National Instruments has become the first vendor to execute a Manufacturing Test License (MTL) agreement with Broadcom. The MTL agreement authorises NI to provide manufacturing test solutions and modifiable application source code to Broadcom wireless LAN and Bluetooth device customers.

Ettus Research, a National Instruments company, has introduced the USRP X300 and USRP X310 high-performance, modular software defined radio (SDR) platforms. Both platforms combine two RF transceivers covering DC–6 GHz with up to 120MHz bandwidth and a large user-programmable Kintex-7 FPGA.

Raima has released version 2 of the Raima Database API for NI LabVIEW, which upgrades Raima Database Manager (RDM) from 11.0 to 12.0 and adds the National Instruments Linux Real-Time platform to its existing Windows and RT VxWorks’ capabilities. Additionally, new security options are available including AES 128-, 192- or 256-bit encryption.

National Instruments and the University of Edinburgh have collaborated to develop a test bed to dramatically improve indoor wireless communications capacity. Professor Harald Haas, lead researcher at Edinburgh has pioneered a next-generation massive multiple input, multiple output (MIMO) technique, referred to asspatial modulation, to power a highly energy efficient capacity increase in another step on the path toward  (5G) wireless communic...

National Instruments and World Robot Olympiad have jointly announced a new a collegiate-level competition to inspire innovation among students worldwide. The Mars Colony-themed competition is a pilot in 2013 and will take place at this year’s WRO world championship held in Jakarta, Indonesia from November 15 to 17.

National Instruments has announced four new R Series boards (USB-7855R, USB-7856R, USB-7855R OEM and USB-7856R OEM) with USB connectivity, which help engineers add FPGA technology to any PC-based system. The products are based on the LabVIEW RIO architecture.

National Instruments has announced the NICVS-1457RT, a rugged, compact device powered by a 1.66GHz Intel Atom processor and featuring two independent GigE Vision ports with Power over Ethernet (PoE) technology.

National Instruments) has introduced Multisim 13.0, a SPICE simulation environment used by educators, students and engineers to explore, design and prototype circuits. It offers comprehensive circuit analysis tools for analogue, digital and power electronics. The graphical, interactive environment helps educators reinforce circuit theory and bridge the gap between the classroom and hands-on laboratory learning.

National Instruments UK & Ireland and AWR are staging a free one-day event covering the latest RF and Microwave technologies, techniques and applications. The RF and Microwave Symposium will take place on September 24 in Hitchin, Hertfordshire, and on September 26 at NI UK & Ireland Headquarters in Newbury, Berkshire.

In a, thankfully, air-conditioned ballroom in a hotel in Austin, Texas, National Instruments hosted its Graphic Design Achievement Awards 2013. Winning companies used LabView to monitor and manage systems  from CERN’s particle accelerator for ion beam cancer therapy to valve leakage detection in industrial pumps.

National Instruments has added updates to its NI LabVIEW reconfigurable I/O (RIO) architecture. The most significant are new instrument driver FPGA extensions, a feature of the NI RF signal analyser and RF signal generator instrument drivers that combine the flexibility of the open FPGA with the compatibility engineers expect from an industry-standard instrument driver.

National Instruments has unveiled a completely redesigned cRIO-9068 software-designed controller that maintains full NI LabVIEW and I/O compatibility with the CompactRIO platform. The controller integrates the Xilinx Zynq-7020 All Programmable system on a chip (SoC), which combines a dual-core ARM Cortex-A9 processor and Xilinx 7 Series FPGA fabric.

National Instruments today announced Chameleon for NI CompactDAQ, a software package developed by NI Gold Alliance Partner PVI Systemsand available on the LabVIEW Tools Network, to create turnkey systems for NI data acquisition hardware that are simple and intuitive to set up and operate.

As oil prices increase each year, renewable energy research and development becomes more of a concern for researchers. Since the Fukushima nuclear disaster, solar energy has become one of the leading candidates for an alternative energy source in the future.

National Instruments has announced its newest general-purpose programmable power supplies, which offer the highest power density available in PXI and form the foundation of automated test systems. The NI PXIe-4112 and NI PXIe-4113 modules provide high power density that saves rack space while simplifying design by eliminating the need to mix multiple instrumentation form factors.

The need for an intelligent power grid that offers accurate, robust information and two-way communication is becoming a reality. Digital technologies are enabling better power quality measurements and system health diagnostics, while distributed intelligent control is allowing the grid to localise faults.

National Instruments has announced the NI PCIe-8236 and NI PCIe-8237R two-port GigE Vision frame grabbers featuring PoE technology. The NI PCIe-8237R features NI LabVIEW FPGA-enabled I/O, including isolated digital inputs and outputs, as well as bidirectional TTL lines for implementing custom counters, PWM signals and quadrature encoder inputs.

National Instruments has announced the NI Direct Injector Driver System, a full solution for engine control that are delivered to the customer ready to use. Digital command signals from an ECU are read on an NI 9411 digital input module and interpreted in a software application loaded on an NI CompactRIO controller. These digital commands are then used to schedule output signals from Drivven DI Driver modules to direct injectors.

The biggest advantage is the automated testing and logging of more than four tests with just one system. The architecture of the application is scalable; hence, the number of tests can be easily increased. Previously, such tests were carried out using printed circuit boards with the manpower required to intermittently run performance checks. This step has now been completely eliminated. - Priyanka Chaudhary, VE Commerical Vehicles Limited