[time-nuts] Low Cost GP-IB PCI card?
SAIDJACK at aol.com
SAIDJACK at aol.com
Sun Jul 9 17:46:22 UTC 2006
In a message dated 7/9/2006 04:56:51 Pacific Daylight Time, jra at febo.com
writes:
>>I found that USB-GPIB controller. Looks like BSD and Linux are supported.
>
>
>> http://www.sparkfun.com/commerce/product_info.php?products_id=549
>
>
> Hi, I bought one on Ebay, they work quite well. They used to be $99 at
> Sparkfun, now they raised the price, and it is out of stock...
> Have you tried using SRQ or other features than simple read/wait/write
> sequences with it? I found with one of the old RS-232-to-GPIB
> converters that anything beyond reads and writes was hard to handle.
> John
Hi John,
I typically only use the basic (polled) features of the GPIB, sending
commands manually to the unit (*RST, *IDN, etc etc), or what is even better I put
the units into "TALK" mode, that way they spit out data without any need to
poll. Then I simply use Win Hyperterm (yuk) to capture the data to a file, and
analyze that later.
Works great with frequency counters, power meters etc. Have not tried SRQ.
One interesting aspect about this "Abdul" card is that it has a built-in
GPIB connector that plugs into the instrument directly. It's a curse and a
blessing: it hangs out of your instrument without any mechanical support etc, and
extends your instrument length, but at the same time it saves you a >$50 GPIB
cable. BTW: the card is now being sold on Ebay again.
One other factoid: the SMD chips seem to be soldered by hand, my card had a
lot of solder flux on it. It's best to clean this off with Flux remover
(Acetone type etc) for long term reliability.
bye,
Said
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