16 bit Waveform Digitizer / Oscilloscope
PCI Express cards

UF2e-4600 Series Overview

There are 12 different 16-bit Waveform Digitizer cards in the UF2e-4600 range. Cards are available offering 2, 4 or 8 input channels and choice of maximum A/D sampling rates.

The UF2e cards are used as lower cost, more flexible and deeper memory alternatives to oscilloscopes and transient recorders. The fast PCI Express bus gives direct integration with your preferred PC software, while the 120 MBytes/s data transfer delivers faster test times.

Waveform Digitizers, Transient Recorder, Oscilloscopes

Although we prefer the term Waveform Digitizers (often shortened to "Digitizers"), other manufacturers may call their products Transient Recorders or PC Oscilloscopes. In any event, the all of these are used to record analog signals at high-speed and with professional instrumentation accuracy.

Advantage of PCI Express for instrumentation

Read an application note on the advantages of PCI Express here.

Applications

Typical applications include ATE, research, communications.

Note: 1Sample=2Bytes

Standard mode...

The signals can be recorded to the onboard signal memory at the maximum clock rate using Standard mode. At the end of the measurement, the data is off-loaded to the PC using DMA at the maximum PCI Express bus data transfer rate of up to 120 MBytes/s. While recording, the card operates independently of the host PC which is available for other tasks.

... and FIFO mode. Record continuously at 120 MBytes per second to PC

Alternatively, the UF2e boards also provide a FIFO mode that continuously transfers recorded data gap-free to the PC during the measurement at up to 120 MBytes/s. This mode has the advantage that more samples can be recorded than the available on-board memory.

Note that the maximum sampling rate is limited by the PCI Express bus transfer rate, which is typically 120 MBytes/s, and the number of activated channels. For 16-bit A/D boards this equates to a max sampling rate of f=120M/2/n where n is the total number of activated channels (including all cards in the system).

Synchronizing multiple-cards in a single PC

The Star Hub option is an add-on that allows multiple cards, even of different types, to be synchronized. There are two versions that support up to 5 cards or 16 cards.

The Star Hub distributes the clock and trigger signals, so all channels are without time-skew errors and all cards start on the same trigger condition (any channel, any external TTL trigger). Any card can be defined as the clock master or trigger master by software. It's also possible to configure AND/OR trigger conditions (channel or external TTL) across multiple cards. Please note that the UF2e Star Hub option is not compatible with the older UF Star Hub option.

Download the UF2/UF2e Star Hub datasheet here.

Synchronizing multiple PC's

A new option, the System Star Hub synchronizes up to 271 UF2e and UF2 cards cards hosted in up to 17 PC's. This option is useful if:

• The number of channels/cards required can't fit in one PC
• Data will be stored continuously (using FIFO mode) to hard disk array and the limits of the PCI/PCI Express means not all cards can be placed in one system
• Extensive online calculations have to be made for several channels and the bus bandwidth isn't capable of streaming data for all channels or a single cpu power is not sufficient

Independent amplifers to match each channel to the sensor

Each channel has it's own amplifier and dcV offset adjustment. This means you are able to select one of the 8 possible input voltage ranges and adjust the dcV offset to best match the output from your sensor, for every channel.

Fine Resolution Sampling Rates

Most other products limit you to a few fixed sampling rate choices, however with the UF2e cards you simply instruct the software which rate you require and the driver will automatically adjust the onboard PLL and hardware divider to achieve the closest sampling rate possible.

External Clock and External Trigger

Need to synchronize with external equipment? As standard the UF2e cards are supplied with connectors for external clock and trigger. Both can be programmed as input or output, so the card can receive a TTL clock or output the internal clock and the trigger connector can receive a TTL trigger event or generate a trigger event from either a software trigger or detected channel trigger.

Flexible Triggering

The UF2e cards offer an exceptional range of trigger possibilities to avoid false triggering:

Easy Programming

Only six key functions to define a complete setup. Small DLL or module (Linux) uses few system resources and does not conflict with other programs. On request, we will be pleased to send you the User Manual as a pdf so you can see the many examples.

The API is identical for all UF2e A/D D/A and Digital cards to reduce programming times.

What's included

The UF2e cards are supplied with:

Features