RFmx WLAN 20.7 Readme

April 2021

This file contains important information about the RFmx WLAN, including system requirements, and installation instructions.

Overview

New Features

Supported Hardware

System Requirements

Supported Operating Systems

Application Software Support

Installation Instructions

Installed Software

File Locations

Executable

Accessing the API

Accessing the Help

Finding Examples

Product Security and Critical Updates

Behavior Changes

Known Issues

Bug Fixes

Automating the Installation of NI Products

Using NI Software with Microsoft Windows 10

Legal Information


Overview

RFmx WLAN supports the following features:

  • Support for OFDM physical layer of 802.11be MU PPDU in SISO and MIMO configurations
  • Support for OFDM physical layer of 802.11n, 802.11ac, and 802.11ax in MIMO configuration
  • Support for OFDM physical layer of 802.11ax SU, MU, Extended Range SU, and trigger-based PPDUs in single transmit chain configuration, conforming to IEEE P802.11ax/D8.0.
  • Support for OFDM physical layers of 802.11a, 802.11j, 802.11p, 802.11n, and 802.11ac in single transmit chain configuration.
  • Support for channel bandwidths of 20 MHz, 40 MHz, 80 MHz, 160 MHz, and 320 MHz for OFDM physical layers.
  • Support for modulation accuracy, transmit power, and spectrum emission mask measurements on OFDM physical layer signals.
  • Support for DSSS physical layer of 802.11b/g.
  • Support for modulation accuracy, transmit power, power ramp, and spectrum emission mask measurements on DSSS physical layer signals.

New Features

RFmx WLAN 20.7 includes the following new features:

  • Support for MIMO measurements of 802.11n/ac/ax/be standards on PXIe-5830/5831/5832/5840/5841
  • Support for 802.11be Standard IEEE P802.11be/D0.3
    • Bandwidth support up to 320 MHz
    • Modulation scheme support up to 4096 QAM
    • MU PPDU MIMO
      • Non-OFDMA and OFDMA
      • Multi-user MIMO
      • Preamble Puncturing
    • [BETA] Trigger-based PPDU MIMO
  • Reference waveform based EVM computation support in OFDMModAcc measurement
  • Support for sample clock rate factor across all measurements

RFmx WLAN 20.6 includes the following new features:

  • Support for PXIe-5832

RFmx WLAN 20.0 includes the following new features:

  • Support for LabVIEW 2020 (32-bit and 64-bit)
  • Support for Start trigger, Advance trigger, and Events in RFInstr
  • Support to configure RFInstr properties in the context of a signal configuration
  • Support for PXIe-5841 with PXIe-5655
  • Support for packet data decoding
  • Support for EVM Noise Compensation on PXIe-5830/5831
  • Support for analysis and data decoding for MCS 12 and MCS 13 in 802.11ax
  • Support for 320 MHz in 802.11ax SU PPDU for early testing of the 802.11be 320 MHz channels

Supported Hardware

The following hardware products are supported in all operating systems listed in the Supported Operating Systems section.

Vector Signal Analyzers

  • PXIe-5668
  • PXIe-5668 with PXIe-5698

Device-specific information about these modules is included in the NI RF Vector Signal Analyzers Help.

Vector Signal Transceivers

  • PXIe-5820
  • PXIe-5830
  • PXIe-5831
  • PXIe-5832
  • PXIe-5840
  • PXIe-5841
  • PXIe-5841 with PXIe-5655
  • PXIe-5646

Device-specific information about these modules is included in the NI RF Vector Signal Transceivers Help.

System Requirements

RFmx WLAN has the following requirements:

  • Processor—1 GHz 64-bit (x64) processor
  • 4 GB RAM *
  • A screen resolution of 1,024 x 768
  • Windows 10, with all available critical updates and service packs

* Depending on the amount of data acquired and/or processed, a larger amount of memory may be required.

Supported Operating Systems

RFmx WLAN 20.7 supports the following 64-bit operating systems:

  • Windows 10
  • Windows Server 2019
  • Windows Server 2016

Note    RFmx WLAN no longer supports Windows Vista/XP/7/8.1, Windows Server 2003/2008/2012, or any 32-bit Windows operating system. RFmx WLAN 20.7 will not install or run on an unsupported OS. You cannot deploy or distribute applications that use RFmx WLAN 20.7 to an unsupported OS. Additionally, after installing RFmx WLAN 20.7, you cannot use any installers built on this computer with any version of LabVIEW, LabWindows™/CVI™, NI TestStand™, or Measurement Studio on an unsupported OS.

For detailed information about NI operating system support, visit http://www.ni.com/r/win32bitsupport.

Application Software Support

RFmx WLAN supports the following application software versions, including service packs. You should install application software, such as LabVIEW or Microsoft Visual Studio®, before installing RFmx WLAN. If you are not using NI application software, refer to  Microsoft Visual Studio Support.

Application Software Versions Supported by RFmx WLAN
LabVIEW 2017, 2018 SP1 f4 patch, 2019 SP1 f3 patch, or 2020 SP1

Required Software

  • NI-RFSA 14.1 or later
  • NI-RFSA 17.1 or later (for initializing debug session when "using breakpoints in C/C++/.NET application" is selected)

Microsoft Visual Studio Support

If you are using the RFmx WLAN .NET Class Library, .NET Framework 4.0 (minimum) is required. The RFmx WLAN .NET Class Library can be used with Visual C# or Visual Basic .NET in any Visual Studio version that can target .NET Framework 4.0 or .NET Framework 4.5.

Installation Instructions

Download the RFmx WLAN installer from ni.com/downloads. NI software includes NI Package Manager to handle the installation. Refer to the NI Package Manager Manual for more information about installing, removing, and upgrading NI software using NI Package Manager.

Notes

  • RFmx WLAN installs the following licensed products:

    • WLAN : Enables analysis of 802.11a/b/g/j/p/n/ac/ax/11be signals with standard-compliant physical layer measurements such as error vector magnitude (EVM), spectrum emission mask (SEM), transmit power (TXP), and more. RFmx WLAN supports single-user and advanced multi-user signals with flexible configurations, impairments, and measurement results per user.
    • WLAN MIMO : Enables analysis of 802.11n/ac/ax/be MIMO signals with standard-compliant physical layer measurements such as error vector magnitude (EVM), spectrum emission mask (SEM), transmit power (TXP), and more. RFmx WLAN supports single-user and advanced multi-user signals with flexible MIMO configurations, impairments, and measurement results per user/per chain/per segment.

Notes

  • If Windows Update is enabled, the installation process might hang if Windows Update interferes with the installation of Microsoft Visual C++ 2015 Run-Time. Visit ni.com/r/exjq43 for more information and steps to resolve this issue.
  • Use the serial number that is included with your software to activate RFmx WLAN. For more information on RFmx WLAN activation, refer to National Instruments Software Activation .

Installed Software

  • <MSTUDIOVS2010DIR> is an alias for the following National Instruments file folder location:
    • Program Files (x86)\National Instruments\MeasurementStudioVS2010
  • <NIDir> is an alias for the following National Instruments file folder location:
    •  Program Files (x86)\National Instruments 
  • <SYSDIR> is an alias for the following file folder location:
    • Windows\SysWOW64 for 32-bit programs and windows\system32 for 64-bit programs

File Locations

Item Installed Location
Version Compatibility Checker <NIDir>\RFmx\niRFmxCompatibility_Checker.exe
Debug Configuration Utility <NIDir>\RFmx\niRFmxDebugConfigurationUtility.exe
DLLs <SYSDIR>
Header files

<NIDir>\Shared\ExternalCompilerSupport\C\include

Import Library files (64-bit)
  • 32-bit: <NIDir>\Shared\ExternalCompilerSupport\C\lib32\msvc
  • 64-bit: <NIDir>\Shared\ExternalCompilerSupport\C\lib64\msvc
.NET Class Libraries
Assemblies <MSTUDIOVS2010DIR>\DotNET\Assemblies\Current\NationalInstruments.RFmx.WlanMX.Fx40.dll
<MSTUDIOVS2010DIR>\DotNET\Assemblies\Current\NationalInstruments.RFmx.InstrMX.Fx40.dll
<MSTUDIOVS2010DIR>\DotNET\Assemblies\Current\NationalInstruments.Common.dll

Executable

Select Start » All Programs » National Instruments » RFmx WLAN » RFmx Soft Front Panel to launch the RFmx Soft Front Panel (64-bit).

Accessing the API

RFmx WLAN palette VIs are available from the Functions » Measurement I/O » NI-RFmx » WLAN palette.

Accessing the Help

Documentation for RFmx WLAN is located at Start » All Programs » National Instruments » RFmx WLAN » RFmx WLAN Documentation. The documentation set is composed of the following documents.

Document Format Description
RFmx WLAN Help HTML/Windows Help Contains primary help content for RFmx WLAN. This help file is an HTML version of a traditional user manual that includes the following information:
  • An introduction to RFmx WLAN
  • How to get started with application development
  • A complete reference for all RFmx WLAN programming functions and VIs
RFmx WLAN 20.7 Readme HTML (this document) Contains information about supported hardware and operating systems, new features, fixed issues, and legal notices.

Finding Examples

You can access all the installed RFmx WLAN examples at Start » All Programs » National Instruments » RFmx WLAN » RFmx WLAN Examples.

For the most recent revisions of documentation and for newly released documentation, visit ni.com/manuals.

Product Security and Critical Updates

Visit ni.com/security to view and subscribe to receive security notifications about National Instruments products. Visit ni.com/critical-updates for information about critical updates from National Instruments.

Behavior Changes

The following are the behavior changes in RFmx WLAN 20.7 from RFmx WLAN 20.6.

  • Obsoleted the RFmxInstr Configure Automatic SG SA Shared LO API and the RFmxInstr Automatic SG SA Shared LO property. Use RFmxInstr LO Source property with Automatic_SG_SA_Shared value instead.
  • Obsoleted RFmxWLAN OFDMModAcc Results HE-LTF Size property and RFmxWLAN OFDMModAcc Fetch HE-LTF Size API. Use RFmxWLAN OFDMModAcc Results LTF Size property and RFmxWLAN OFDMModAcc Fetch LTF Size API instead.
  • Obsoleted RFmxWLAN OFDM HE-LTF Size property. Use RFmxWLAN OFDM LTF Size property instead.
  • Obsoleted RFmxWLAN OFDM Num HE-LTF Symbols property. Use RFmxWLAN OFDM Num LTF Symbols property instead.
  • Obsoleted public int FetchPpduInformation(string selectorString, double timeout, out RFmxWlanMXDsssModAccDataModulationFormat dataModulationFormat, out int payloadLength, out RFmxWlanMXDsssModAccPreambleType preambleType, out int lockedClocksBit, out int headerCrcStatus, out int psduCrcStatus) method. Use public int FetchPpduInformation(string selectorString, double timeout, out RFmxWlanMXDsssModAccDataModulationFormat dataModulationFormat, out int payloadLength, out RFmxWlanMXDsssModAccPreambleType preambleType, out int lockedClocksBit, out RFmxWlanMXDsssModAccPayloadHeaderCrcStatus headerCrcStatus, out RFmxWlanMXDsssModAccPsduCrcStaus psduCrcStatus) method instead.

The following is the behavior change in RFmx WLAN 20.6 from RFmx WLAN 20.0.

  • Noise calibration performed by OFDMModAcc EVM on PXIe-5840 and PXIe-5644/5645/5646 using earlier versions of RFmx is no longer valid. Noise calibration should be re-run before performing noise compensation.

The following is the behavior change in RFmx WLAN 20.0 from RFmx WLAN 19.1.

  • SEM Mask creation now accounts for nearest bin quantization of offset start and stop frequencies

Known Issues

You can access the RFmx WLAN known issues online at RFmx WLAN 20.7 Known Issues.

Bug Fixes

You can access the RFmx WLAN bug fix list online at RFmx WLAN 20.7 Bug Fixes. This list describes a subset of issues fixed in RFmx WLAN. If you have a Bug ID, you can search this list to validate that the issue has been fixed.

Automating the Installation of NI Products

You can automate the installation of most NI products using command-line arguments to suppress some or all of the installer user interface and dialog boxes.

If the NI product you are installing uses Microsoft .NET 4.6.2, the .NET installer may run before any NI software installs and may require a reboot before the installation of NI software begins. To avoid a .NET reboot, install .NET 4.6.2 separately before you install NI software.

For more information about automating the installation of NI products, refer to Automating an Installer in the NI Package Manager manual.

Using NI Software with Microsoft Windows 10

Microsoft Windows 10 is the latest version of the Windows operating system and features significant changes compared to previous versions. Windows 10 introduces several new capabilities and also combines features from both Windows 7 and Windows 8. For more information about NI support for Windows 10, visit ni.com/windows10.


Legal Information

Copyright

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End-User License Agreements and Third-Party Legal Notices

You can find end-user license agreements (EULAs) and third-party legal notices in the following locations after installation:

  • Notices are located in the <National Instruments>\_Legal Information and <National Instruments> directories.
  • EULAs are located in the <National Instruments>\Shared\MDF\Legal\license directory.
  • Review <National Instruments>\_Legal Information.txt for information on including legal information in installers built with NI products.

U.S. Government Restricted Rights

If you are an agency, department, or other entity of the United States Government ("Government"), the use, duplication, reproduction, release, modification, disclosure or transfer of the technical data included in this manual is governed by the Restricted Rights provisions under Federal Acquisition Regulation 52.227-14 for civilian agencies and Defense Federal Acquisition Regulation Supplement Section 252.227-7014 and 252.227-7015 for military agencies.

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Content from the IVI specifications reproduced with permission from the IVI Foundation.

The IVI Foundation and its member companies make no warranty of any kind with regard to this material, including, but not limited to, the implied warranties of merchantability and fitness for a particular purpose. The IVI Foundation and its member companies shall not be liable for errors contained herein or for incidental or consequential damages in connection with the furnishing, performance, or use of this material.

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Refer to the NI Trademarks and Logo Guidelines at ni.com/trademarks for information on NI trademarks. Other product and company names mentioned herein are trademarks or trade names of their respective companies.

Patents

For patents covering the NI products/technology, refer to the appropriate location: Help»Patents in your software, the patents.txt file on your media, or the NI Patent Notice at ni.com/patents.

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