Introduction
Chapter 1
PCI-GPIB for Digital UNIX
1-2
© National Instruments Corp.
What You Need to Get Started
PCI -GPIB board
3.5 in. NI-488.2M Distribution Disk for PCI-GPIB and Digital UNIX
or
NI-488.2M Distribution Tape for PCI -GPIB and Digital UNIX
Digital UNIX 3.x or higher installed on your computer
Super-user privilege
Software Description
The NI-488.2M software for Digital UNIX includes a multitasking driver
and utilities that transform a DEC Alpha Station running Digital UNIX into
a GPIB Controller with complete communications and bus management
capabilities. The NI-488.2M software also includes a C language interface,
a program to test the installation of the software, an interactive control
program, and an interactive configuration program.
The NI-488.2M driver supports up to four PCI-GPIB boards and is
completely compatible with both IEEE 488 and IEEE 488.2 instruments.
Hardware Description
The PCI-GPIB is an IEEE 488 interface for computers with PCI expansion
slots. The TNT4882C ASIC performs the basic IEEE 488 Talker, Listener,
and Controller functions, including those required by the most recent GPIB
standard, IEEE 488.2. The PCI-GPIB can sustain data transfer rates of up
to 1.2 Mbytes/s, and can also implement a high-speed GPIB protocol
(HS488), so that you can have data transfers of up to 1.5 Mbytes/s,
depending on the speed of your system.
You can use standard GPIB cables to connect the PCI-GPIB with up to 14
instruments. If you need to use more than the maximum number of
instruments, you can use the National Instruments GPIB extenders or the
