that when I used a theremocouple on another project, there was a special module that the thermocouple plugged into, and which (in turn) was connected to the NI DAQ device (sorry, I'm not sure what specific device we were using, possibly a Compact DAQ).
If you are still "stuck", or if the Elvis is not recognized, leave it plugged in, expand the Software tab in MAX, and attach a screen shot of the Devices and Interfaces and Software entries shown in MAX so we'll understand better what you are working with.
Bob Schor
