Configure Multiple 7344's

[rcdon]

We have an application that requires more than 4 servo motors. We are trying to configure two 7344's in MAX. We've tried it in a PC (2 PCI-7344) and PXI (two PXI-7344). However, they cannot be configured independently in MAX. A change on one board is also reflected on the other (for example, change the encoder counts of Axis 1 on board 1, and Axis 1 on board 2 is also changed). We've got LV RT 6.1/Motion 5.2 on the PXI, and LV 7/Motion 6.0 on the PC (Win2K). HELP!!! Can two or more 7344's coexist in a chassis? Can we do all of the configuration programmatically? We need these things working ASAP...

[Dustin_W]

When configuring the boards in MAX you should see two separate entries, one for board 1 and one for board 2. The configuration settings for both should be kept separate, if this is not the case I would recommend contacting NI directly to get one-on-one trouble shooting. You can contact NI by going to www.ni.com/ask and selecting phone NI.

[Jochen]

The configuration data for NI motion boards are kept in setting records that are identified by their name.
By default all 7344 boards use the same setting record with the name "Default 7344 settings". In this case it's correct that changes to these settings are reflected for both boards.

In order to use seperate settings for each board you need to select the "Default 7344 settings" entry in MAX and click on the "Change Settings" button in the toolbar on the right side in MAX. In the following dialog click on the "Create new settings..." button (folder symbol). Now you should be able to use seperate records of settings for both boards.

Regards,

Jochen Klier
Applications Engineering Group Leader
National Instruments Germany GMbH

[rcdon]

Thanks, Jochen - this very solution dawned on me a few hours after I posted my question! I was going to post the answer here when I got a chance.
I have to say, though, that the whole process in MAX of saving/exporting/importing/selecting configurations is less than intuitive (that's putting it nicely).

Thanks again,
Rod