In this video we're be talking about getting started with your Agilent M9018A PXI Chassis.
Before you can begin using your chassis there's some simple installation instructions you
should follow.
First, you begin by installing your software.
You're gonna need to install Agilent IO Libraries along with the instrument drivers for each
card you plan on installing.
Let's start by installing IO Libraries.
If you don't have the installation CD, you can download it at the link below.
Go ahead and click Install Now, and follow the steps in the installation wizard.
Now that IO Libraries is installed you can begin installing drivers.
You want to start by installing the chassis driver first.
At the end of the installation, it's gonna ask if you want to restart.
Make sure you pick No, as you still need to install drivers for each card you plan on
inserting in the chassis.
If you purchased an Agilent card, it should have shipped with a driver CD.
If it didn't, or you misplaced it, you can always go to the website, or you can open
up IO Libraries, like I have on the screen, and then you can go up to Update Drivers and
it'll take you to a list.
You can then browse or type in the name of your card.
I'm going to install an M9151A.
So go to download driver, and it should take you to a web page that has a link for the
driver.
There we go.
Now, if you scroll down you'll see a link to download the driver.
You can either select Run or Save.
I'm gonna go ahead and select Run.
Once the download finishes, follow the installation prompts.
If this is the last driver you need to install, go ahead and shut down the PC when you're
done.
Now that all the software and drivers are installed, we can move on to steps three and
four where we install the hardware.
Now let's take a quick moment to talk about glyphs.
Every PXI chassis contains glyphs above each slot.
This indicates to the user what type of card is compatible with that slot.
The M9018A has 18 slots.
All of them are PXI Express Hybrid slots, with the exception of slot 1 and slot 10.
Slot 1 is a PXI Express System slot, and slot 10 is the PXI Express System Timing slot.
The other 16 slots are compatible with PXI-1 hybrid cards, and PXI Express cards.
Original PXI-1 cards can be modified to work with this chassis by converting it to a hybrid
card, but that's a topic for another video.
Before you install any cards in the chassis, make sure your chassis power is turned off.
Now I'm going to install a PCIe Cable Interface card.
This needs to be inserted in slot 1. Make sure the injector is still down while you
slide it in.
At the very end you should be able to click it upwards and lock the card into place.
Now the M9021A is a little unique.
It doesn't derive power from the chassis connector used by most PXI embedded controllers.
Instead, the M9021 uses the top connector on the chassis backplane for its power.
In order to use this card in slot 1, there's a switch on the M9018 that lets you change
the voltage setting.
So if you want to do a quick check, turn on the power.
And if the LEDs don't turn on, like it does here, then you need to power down the chassis
and flip that switch.
Now let's go back to the cable interface card and plug in the cable.
If you do it correctly, you should be able to hear the cable click, like that, and it
should be in there securely.
Now to remove it, you put your finger in the green tab and pull.
Similarly, when you plug it into your laptop card or your desktop PC, the cable should
snap into place.
Disconnecting it is basically the same method.
You just put your finger through the green tab and pull.
Now you just need to plug it into your laptop and power it on your chassis.
There we go, it's plugged in.
Once the chassis is powered on, and you turn on your laptop, if you get a orange light,
you know you did something wrong.
The light should be green.
Usually this indicates you have loose connection somewhere.
If the light is green you know everything is hooked up correctly and you're ready to
go.
Now I'm gonna install the M9151A card.
This can go into any slot other than slot 1 or 10, because it is a PXI Express card.
I locked it in, and that's the last card I'm gonna insert.
So now I'm gonna go ahead and power on my chassis, and then I'm gonna go ahead and power
on my PC.
And if you do it in that order, you should see something like this.
When you boot the PC, it should automatically find your new hardware.
If it doesn't, that means you most likely didn't turn on the chassis first, and the
PC didn't get to enumerate the chassis.
Unfortunately, what this means is you have to shut down the PC completely and make sure
the chassis's powered on, and then turn your PC back on again.
Now you should be able to select the Install Software Automatically, since you already
installed the driver for the chassis, and for all of the cards.
Once you have completed the hardware wizard for the M9018A, your PC should discover any
cards you have inserted in the chassis.
I've only got an M9151, so I'm going ahead and installing that.
If you have any other cards inserted, you'll have to installs those now.
Once all the hardware is installed, you can either restart the computer, or you can go
to the control panel and go to Administrative Tools, go to Services.
And in the Services menu, you go to Agilent PXI Resources, and you click the Restart button.
Like I said, you could restart the computer if you want, instead.
But this is a little quicker.
Now you've completed the hardware setup, and we can move on to the last section, Checks
and Verifications, steps 5, 6, and 7.
You can go ahead and start up Agilent Connection Expert.
Now when you start it up, you should be able to see your chassis, and you should be able
to see the card that you installed.
See, right there on top is the chassis, and then underneath it is the card.
If I click on it, you can see I'm in slot 4.
If I go to install drivers, I can start up the soft front panel.
Now this card is just an RF multiplexer.
So basically I can just move around some of the little switches, verifying that the card
is installed correctly.
Now I gave you a very simple example of just one card installed.
But usually you'll have multiple cards installed, like in the screenshot shown here.
If that's the case, you probably want to � click on the chassis.
As you can see, it'll show you all the cards you have installed in a nice list, and it
tells you which slot they're in.
Now if you installed a driver incorrectly or forgot to install a driver, it'll simply
say, PCI Device instead of giving me a descriptive name like shown here.
Once you've completed verifying your cards you're all done.
I hope this video was helpful, and I thank you for watching.