What Is Instrument Control?
Instrument control is a PC-based approach that combines programmable software and hardware connectivity for automating measurement acquisition from third-party instrumentation. An instrument control system consists of instrumentation, connectivity hardware, and a computer with programmable software. Compared to traditional measurement systems, the combination of NI LabVIEW software, instrument drivers, and connectivity hardware is the most productive, flexible approach to automating third-party instrumentation.
Parts of an Instrument Control System | See a Complete Guide to Building an Instrument Control System
What Is an Instrument?
There are two types of instruments: stand-alone and modular. Traditional instrument control applications employ stand-alone (benchtop) instruments to gather specific measurement data, but as hardware technologies advance, modular instruments are becoming increasingly popular for acquiring measurement data.
Types of Instrument Control Systems
Stand-Alone
Although primarily designed for manual use, stand-alone instruments can also be incorporated into an automated measurement system. Using instrument control software, you can control the instrument with a PC through a communication bus such as GPIB, USB, serial, or LAN/Ethernet.
Modular
You now have the option of creating more flexible and scalable measurement systems by taking advantage of virtual instrumentation. By combining general-purpose, modular hardware with flexible, high-performance software, you can design and develop custom system solutions for your measurement needs.
What Is Instrument Control Hardware Connectivity?
Instrument control hardware connectivity is the interface that is used to connect your instrument to your PC. You rely on instrument control hardware solutions to communicate to instruments directly via stand-alone or modular buses such as GPIB, RS232, USB, Ethernet, PCI, and PXI.
Types of Instrument Control Buses
Overview
Instruments usually offer one or more bus options through which you can control them, and PCs usually offer multiple bus options for instrument control. If a PC does not natively have the bus that is on the instrument, you can usually add it as a plug-in board or an external converter. There are many buses for instrument control and they can be divided into these general categories.
Stand-Alone
Stand-Alone instruments are used to communicate with rack-and-stack instruments, these include test and measurement-specific buses such as GPIB and PC-standard buses such as serial (RS232), Ethernet, and USB. You can use some stand-alone buses as a medium for other stand-alone buses such as a USB-to-GPIB converter.
Modular
Modular instruments incorporate the interface bus into the instrument itself. Modular buses include PCI, PCI Express, VXI, and PXI. You also can use these buses as a medium to add a stand-alone bus into a PC that does not have one, such as with an NI PCI-GPIB controller board.
What Is a Computer’s Role in an Instrument Control System?
A computer with programmable software controls the automation of instruments and processes, visualizes, and stores measurement data. Different types of computers are used in different types of applications. A desktop may be used in a lab for its processing power, a laptop may be used in the field for its portability, or an industrial computer may be used in a manufacturing plant for its ruggedness.
What Are the Different Software Components in an Instrument Control System?
Application Software
Application software facilitates the interaction between the computer and user for automating the process of acquiring, analyzing, and presenting measurement data from instruments. Instrument control software tools come in the form of either a prebuilt application with predefined functionality, or a programming environment for building applications with custom functionality. To take advantage of an application software tool that meets the needs of your current system and scales over time, choose an application development environment in which you can create custom applications.
Driver Software
Driver software provides application software the ability to interact with an instrument. You can control your instruments through direct I/O commands or by using an instrument driver. Generally, an instrument driver is the preferred approach because it simplifies communication with the instrument device by abstracting low-level programming protocols that may be specific to one instrument. Typically, instrument drivers expose an API that is used within a programming environment to build application software.
Read five things you should consider when choosing your driver software
Read more about building an instrument control system.
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