Wanted: DIO board with programmable output voltage levels

[gcaw]

Hi,

Apologies if this is not specifically LabView, but I couldn't find
another relevant group.

We need a board that will allow us to do simple control and debugging
of the various chips that we develop. Specifically this is what we are
looking for:

- PCI board
- 24+ digital I/Os
- programmable output levels in range 1V to 3.3V
- Linux driver support (or at least the specs to allow us to develop
our own driver).

I have found many companies providing digital I/O boards, but they are
all TTL/5V.

If you know of anyone who offers such a board then please let me know.

Thanks

Greg

[Ray.R]

Hi Greg,

I was in a similar boat as you are in...

Check out this link:
http://exchange.ni.com/servlet/ProcessRequest?RHIVEID=101&RPAGEID=135&HOID=506500000008000000E1A40000&UCATEGORY_0=_31_%24_12_&UCATEGORY_S=0

I did find a company that does a 3.3V board: Access IO Products.

If you want various voltage levels, you may be stuck with a DAQ board...

However, check with NI Customer Service... I think they were or are to release a newer DIO board which supports multiple voltages.

Regards,

JLV

[Wiebe@CARYA]

Hi,

Why can't you use an analog board, and switch between 0V and the desired
output voltage?

Sorry if this is obvious, I'm not into hardware (or I try to keep out).

Regards,

Wiebe.

"gcaw" wrote in message
news:6eb2ad89.0405060951.c722861@posting.google.com...
> Hi,
>
> Apologies if this is not specifically LabView, but I couldn't find
> another relevant group.
>
> We need a board that will allow us to do simple control and debugging
> of the various chips that we develop. Specifically this is what we are
> looking for:
>
> - PCI board
> - 24+ digital I/Os
> - programmable output levels in range 1V to 3.3V
> - Linux driver support (or at least the specs to allow us to develop
> our own driver).
>
> I have found many companies providin
g digital I/O boards, but they are
> all TTL/5V.
>
> If you know of anyone who offers such a board then please let me know.
>
> Thanks
>
> Greg

[Jeremy_C]

Greg,

Both JLV and Wiebe have contributed advice that I would give. The only digital devices that we sell that allow for non 0-5V levels are the 655x boards discussed in the link JLV provided. However, if an analog signal will work, we have a new analog output board called the NI 6723 that has 32 outputs. Without knowing more about your exact requirements, it sounds like you could simply generate an analog voltage in your desired range. Unfortunately, none of these boards are supported by Linux. You may want to post this question in the Digital I/O section of the discussion forum in case some other digital customers have come across a similar situation.

Digital I/O Discussion

[gcaw]

Thanks to the various pointers offered by people. I thought I would
summarize my findings.

So far I have not found a single board that provides 3.3V DIOs, is
PCI, and has
linux driver support.

I have now moved to explore two other approaches:

1. A single board computer that offers this. I have found several
solutions in this space.

2. roll my own using an FPGA (which have flexible I/O capabilities)

I am seriously considering 2. only because I may be doing a PCI-based
FPGA board
anyway, and I can spin the DIO (for a different project) for almost no
extra work.

-Greg