Data Acquisition (DAQ) and Control from Microstar Laboratories

Footnotes -- Microstar Laboratories Catalog

data acquisition filtering data acquisition software channel architecture enclosures services

This document lists the footnotes referenced in the printed Microstar Laboratories product catalog identified with onboard01a on the back cover. Download the updated PDF version of the catalog. Follow the links for more information about DAP product features.

  • Inside Front Cover
    1 [samples and time interval]
    To maintain full 14-bit resolution may require a lower sample rate when sampling more than one channel per ADC.
    2 [samples for DAP 4400a and DAP 5400a]
    DAP 4400a: Four A/D converters at 800k samples per second from each ADC.
    DAP 5400a: Eight A/D converters at 1.25M samples per second from each ADC.
    3 [samples and time interval for DAP 5216a]
    To maintain full 16-bit resolution may require a lower sample rate when sampling more than one channel per ADC.
    4 [expandable for iDSC 1816]
    A single PC may contain several iDSC 1816 boards and a network may contain several such PCs for a system with many synchronized channels of filtered, simultaneous data acquisition.
    5 [samples and time interval for iDSC 1816]
    Eight channels at 153.6k samples per second on each channel.
    6 [gain]
    Only unit gain assures top sampling speed. All models except the DAP 4400a and iDSC 1816 also have gains of 10 and 100.
    7 [samples transferred and logged]
    Maximum disk logging and data transfer rates vary with PC platform.
  • Page 1:
    1 [unique]
    Other companies now feature some degree of onboard intelligence. Our approach remains unique, however: engineers who use compiler-provided IDE implementations like Microsoft Visual C++ and Visual Studio or Borland C++Builder to build applications on a PC under Windows can use the same tools to build applications to run on a data acquisition board under a real-time operating system. See page 6 of the print catalog.
    2 [Windows]
    Microstar Laboratories products work with these Microsoft operating systems: Windows 2003, Windows XP, Windows 2000, Windows NT, Windows Millennium Edition, Windows 98, and Windows 95.
    3 [1816/048]
    Both solutions employ a built-in four-pole lowpass Butterworth filter on every channel before analog-to-digital conversion. The specialized DAP, the iDSC 1816, uses onboard DSP chips to implement further signal processing on the filtered data.
  • Page 3:
    1 [Eurocard B]
    The Eurocard A format, used in CompactPCI systems, has the same 3U height (100mm) but not the depth: 160mm against 220mm for the Eurocard B format.
    2 [networked]
    DAPcell Local Server and DAPcell Network Server software, described on page 7 of the print catalog, allow a number of DAP boards to act as a single synchronized system even though spread across networked PCs. See also page 16 of the print catalog.
  • Page 4:
    1 [other software [DAPcell]]
    DAPcell Network Server software makes selecting a board on the network as easy as selecting a printer: even from out-of-the-box versions of LabVIEW, for example.
  • Page 6:
    1 [manual [Free CD]]
    To receive the complete set of our user manuals, download our DAPtools Basic CD or call us.
  • Page 8
    1 [DAP 5216a]
    To maintain full 16-bit resolution may require a lower sample rate (longer time interval) when sampling more than one channel per ADC.
    2 [DAP 5200a]
    To maintain full 14-bit resolution may require a lower sample rate (longer time interval) when sampling more than one channel per ADC.
    3 [gain]
    Only unit gain assures top sampling speed. These models, the DAP 5216a and the DAP 5200a, also have gains of 10 and 100.
    4 [samples transferred and logged]
    Maximum disk logging and data transfer rates vary with PC platform.
  • Page 10
    1 [DAP 5400a and DAP 4400a]
    To maintain full 14-bit resolution on these models, the DAP 5400a and the DAP 4400a, may require a lower sample rate (longer time interval) when sampling more than one channel per ADC.
    2 [samples transferred and logged]
    Maximum disk logging and data transfer rates vary with PC platform.
  • Page 12
    1 [DAP 4200a and DAP 4000a]
    To maintain full 14-bit resolution may require a lower sample rate (longer time interval) when sampling more than one channel per ADC.
    2 [gain]
    Only unit gain assures top sampling speed. These models, the DAP 4200a and DAP 4000a, also have gains of 10 and 100.
    3 [samples transferred and logged]
    Maximum disk logging and data transfer rates vary with PC platform.
  • Page 14
    1 [DAP 840]
    To maintain full 14-bit resolution may require a lower sample rate (longer time interval) when sampling more than one channel per ADC.
    2 [gain]
    Only unit gain assures top sampling speed. The DAP 840/103 also has gains of 10 and 100.
    3 [samples transferred and logged]
    Maximum disk logging and data transfer rates vary with PC platform.
  • Page 16:
    1 [DSP - Filtering]
    The DAPtools Standard package, described on page 7 of the print catalog, includes DAPL IFM, the DAPL IIR Filter Module, to provide the last five commands on this list. The DAPtools Basic package does not include this module.
    2 [DAP 5200a benchmarks]
    Performed on a DAP 5200a/626 running under Windows NT 4.0 on an 800MHz Pentium III.
    3 [no charge on CD]
    To receive the complete set of our user manuals, download our DAPtools Basic CD or call us.
    4 [relevant]
    The DAP 4400a has no analog output and no digital input or output; DAPL commands that invoke these features will not work on this board.
    5 [FIR filters]
    Technical Note TN-164 Version 2.2 gives the details.
    6 [applications [...] customers]
    See sample applications on our Web site.
    7 [DAPcell]
    The DAPtools Standard package and the DAPtools Professional package, described on page 7 of the print catalog, include, respectively, DAPcell Local Server software and DAPcell Network Server software.
    8 [50M samples per second]
    A single DAPcell server PC can support up to 7 DAP boards as standard. In the benchmark server, Microstar Laboratories used 4 DAP boards, each with an overall data acquisition rate of 1228.8k samples per second, and logged to disk at the full acquisition rate: 4.9152M samples per second. A single DAPcell client PC, requesting the disk logging service from 11 servers configured like the benchmark server, then can log to disk at an overall rate of 54.0672M samples per second.