README.TXT for Agilent E1422 Remote Channel Multi-function DAC
Contents:
1 Introduction
2 Downloading Driver Into Agilent E1406 Command Module
2.1 Installing Agilent VIC on the Local Hard Drive
2.2 Copying Driver Files to Floppy
2.3 Downloading the Driver
3 VISA Specific Information
3.1 Instrument Addresses
3.2 Executing the Soft Front Panel without VISA
4 Using the Agilent E1422 Driver in Application Development Environments
4.1 C/C++
4.2 Microsoft Visual Basic
5.0 Examples
6.0 Known Defects
7.0 Obtaining New and Updated VXIplug&play Drivers
8.0 Revision History
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1. Introduction
The help file included with the Agilent E1422 VXIplug&play driver contains
instrument and programming information. This readme file contains
additional information for the Agilent VXIplug&play programmer.
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2 Downloading Driver Into Agilent E1406 Command Module
The following steps will need to be taken to install your SCPI (downloaded)
driver into an E1406 command module.
NOTE: The E1422 driver is too large for the E1405 command module. You
will need an E1406 command module with the expanded memory option
(Option 11) to download this driver successfully.
2.1 Installing VIC on the Local Hard Drive
Insert the Instrument Drivers CD ROM and let Install Shield run. Proceed
with the install until you get to the "Choose Type of Installation"
screen. Select "INSTALL DRIVERS" (the first choice) and then select
"VXIInstallation Consultant (32-bit Agilent VIC)". Proceed and install VIC
onto your hard drive. After VIC is installed, exit the installation, but
leave the Instrument Driver CD ROM in the drive.
2.2 Copying Driver Files to Floppy
From the Windows menu, run Explorer ( to bring up Explorer, do a right mouse
button click on the "Start" icon). Select the CD ROM drive.
Go to the directory:
dscpie142210302.dos
Insert a floppy disk into either your A or B drive. Copy the files
E1422.dba, e1422.du and e1422.dc to the floppy disk.
2.3 Downloading the Driver
Keep the floppy disk containing the E1422.dba, E1422.du, and E1422.dc files
from the previous step inserted into the floppy drive, but you may now
remove the CD ROM from the CD drive.
Run VIC from the local hard drive by double clicking on its Icon.
VIC should automatically read your floppy disk and ask if there are
more floppies to read -- click on "No".
From the next screen select "Download". Configure your system by first
selecting your E1406 from the "Mainframes/Resource Managers" tab, and
press "Add". Now select your mainframe type from the list and press "Add".
Next, select the "Instruments" tab, select the E1422 entry and press
"Add".
Press "Continue" and keep going for several more screens, pressing more
"Continue" buttons, an OK (at GPIB screen), and "Ready" (to test the
interface). Eventually you will arrive at a screen that is labeled
"Copy Driver Files". The E1422 driver will show up listed in a
box in the center of this screen. VIC is indicating the e1422.du file
is not in VIC's database and is asking you where to find it. You must
now double click on the E1422 entry in that center box to force VIC
to browse to find the file. VIC should find it right away if it is on the
A drive floppy (if not, you will have to use the browser to point to the
location of the file); select "Open". VIC should now proceed with
downloading the E1422 driver.
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3.0 VISA Specific Information
The following topics refer to instances when the driver is used with
different versions of VISA.
3.1 Instrument Addresses
When using Agilent VXIplug&play instrument drivers, instrument addresses
must be all uppercase letters. Implementation of the addressing scheme is
vendor specific and some vendors support mixed cases. However, for
maximum portability, the instrument address should use uppercase
characters only.
For example: use "VXI0::56::INSTR" instead of "vxi0::56::instr"
3.2 Executing the Soft Front Panel without VISA
The VISA dynamic link library provides a communication library
between your program and the instrument. The SFP may be executed without
VISA or without the HPE1422.dll present. It will do a partial emulation
of the hardware for demo purposes.
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4. Using the Agilent E1422 Driver in Application Development Environments
This section offers suggestions on using the hpe1422.dll within
various application development environments.
4.1 C/C++
Refer to your C/C++ manuals for information on linking
and calling .DLLs.
Rebuilding the driver DLL should be done in a different directory than
the one the driver was installed in order to differentiate the changes.
4.2 Microsoft Visual Basic
Refer to the Microsoft Visual BASIC manual for information on calling DLLs.
The BASIC include file is hpe1422.bas, which is contained in the directory
~winntinclude or ~win95include. The ~ refers to the directory in the
VXIPNPPATH variable. By default this is set to C:VXIPNP on Agilent I/O
Libraries revisions prior to J.01.00; or to C:Program FilesVISA on
revisions J.01.00 or later.
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5.0 Examples
Some programming examples may be found on the CD-ROM in the directory
"exampleshpe1422". Additionally, examples for a similar instrument
(E1415) may be found on the CD ROM in directory "exampleshpe1415" --
these examples could be easily modified to work with a Agilent E1422 since
the syntax and features of these two instruments is virtually the same.
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6.0 Known Defects
This driver does not work on National MXI 1 interface.
The 'hpe1422_configTemp' can generate multiple errors on the
instrument if the channel list parameter is incorrect.
The downloaded driver in the Agilent E1406 command module does not support
the Agilent E1139 SCP (Special version of E1538 SCP) at this time.
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7.0 Obtaining New and Updated VXIplug&play Drivers
The latest copy of this instrument driver and other Agilent instrument
drivers are available at the Agilent Technologies customer WWW site:
http://www.agilent.com/find/inst_drivers
The E1422 driver is located in a self-extracting archive file named
e1422.exe.
NOTE: If you are using an Agilent Command Module, you may also need to
download a new SCPI driver into your command module in addition to
downloading the most recent VXIplug&play driver.
If you do not have Internet access, the drivers can be obtained by
contacting your country support organization. In the US, the phone
number is 800-452-4844. A list of contact information for other
countries is available on the Access Agilent Technologies website:
http://www.agilent.com/find/assist
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8.0 Revision History
A.01.00 May 1999
Initial release
hpe1422_32.dll : A.01.00
hpe142232v.dll : G.01.00
hps1422.exe : A.01.00
hpvscp32.dll : G.03.02
A.01.01 June 1999
Fixed a problem in quarter bridge strain EU conversion (hpe142232v.dll).
Also, there was a problem fixed regarding reading saved calibration
constants from non-volatile Flash.
Fixed hpe1422_reset function (hpe1422_32.dll) -- had a problem when
hpe1422_errQueryDetect was enabled. Also the hpe1529_configStrainE1529
function did not work properly and was fixed.
hpe1422_32.dll : A.01.01
hpe142232v.dll : G.01.01
hps1422.exe : A.01.00
hpvscp32.dll : G.03.02
A.01.02 August 1999
hpe1422_32.dll: Made certain of type cast in readFifo_Q (non E1406 path)
Possibly not a problem, but had problems with similar type cast on
Win95 built version.
hpvscp32.dll: A problem was fixed with releasing handles when instrument
session closed. After lots of opens and closes on NT platform, could
use up available handles.
hpe1422_32.dll : A.01.02
hpe142232v.dll : G.01.01
hps1422.exe : A.01.00
hpvscp32.dll : G.03.03
A.01.03 October 1999 (Internal release, copy to Boeing)
hpe142232v.dll: Added trigger status to ALGorithm subsystem (S10220).
This allows users to determine if any extra sample triggers occurred
or if any sample triggers were dropped during a measurement.
hpe1422_32.dll : A.01.02
hpe142232v.dll : G.01.02
hps1422.exe : A.01.00
hpvscp32.dll : G.03.03
A.01.04 January 2000
hpe142232v.dll: Fixed defect caused by last release which made first
"init" cycle have one channel out of order in the scan list.
Subsequent "init" cycles had correct scan sequence. Setting the
filter was taking longer than necessary for multiple channels on
same box, this was corrected. Meas:volt:exc and meas:volt:unst
put incorrect data into fifo (stored data was correct however).
Meas:volt:exc and meas:volt:unst altered channel list if different
from rout:seq:def list.
hpe1422_32.dll: Was missing some bridge types (like Q350,Q120) in
hpe1422_configStrainE1529, due to I/O code copied from
hpe1422_configStrainE1506 without proper modification.
readme.txt file modified with "Agilent" web pages listed for driver
updates.
hpe1422_32.dll : A.01.04
hpe142232v.dll : G.01.03
hps1422.exe : A.01.00
hpvscp32.dll : G.03.03
A.01.05 April 2000
hpe142232v.dll: Fixed defect with meas:volt:unst which caused the
unstrained value to apparently have no effect on the converted
strain value. The problem was compiler optimization of mixed
mode arithmetic used in calculations of strain.
hpe1422_32.dll : A.01.04
hpe142232v.dll : G.01.04
hps1422.exe : A.01.00
hpvscp32.dll : G.03.03
A.01.06 August 2000
hpe142232v.dll: Now includes newer E1538 SCP code. This is a don't
care for almost all E1422 users. Revision number
not modified because previous revision was not widely distributed.
Also, this is same code shipped on Unix as B.01.04 revision.
hpe1422_32.dll: Re-built with max. speed optimization; same bits as last
revision, so rev. number not changed. Is now about 10K larger file,
but faster (according to MSVC++ compiler options).
hpe1422_32.dll : A.01.04
hpe142232v.dll : G.01.04
hps1422.exe : A.01.00
hpvscp32.dll : G.03.03
A.01.07 October 2001
Agilent rebranding
hpe142232v.dll: fixed problem in calibrating multiple units
hpe1422_32.dll : A.01.05
hpe142232v.dll : G.01.05
hps1422.exe : A.01.01
hpvscp32.dll : G.03.04
A.01.08 December 2001
hpe142232v.dll: fixed quarter bridge strain calculation error
hpe1422_32.dll : A.01.05
hpe142232v.dll : G.01.06
hps1422.exe : A.01.01
hpvscp32.dll : G.03.04
A.01.09 March 2002
hpe142232v.dll: Modified to support temperature and on-the-fly
excitation measurements enhancements.
hpe1422_32.dll: At startup, cal data for 1st E1529 on an E1539
was used also for 2nd E1529 on that E1539
hpe1422_32.dll: CAL:REMote:STORe would store data multiple times
if two channels on same E1529 were in channel list
hpe1422_32.dll : A.01.06
hpe142232v.dll : G.01.07
hps1422.exe : A.01.01
hpvscp32.dll : G.03.04
A.01.10 April 2002
hpe142232v.dll: syst:ctype:rem? -- string returned was missing
some text ("Chan xxx") on first E1529 (of two) in description.
hpe1422_32.dll : A.01.06
hpe142232v.dll : G.01.08
hps1422.exe : A.01.01
hpvscp32.dll : G.03.04
A.01.11 May 2002
hpe1422.fp: Modified to eleminate some warnings that were occurring
when used with VEE programming environment. LABView and LABWindows
will also benefit from this modification, and may have been erroring
with old .fp.
hpe1422_32.dll : A.01.06
hpe142232v.dll : G.01.08
hps1422.exe : A.01.01
hpvscp32.dll : G.03.04
A.01.12 June 2002
E1538A SCP self-test would fail on digital output channels if
pull-up enable switch was set to disable.
hpe1422_32.dll : A.01.06
hpe142232v.dll : G.01.09
hps1422.exe : A.01.01
hpvscp32.dll : G.03.04
A.01.13 November 2002
Fixed defect in hpe142232v.dll where CVT data fetch did not properly
convert temperature readings beyond the first fetch.
Visual Basic .bas file was updated -- was missing some function
prototypes.
hpe1422_32.dll : A.01.06
hpe142232v.dll : G.01.10
hps1422.exe : A.01.01
hpvscp32.dll : G.03.04