NIWeek boasts record attendance
Martin Rowe, Senior Technical Editor -- Test & Measurement World, 8/8/2007 2:44:00 PM
| Also see: NIWeek covers mechatronics, Windows Vista Wednesday's sessions included a demonstration of a mechatronics system and advice for programmers who need to write applications for Vista. And on the show floor, companies exhibited PXI-based systems. Read more |
Denhe followed with introductions of LabView 8.5, which adds several features that improve throughput in test applications. Taking advantage of multicore processors, LabView's multithreading ability automatically assigns program threads to processor cores. LabView 8.5 can run up to four threads on each processor core, allowing engineers to build applications where one core acquires data and another performs analysis, filtering, signal processing, or datalogging.
LabView developer Rob Dye demonstrated this feature by running four FFT threads, each on a different processor core. As he added threads from one to four, attendees could see how each thread ran independently and overall performance increased by 4X.
Attendees also saw LabView 8.5's state-chart module, which lets you build applications with state charts that define user interfaces, communications protocols, controls, and other functions. Denhe explained that state charts contain LabView code that you can run or edit, but they provide a higher level of abstraction to your programs than writing your own code.
LabView has an FPGA extension that lets you download code and run it on an FPGA. Product manager Vineet Aggarwal provided the crowd with a most unusual demonstration. He developed an audio recording application that lets him create a multiple-track audio program. Using only his voice, Aggarwal laid down tracks and created his own song on the stage. (Watch a video of Aggarwal's presentation.)
NI engineers Kristi Hummell and Scott Savage introduced an 18-slot PXI/PXI Express instrument chassis that lets engineers build applications that take advantage of PXI Express' high bandwidth while still using PXI instruments. NI also demonstrated several new PXI Express instrument cards, including a 100-Msample/s, 14-bit digitizer with two simultaneously sampled channels and two 32-channel digital I/O modules that run at 50 MHz and 25 MHz.
Neil Fiereisel then demonstrated two RAID hard-drive chassis capable of holding four or 12 drives. Using PXI Express-based instruments, Fiereisel demonstrated how such a system can stream 600 Mbytes/s to disk, which is fast enough to accommodate four video programs.
The day continued with technical sessions divided into tracks. The test and data-acquisition track consisted of 26 technical presentations that were to be given over the three days of the conference. Other tracks include software development and real-time control and embedded systems.
NI's Travis White discussed measurement techniques for low-level measurements in "Tips and Tricks for DC Test Systems." He covered measurement basics on measurements such as voltage, current, and resistance, emphasizing sources of errors and how to minimize them.
In "Selecting the Right Digitizer/Oscilloscope," NI's Kaustubh Wagle asked which form factor attendees think about when they think of an oscilloscope. Most said they think of a box instrument. "A digitizer is the analog front end and ADC. The rest is a computer," he said. "In R&D, engineers like to play with the knobs and they like stand-alone instruments." Wagle then covered digitizer basics: sampling rate and bandwidth.
In his discussion of bus throughput, Wagle pointed out the relationship between bus speed and onboard memory. The slower the bus, the more memory you need in an oscilloscope. Wagle also explained why you can't just interleave many ADCs to attain extremely high sample rate. "ADCs are different," one audience member pointed out. "It gets hard to match ADC characteristics."
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