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What VirtualBench Version Will Work with My PCI-44xx or NI-45x Dynamic Signal Analyzer (DSA) Boards?

Primary Software: Other NI Software>>VirtualBench
Primary Software Version: 2.1
Primary Software Fixed Version: N/A
Secondary Software: N/A

Problem: What VirtualBench Version Will Work with My PCI-44xx or NI-45x Dynamic Signal Analyzer (DSA) Boards?

Solution: VirtualBench DSA 2.1.1 and later will work your 44xx or 45xx DSA device. The 44xx boards are purely acquisition devices -- they do not perform any signal analysis in hardware. VirtualBench DSA uses the host processor in your computer to perform frequency domain analysis of the incoming signals. The 44xx boards work essentially like E series multifunction DAQ boards in VirtualBenchI-DSA, and their behavior has not changed greatly from one version of the software to the next. VirtualBench DSA controls these boards using calls from the NI-DAQ driver -- this is the same driver that operates multifunction DAQ hardware.

If you have a 45xx DSA board, you can also use VirtualBench 2.1.1 or later. These instruments have an on-board DSP (Digital Signal Processing) chip to do frequency-domain analysis in hardware. Using the DSP is much faster than using the host processor, and it adds some additional calculations that are not supported in software. The NI-DSA driver is used to control the DSP chip on the board.

VirtualBench 2.5 is the first version to access the DSP chip on the 45xx hardware. This means that if you are using an earlier version of VirtualBench with your 45xx board, it will act just like a 44xx device. It will still function, but you will not be able to take advantage of the extra speed and functionality of the DSP chip.

It is recommended to upgrade to the latest version of NI-DAQ, NI-DSA and VirtualBench-DSA if you have the NI 4551 or NI 4552 instruments.


Related Links: Drivers and Updates: NI-DSA

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Report Date: 10/29/1998
Last Updated: 12/07/2004
Document ID: 1ESG2D0O

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