umi 7774 required for ni drives?

[aks23]

i am designing a motion control system using 3 stepper motors (ni Nema 23) and correspondingly 3 ni P70360 drives. Is a umi 7774 required to connect these to the 4 axes pci motion controller card?  (i'm confused as its description on the ni site says that it is required for 3rd party drives BUT in the discussions i've read a lot of people have used umi 7774 with ni drives )

[The_Hunt · Accepted solution]

Hello aks, 

Yes, you will need to purchase and use our Universal Motion Interface (UMI) 7774 board in order to connect the three drives/motors to the motion controller card. 

It may have been confusing because we do explicitly say that it is required for 3rd party drives, but not necessarily required for our drives. Having said that, the vast majority of customers use the UMI board because it eliminates the need for custom cables, and makes it far easier to connect to more than one axis. 

Here are some links that may provide more detail and could prove to be helpful.

[1] NI Stepper Motion System Selection Guide

[2] Cabling for a Motion System with a Danaher Drive Explained