With even a few analogue outputs, your application may come up against two serious problems: ground currents and phase errors.
Microstar Laboratories, maker of data acquisition processor (Dap) boards and network-ready Dapservers, has announced a new board that eliminates these possibilities at relatively low cost.
The board - part number MSXB 075 - includes four single-ended analogue outputs, with an isolated ground for each output.
And it updates all channels simultaneously.
MSXB 075 boards fit into a backplane in a standard industrial enclosure, as do related signal-conditioning products that conform to the external hardware specifications of the Microstar Laboratories channel architecture: signal connectors on 3U (100mm high) Eurocard B (220mm deep) boards - Eurocards - that often pre-process a signal.
MSXB 075 outputs connect through a DB37 male connector.
A backplane connector on each board connects it to a digital backplane factory-fitted into the industrial enclosure.
An interface board that also plugs into the backplane receives digitized waveforms from a Dap board controlled by a PC or Dapserver.
MSXB 075 boards also fit directly into a Dapserver to form a network-ready isolated package.
Add MSXB 084 and MSXB 078 boards for isolated analogue inputs and isolated digital inputs and outputs.
You can order a Dapserver already populated with the boards you need.
Dapservers leave the factory with software preloaded and ready to run.
PCs and rack-mountable Dapserver system packages each can contain - and control - more than one Dap board.
Every Dap board includes an onboard processor running a real-time operating system.
Windows applications that support DLL calls can control a Dap board by communicating with this onboard operating system.
You can control a Dap board from Dapstudio - a Windows application from Microstar Laboratories - as well as from third-party (or your own) software.
Dap boards - even those directly controlled by different PCs or Dapservers - can communicate among themselves independently of Windows to synchronise their clocks.
They then all work together as a networked data acquisition and control system that you can operate even from a laptop.
If your application has a number of analogue outputs on MSXB 075 boards distributed over a network, these output channels can update simultaneously, as a single synchronised system.
And none of these channels introduce noise from ground currents.
For smaller systems, you can hook up a single Dapserver to any PC with an ethernet connection.
Or attach a keyboard and screen to the Dapserver and control it directly - using software preloaded at the factory.
And, of course, a Dapserver does not have to be installed in a rack.
When each output needs an isolated ground, and when eliminating phase differences matters, check out the latest product from Microstar Laboratories.
The new MSXB 075 four-channel analogue output expansion board provides channel-to-channel and channel-to-PC isolation - and lets your application update all channels simultaneously, even when the channels are on separate boards.
MSXB 075 boards connect to Dap boards controlled by Windows applications like Dapstudio.
The company will supply evaluation hardware and software at no charge.
You can download a full version of the latest Dapstudio software to evaluate it.
You do not need Dap hardware to try out some of the features of Dapstudio.
To try out all of its features, you will need demo hardware, available from Microstar Laboratories.
The MSXB 075 board is available now, and costs US$475.
