Terminating waveform generation with NI 5421

[Powderdemon]

Hi

I'm using a NI 5421 (PCI) AWG to create custom voltage pulses. I can configure the card to produce the required waveform (usually a DC offset or square wave), but would like to know how to limit the number of waveforms the card actually outputs. Ideally completely terminating waveform generation and returning the output to 0 volts.

Can this be done?? If so, any suggestions would be much appreciated.

Many thanks

James

[Drew Creel]

Yes, it can be done. What you'll need to do is create a waveform for your pulse and another one for a 0V DC signal. Then use Arbitrary Sequence mode to create a sequence with your two waveforms. You can use the Loop Count array input on the Create Arbitrary Sequence function to specify how many times each waveform should play.

Check out the Arbitrary Sequence examples for LabVIEW/CVI/C that ship with NI-FGEN for an example of this.

Drew Creel
Software Engineer
Signal Generators Group
National Instruments