Ocean Optics USB4000 Spectrometer

[TimChem]

Hi,

I had to purchase the OceanOptics OMNIdriver in order to get either of my Ooptics spectrometers to work. Once I purchased the driver, I used the base LabView vi that came with the driver to run the spectrometers, and they are working perfectly. Hope this helps.

Best,

tim

[AnalogKid2DigitalMan]

Alvin:

Thanks for looking into this.

Tim:

Thanks for the tip.

-AK2DM

[wacker]

AlvinT: would you please add the hyperlink here whene drivers will be released? Thanks a lot!

[AlvinT]

The driver has been released on IDnet. Click here to get to the driver page.

AlvinT

[maxwellb]

AlvinT,

It's incredible how easy your driver makes working with the USB4000. It looks like a lot of work went into it. I'm sure a lot of folks, myself included, will really appreciate this.

One question about it: Why does my spectrum pop up immediately when I run the Get Spectral Waveform VI? Shouldn't it take 6 seconds, or whatever the integration time is set to, to return a spectrum?

Max

[Jason_P]

The new drivers are very nice, but is there any chance that the next version will be done in LVOOP?  I ended up implementing something similar a while back, but instead of using case statements to handle the different types of spectrometers, I created classes for each type and used dynamic dispatch VIs for the type-specific functions.  This approach allows the driver framework to be expanded as needed for new types of spectrometers.  Further, they can be handled as plug-ins and not even require rebuilding the exe that calls them.

Just a thought...

JasonP

[NathanT]

Hello Jason,

        There are no plans to update the instrument driver to LVOOP, but we would certainly be happy to add your LVOOP based instrument driver to IDNet.  We try to keep NI-Certified LabVIEW Plug and Play Instrument Drivers fairly simple, to aid in modification and debugging.

If you have time, I recommend taking a look at How to Mitigate Hardware Obsolescence in Next-Generation Test Systems, which uses LVOOP for dynamic interchangeability.

Cheers,

NathanT

[AlvinT]

Max,

I'm glad the driver helps. 

As for your question, the integration time set using Configure Integration Time VI for US4000 is in microseconds.If you did not change the default value of 6000, you are actually setting an integration time of 6milliseconds.

More information regarding the integration time units is available if you turn on the context help and mouse over the control. Some models has units in milliseconds while the others in microseconds.

I  hope this answers your question.

Thanks,

AlvinT

[AlvinT]

Max,

I got more information from Ocean Optics regarding your question. 

The spectrometer is free-running, meaning that spectral acquisition is always happening – it does not begin when the request is made.  The first spectrum acquired may take any amount of time up to the integration time depending on when in the integration period the request arrived.

More details can be found here.

AlvinT

[maxwellb]

Thanks, Alvin! That answers my question.