New Data Translation DAQ board provides power, programmability, precision

Marlboro, MA - Data Translation has announced the DT9841 Fulcrum II Series. By combining the accuracy of Texas Instruments' (TI) floating-point TMS3206711 digital signal processor (DSP) with the speed of two 24-bit sigma-delta A/D and D/A converters on a standard 6U card that communicates to the host via USB 2.0, the DT9841 is an intelligent data acquisition system for processing measurements that require high performance in real-time.

By Control Engineering Staff November 4, 2002

Marlboro, MA – Data Translation has announced the DT9841 Fulcrum II Series. By combining the accuracy of Texas Instruments’ (TI) floating-point TMS3206711 digital signal processor (DSP) with the speed of two 24-bit sigma-delta A/D and D/A converters on a standard 6U card that communicates to the host via USB 2.0, the DT9841 is an intelligent data acquisition system for processing measurements that require high performance in real-time.

According to Fred Molinari, president, founder, and ceo of Data Translation, ”Leveraging the accuracy of TI’s DSP devices, OEMs, integrators, institutions, and laboratories now have a product with the kind of speed and power that’s never been available before today. This is very important in the embedded applications market, where precision in mission-critical applications is vital and speed is an essential factor in processing measurements.”

”The Fulcrum II Series boards offered from Data Translation add high-performance analog circuitry with peripheral-rich C6711 DSPs giving our customers a complete off- the-shelf, real-time test and measurement system,” said Martin Burgos, C67x product marketing manager, TI. ”Customers can accelerate their time to market by combining C6711 DSPs with high-performance analog circuitry into their designs.”

Data Translation data acquisition product manager, Tim Ludy, told Control Engineering, ”This product is designed to provide a complete platform for OEM customers who can take advantage of the programmability of the TI DSP chip and the variety of connectors offered. It will also serve as a platform for future growth of our product line serving both OEMs and end users.”

The DT9841 is a complete data acquisition measurement system. Equipped with A/D, D/A, D/IO, clock timer and trigger, the DT9841 features:

8 simultaneous channels of 24-bit sigma-delta A/D, 100kS/s, expandable to additional modules

2 simultaneous channels of 24-bit sigma-delta D/A, 100kS/s, expandable to additional modules

24 lines of digital I/O: 8 inputs, 8 outputs and 8 programmable as digital I/O and up to 3 counter timers with up/down capability

USB 2.0 support for ultra fast communications with the host and for the next-generation of peripherals that require processing speeds up to 480 Mbps.

Each A/D and D/A subsystem has its own high-speed pathway in and out of memory so each can execute real-time measurements without processor intervention. The embedded C6711 DSP is software programmable and can be used in a standalone or system test operation. It does not require host intervention because it comes with 2 Mbytes of flash memory for autonomous operation. The DSP bypasses Microsoft Windows’ latencies, allowing for high-speed uninterrupted data transfer.

Up to eight additional cards can be added via a LVDS communication port to expand channel count up to 64 simultaneous A/D input signals plus 16 D/A output signals.

The DT9841 can be used by developers, programmers and high-level applications software package users. The host software for the DT9841 provides a means of installing and configuring the DT9841 from the host, tools for downloading and executing DSP programs, an API for writing host programs to communicate with running DSP programs, an API for building utilities, diagnostics, etc., and sample programs that use the two APIs.

Users can develop programs in TI’s Code Composer Studio Integrated Development Environment (IDE). In future versions, users will also be able to program using Data Translation’s test and measurement application environment, DT Measure Foundry.

To learn more about TI’s real-time eXpressDSP Software and Development Tools and receive free evaluation tools, visit dspvillage.ti.com/ordercd7 .

The DT9841 is priced at $3995 and is available for immediate order. The board comes in two memory configurations: the DT9841-128 with 128MB of SDRAM and the DT9841-64/2 with 64MB of SDRAM and 2MB of Flash.

The DT9841 includes an extensive library of application examples and tutorials as well as online help. Data Translation provides complete technical support for all its products. Support is also available 24×7 via Data Translation’s website at www.datatranslation.com. An animated demonstration of the software is also available on the company’s website.

Control Engineering Daily News DeskGary A. Mintchell, senior editor gmintchell@reedbusiness.com