RFmx Bluetooth 19.1 Readme

October 2019

This file contains important information about the RFmx Bluetooth, 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

Using NI Software with Microsoft Windows 8.1

RFmx Bluetooth Drops Support for Windows 7 (64-Bit) and Windows Server 2008 R2 in 2021

Legal Information


Overview

RFmx Bluetooth supports the following features:

  • Support for Basic Rate, Enhanced Data Rate, and Low Energy versions of Bluetooth physical layer conforming to the Bluetooth Core Specification v5.1, and the Bluetooth RF PHY test specifications RF.TS.5.1.0 and RF-PHY.TS.5.1.1.
  • Support for Low Energy Direction Finding physical layer conforming to Bluetooth Core Specification v5.1.
  • Support for modulation accuracy (df1, df2, frequency error), transmit power, adjacent channel power, frequency range and 20 dB bandwidth measurements on Basic Rate physical layer signals.
  • Support for modulation accuracy (frequency error, differential EVM (DEVM)), transmit power, adjacent channel power (in-band spurious emissions) measurements on Enhanced Data Rate physical layer signals.
  • Support for modulation accuracy (df1, df2, frequency error), transmit power, adjacent channel power (in-band emissions) measurements on Low Energy physical layer signals.

New Features

RFmx Bluetooth 19.1 includes the following new features:

  • Support for PXIe-5841
  • Support for angle of departure transmitter tests on low energy physical layer signals

RFmx Bluetooth 19.0 includes the following new features:

  • Support for LabVIEW 2019 (32-bit and 64-bit)
  • Support for De-embedding S-Parameter External Attenuation Tables
  • Addition of Reference Level Headroom property

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-5646
  • PXIe-5840
  • PXIe-5841
  • PXIe-5820

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

System Requirements

RFmx Bluetooth has the following requirements:
  • Processor—1 GHz 64-bit (x64) processor
  • 4 GB RAM *
  • A screen resolution of 1,024 x 768
  • Windows 10/8.1/7, 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 Bluetooth 19.1 supports the following 64-bit operating systems:

  • Windows 10/8.1 1 /7 SP1 2
  • Windows Server 2012 R2 1
  • Windows Server 2008 R2 SP1 2

1 NI software installs VC2015 Runtime and .NET 4.6.2. Windows 8.1 and Windows Server 2012 R2 require Microsoft updates to support these items. Refer to Microsoft KB2919442 and KB2919355 for more information about how to install these updates.

2 NI software is signed with a SHA-256 certificate. Windows 7 SP1 and Windows Server 2008 R2 SP1 require Microsoft updates to support SHA-256. Refer to Microsoft KB3033929 for more information about how to install this security update.

Note   In 2019, RFmx Bluetooth dropped support for all 32-bit Windows operating systems. RFmx Bluetooth will not install or run on an unsupported OS. Refer to RFmx Bluetooth Drops Support for Windows 7 (64-Bit) and Windows Server 2008 R2 in 2021 for information about future OS support.

Application Software Support

RFmx Bluetooth supports the following application software versions, including service packs. You should install application software, such as LabVIEW, LabWindows/CVI or Microsoft Visual Studio®, before installing RFmx Bluetooth. To add support for application software installed after installing RFmx Bluetooth modify your RFmx Bluetooth installation or launch the RFmx Bluetooth installer again. If you are not using NI application software, refer to  Microsoft Visual Studio Support .

Application Software Versions Supported by RFmx Bluetooth
LabVIEW 2016, 2017, 2018 SP1 f4 patch, or 2019

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 Bluetooth .NET Class Library, .NET Framework 4.0 (minimum) is required. The RFmx Bluetooth .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.

Installation Instructions

NI installs RFmx Bluetooth using NI Package Manager. If you do not already have NI software installed, RFmx Bluetooth installs NI Package Manager to handle the installation of your NI software. Visit ni.com/info and enter the Info Code NIPMDownload to download NI Package Manager. Refer to the NI Package Manager Manual for more information about installing, removing, and upgrading NI software using NI Package Manager.

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.BTMX.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 Bluetooth» RFmx Soft Front Panel to launch the RFmx Soft Front Panel (64-bit).

Accessing the API

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

Accessing the Help

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

Document Format Description
RFmx Bluetooth Help HTML/Windows Help Contains primary help content for RFmx Bluetooth. This help file is an HTML version of a traditional user manual that includes the following information:
  • An introduction to RFmx Bluetooth
  • How to get started with application development
  • A complete reference for all RFmx Bluetooth programming functions and VIs
RFmx Bluetooth 19.1 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 Bluetooth examples at Start»All Programs»National Instruments»RFmx Bluetooth»RFmx Bluetooth 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 items are behavior changes in RFmx Bluetooth 19.1 from RFmx Bluetooth 19.0.

  • Obsoleted RFmxBT Analyze (IQ) API. Use RFmxBT Analyze (IQ, 1 Wfm) API instead
  • A warning is thrown if the measurement fails to detect start of the packet when you set the Burst Sync Type property to Preamble

The following items are behavior changes in RFmx Bluetooth 19.0 from RFmx Bluetooth 3.0.

  • Dropped support for LabVIEW 2015
  • Deprecated the Recommended I/Q Measurement Bandwidth property in RFInstr

Known Issues

You can access the software and documentation known issues list online. Refer to the RFmx Bluetooth Known Issues for an up-to-date list of known issues.

Bug Fixes

The following items are the IDs and titles of a subset of issues fixed in RFmx Bluetooth . This is not an exhaustive list of issues fixed in the current version of the RFmx Bluetooth . If you have a Bug ID, you can search this list to validate that the issue has been fixed.

The following items are changes in RFmx Bluetooth 19.1 from RFmx Bluetooth 19.0

ID Fixed Issue
217592 Fixed an issue where the computed acquisition length did not include VBW filter group delay for TxP measurement.
235284 Fixed an issue of intermittent failure in auto detection of signal utility.
249283 Fixed an issue to report an error when measurement bandwidth exceeds the device instantaneous bandwidth on PXIe-5668 and PXIe-5665 devices.
234240 Fixed an intermittent error occurring at Analyze IQ API when performing a composite measurement with different averaging count for each measurement.

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 4.0, 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 4.0 separately before you install NI software.

For more information about automating the installation of NI products, refer to the following KnowledgeBase articles:

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 .

Using NI Software with Microsoft Windows 8.1

When you install NI software on Microsoft Windows 8.1, you will notice a few additional tiles in the Apps view, including shortcuts to NI application software products such as NI LabVIEW, Measurement & Automation Explorer (NI MAX), and NI Launcher. For more information about NI support for Windows 8.1, visit ni.com/windows8 .

RFmx Bluetooth Drops Support for Windows 7 (64-Bit) and Windows Server 2008 R2 in 2021

RFmx Bluetooth will drop support for Windows 7 (64-bit) and Windows Server 2008 R2 starting in 2021. Versions of this product that ship after May 1, 2021, may not install or execute correctly on these operating systems. For detailed information about NI operating system support, visit ni.com/r/win32bitsupport .

For detailed information about NI application software product life cycles, visit ni.com/info and enter one of the following Info Codes:

Product Info Code
LabVIEW lifecycle
LabWindows/CVI cvi_lifecycle
Measurement Studio mstudiolifecycle
TestStand tslcp
DIAdem ddlcp
SignalExpress selcp
VeriStand nivslifecycle

Legal Information

Copyright

© 2019 National Instruments. All rights reserved.

Under the copyright laws, this publication may not be reproduced or transmitted in any form, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, storing in an information retrieval system, or translating, in whole or in part, without the prior written consent of National Instruments Corporation.

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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.

IVI Foundation Copyright Notice

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.

Trademarks

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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