Press Releases July 2009

DeLuxe GPIB-cables by Meilhaus Electronic

GPIB – 40 Years of Rugged Connectivity

GPIB was originally developed by Hewlett-Packard in the late 1960s and was accepted as IEEE488 standard in the 1970s. The GPIB / IEEE488 interface has been the choice of professionals, when it comes to a proven connection of PCs to measurement devices ever since. Its rugged, industrial grade connector mechanisms, its real-time response and maximum connection length still gives it advantages over the more modern USB or LAN/Ethernet interfaces.

Meilhaus Electronic has been involved with the GPIB ever since it’s founding, over 30 years ago. Since a secure connection is a key factor for dependable communication between a host PC and various measurement devices, Meilhaus Electronic has developed their own line of dependable and innovative line of GPIB cables. The most revolutionary model line is the DeLuxe family. Besides the high quality cable itself, which offers features such as twisted pair lines and multiple shielding to prevent interferences, the DeLuxe cables have special connectors. These connectors are not made of the usual die-cast zinc, but of aluminium. This reduces the weight by about 50%, which is an important factor, when several connectors are stacked, as it is often the case in GPIB applications. Another advantage is the lower resistance, which leads to an improved shielding. The most innovative feature of this new connector is that the wire exits the housing at a 30-degree angle. This allows connectivity to GPIB interfaces that are located in slightly recessed enclosures as they are often encountered when GPIB boards are integrated into standard PC slots, where extension connectors are usually required.

Besides the DeLuxe- and standard lines of GPIB cables with lengths of 0.5 to 20 meters, Meilhaus Electronic offers a wide range of GPIB devices and accessories including adapters from Serial, LAN or USB to GPIB, relays that can be driven by the GPIB and others.

IEEE488 DeLuxe Series

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Meilhaus Electronic Expands Driver Software Support

Open Software Concept for Measurement- and Control Boards

Of course the features of hardware components are an important factor when designing measurement- and control applications. On the other hand the supported software plays an ever increasing role as well. The question, which operating systems and which developing environments fit a certain component can be an essential factor. Meilhaus Electronic therefore uses its experience to offer solutions to these demands. „With our hardware we have reached a high quality standard and a large range of functionalities which cover most applications” says Mr. Peter Omlor, head of R&D. “Of course we will continue to develop new and improved hardware. At the moment, however, we are concentrating on the software integration of our products.”

The basis is the newly introduced ME-iDS, the Meilhaus Electronic intelligent Driver System.  It offers a universal programming interface for the Meilhaus Electronic measurement- and control boards under Windows or Linux. It doesn’t matter, whether the board is controlled via the standard PCI, cPCI, or PCIexpress interfaces, or if it is connected to the host by USB or LAN: The driver remains the same. Therefore the programmer does not need to take the interface or operating system into account, when writing his or her software.

The driver system supports a multitude of well-known high-level-languages, developing environments, and software packages. The high-level-languages are C (ANSI-C under Linux, C++ and C# under Windows), Visual Basic and Delphi under Windows as well as Python under Windows and Linux. The developing environments are supported through Comedi-drivers for Linux (Linux Control and Measurement Device Interface), a MATLAB-driver (“.m-file”) for Windows and Linux, an Agilent VEE-driver for Windows, and a LabVIEW-driver for Windows and Linux. In Agilent VEE the calls for the driver are directly integrated into the developing environment.

Now that they have been implemented in the test-sequencer TestManager, the ME-boards can be directly integrated into a software development package for the creation of applications for testing-sequences. Furthermore the ME-boards are supported by real-time simulation software such as Scale RT by Cosateq, TurboLab for data acquisition and analysis, as well as the visualization software DAQFactory. All these integrations were developed in close co-operation with the producers of the according software packages. For support the customer can contact Meilhaus Electronic or the software producers, depending on the subject of the inquiry.

Meilhaus Electronic offers on-site training for the implementation of the ME-iDS on demand.

Driver-software for Meilhaus Electronic measurement and control boards

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