OPERATING MANUAL

Data Acquisition Systems NI9203, NI9213 &

NI9220

Abhinav Verma, Guruditya Sinha

guruditya.sinha@teamindus.in

TABLE OF CONTENTS
1. Overview....................................................................................................3
1.1.
1.2.
1.3.

NI-9220: DAQ for Voltage measurement........................................................3

NI-9213: DAQ for Temperature measurement................................................4
NI-9203: DAQ for Current measurement........................................................5

2. Procedure for hardware connection...........................................................6

2.1.
2.2.
2.3.

NI-9213 Connection Details...........................................................................6

NI-9220 Connection Details...........................................................................7
NI-9203 Connection Details...........................................................................9

3. Procedure to get started with labVIEW:....................................................10

4. Procedure to configure DAQ hardware with labVIEW:..............................10
5. Procedure to display input and output:....................................................11
6. Procedure to process input and create output:........................................11
7. Procedure to save output signal data to a file.........................................12

TABLE OF FIGURES
FIGURE 1: NI-9220
FIGURE 2: NI-9213
FIGURE 3: NI-9203
FIGURE 4: NI-9213 PIN DIAGRAM
FIGURE 5: NI-9213 WIRING
FIGURE 6: NI9220 WITH A SPRING-TERMINAL CONNECTOR (LEFT), NI9220 WITH D-SUB
CONNECTOR (RIGHT)
FIGURE 7: NI-9220 PIN DIAGRAM
FIGURE 8: NI-9220 GROUNDED DIFFERENTIAL MODE
FIGURE 9: NI-9220 FLOATING DIFFERENTIAL MODE
FIGURE 10: NI-9220 SINGLE ENDED MODE
FIGURE 11: NI-9203 PIN DIAGRAM
FIGURE 12: NI-9203 SINGLE ENDED MODE

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1. OVERVIEW
This document outlines the procedure to set up the hardware and software of the
Data Acquisition Systems provided by National Instruments.

1.1. NI-9220: DAQ

FOR

VOLTAGE

MEASUREMENT

FIGURE 1: NI-9220
NI-9220 is a data acquisition system for voltage measurement that has 16

differential input channels.

The resolution offered is of 16 bits per channel.
Maximum supported sample rate for the device is 100,000 Samples per

second.
Theoretically, the maximum frequency that can be analyzed is 50kHz with an
anti-aliasing filter but it is recommended not to apply frequency more than
20kHz in any case as it will result in just five or fewer samples per cycle.
Input impedance for the device is 1 G.
18 to 28 AWG copper conducting wire with 7mm of insulation should be
used for a connection.
NOTE: Maximum differential input should not exceed 10V.

1.2. NI-9213: DAQ

FOR

TEMPERATURE

MEASUREMENT

FIGURE 2: NI-9213
NI-9213 is a data acquisition system for temperature measurement using a

thermocouple, that has 16 thermocouple channels of 24-bit resolution each.

It also has an auto-zero channel and a cold junction channel.
Auto-Zero Channel Explain what it means and its usage
Cold Junction Channel - Explain what it means and its usage
The sample rate is 1/(Conversion Time * Number of Channels) or 100
Samples per second, whichever is small.
Conversion time for High resolution = 55ms
Conversion time for High speed = 740us
Voltage range for each channel is -78.125 to 78.125mV.
Differential input impedance is 78 M.
Measurement sensitivity for High resolution are:
Channel

Resolution

J,K,T,E,N
B,R,S

<0.02C
<0.15C

Measurement sensitivity for High speed are:

Channel

Resolution

J,K,T,E
N
B
R,S

<0.25C
<0.35C
<1.2C
<2.8C

18 to 28 AWG copper conducting wire with 7mm of insulation should be

used for a connection.

1.3. NI-9203: DAQ

FOR

CURRENT

MEASUREMENT

FIGURE 3: NI-9203
NI-9203 is a data acquisition system for current measurement with 8

channels of 16-bit resolution at 200,000 Samples per second.

It has a programmable current range of 0-20mA in unipolar mode and

-20mA to 20mA in bipolar mode.

Scaling coefficient is 330nA/LSB for unipolar and 660nA/LSB for bipolar

mode.
Input bandwidth of the device is 850kHz for -3dB cutoff.
Input resistance is 138 and input capacitance is 20pF. Do I need to take

special care when connecting the sensor? If yes, then please mention
specifics
12 to 24 AWG copper conducting wire with 10mm of insulation stripped
from an end should be used for screw terminal wiring.

2. PROCEDURE FOR HARDWARE CONNECTION

2.1. NI-9213 CONNECTION DETAILS
Connect the positive terminal of a thermocouple to the TC(n)+ terminal and
the negative terminal of the thermocouple to the TC(n)- terminal of a
channel.

FIGURE 4: NI-9213 P IN DIAGRAM

To connect the NI 9213 spring-terminal connector follow the steps below:

Use flathead screwdriver with a 2.3 mm x 1.0 mm (0.09 in. x 0.04 in.) blade,
included with the NI 9213
Insert the screwdriver into a spring clamp activation slot to open the
corresponding connector terminal.
Press a wire into the open connector terminal.
Remove the screwdriver from the activation slot to clamp the wire into place.

FIGURE 5: NI-9213 W IRING

2.2. NI-9220 CONNECTION DETAILS

FIGURE 6: NI9220 WITH A SPRING-TERMINAL CONNECTOR (LEFT), NI9220 WITH

D-SUB CONNECTOR (RIGHT )

FIGURE 7: NI-9220 P IN DIAGRAM

Grounded Differential mode: Follow the scheme below when GND of

sensor is known and is different from the negative terminal

FIGURE 8: NI-9220 G ROUNDED DIFFERENTIAL MODE

Floating Differential mode: Follow the scheme scheme when GND of

sensor is unknown

FIGURE 9: NI-9220 F LOATING DIFFERENTIAL M ODE

Single Ended mode: Follow the scheme below when GND of sensor is
known and is same as the negative terminal.

FIGURE 10: NI-9220 S INGLE ENDED M ODE

To connect the sensor to NI9220 D-SUB type connector, use a 37 pin, 2-row
D-SUB female connector.

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2.3. NI-9203 CONNECTION DETAILS

FIGURE 11: NI-9203 P IN DIAGRAM

Single ended mode: Follow the scheme below only with the current sensors
and NOT with voltage sensors.

FIGURE 12: NI-9203 S INGLE ENDED M ODE

To connect the sensor to NI-9203, unscrew the screws and put stripped wire
ends to make a connection.

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3. PROCEDURE TO GET STARTED WITH LABVIEW:

1. Start the labVIEW version that you have and click on Create Project.
2. Select Blank Project and click on Finish button to get to the Project
Explorer.
3. You will see a Project tree with Project: Untitled Project 1 at the top of
the hierarchy, followed by My Computer that has two branches named
Dependencies and Build Specifications.
4. Click on New button in the toolbar, or got to File in the main menu bar
and choose the option New. Choose Blank VI from the dialog box and
click on OK.
5. Two windows named Front Panel and Block Diagram will pop up.
6. Block diagram is the window where we write the code or draw the schematic.
Example: Algorithm for signal processing, Algorithm to save data to a file etc.
7. Front Panel is the window that is used for interaction. It is just like
input
and output device for the schematic. Tools like input button, waveform
analyzer etc will be present here.

4. PROCEDURE TO CONFIGURE DAQ HARDWARE WITH

LABVIEW:
1. Right click on the block diagram page and choose Measurement
I/O. Choose NIDAQmx from the submenu and finally, choose
DAQ Assistant. Drag and drop it to the block diagram page.
2. Alternatively,
you can press Ctrl+<Space> and type DAQ
Assistant in quick drop bar. Double click on DAQ assistant, drag and
drop it in the block diagram.
NOTE: If NIDAQmx is not installed on the system or is not properly
configured, then you may not find the NIDAQmx option. Please visit the
National Instruments website and download the required packages.
3. A measurement configuration dialog box will pop up. Choose the signal

4.
5.
6.
7.

type after selecting Analog Input under the Acquire Signal

option.
Choose current for NI9203, temperature for NI9213 and voltage for
NI9220.
Choose the analog channel on which you want to acquire the signal.
For physical devices like DAQ the device name will be something like
Dev 1 but for a virtual device, the name will be SimuDAQ.
Click the finish button to get to the task configuration page. You may
leave most of the parameter here to their default values.

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8. Under the Timing Setting on the same page, choose N samples as

the acquisition mode and set the Rate to the frequency at which you
want to sample the input. Finally, choose the total number of samples
that you want to read.
9. Generally, the rate of sampling should be 5 to 10 times the highest
frequency of a signal. Samples to read should be equal to 1/(time of
sampling)*(sample rate).
10.
You can preview the data by click on Run button at the top of
the dialog box.
11.
Click OK and place the DAQ Assistant on the block diagram page.
12.
You will notice 6 input pins of different purpose and colors as
input to the DAQ assistant. There will be 3 output pins too. For basic
purposes, you should be concerned with Signal Out pin only.

For the sake of demonstration, I will make a schematic that acquires a signal
at 1000 Samples/sec for 10 seconds. I will further process the signal so that
Output=2*Input + 5 and save the signal data to a file. Please do not use
first person in a manual for description, Edit please

5. PROCEDURE TO DISPLAY INPUT AND OUTPUT:

1. Set the Samples to Read parameter to 10,000 and Rate to 1000, leaving
Acquisition Mode to N samples.
2. Now switch over to Front Panel. You can press Ctrl+E to toggle between
the front panel and the block diagram.
3. Right click on the front panel page and go to Graph and select Waveform
Graph.
4. You can alternatively press Ctrl+<space> and type Waveform Graph.
5. Place the graph and return back to block diagram. You will notice another
block placed there, named waveform graph. It has only one input and it
displays the signal that it receives as input.
6. Click on the Signal Out pin of DAQ assistant and drag the wire out of it to
the input pin of waveform graph.
7. Save your schematic and run it. Toggle to the front panel and you will notice
signal acquired by DAQ from the physical world being displayed on the
waveform graph.

6. PROCEDURE TO PROCESS INPUT AND CREATE OUTPUT:

1. Right click on the block diagram page and you will notice a Numeric block.
Select it and then select Multiply. Add it to the block diagram.
2. Place an Add block similarly. Then add two Numeric Constant blocks
by selecting the option numeric constant under numeric.

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3. You can also add them by pressing Ctrl+<space> and then typing the
names.
4. The default values of numeric constants are 0 and 0. Change them to 2 and
5.
5. You will notice that the Multiply and Add block have two inputs and an
output.
6. Join the output pin of numeric constant 2 to the input pin of multiply block.
Join the other pin to the output pin of DAQ assistant. (Since the output of
DAQ assistant is a signal so it can be attached to many inputs at the same
time.)
7. Then join the output pin of multiply block to the input of addition block and
another input of addition block to numeric constant 5. This completes the
function Output=2*Input+5.
8. Place another waveform graph as we did earlier and join its input to the
output of addition in order to view the output on the graph.
9. Save and run the code. You will see the input being processed and
displayed as output.

7. PROCEDURE TO SAVE OUTPUT SIGNAL DATA TO A FILE

1. Right click on the block diagram page and choose File I/O option. Choose
Write to Measurement File in the menu.
2. A new dialog box will pop up. Choose file name and location, file format and
delimiter (for CSV).
3. Set X Value (Time) columns to one of the three parameters and click on
OK.
4. Save and run the program. You will find a data file in the specified location.

Visit www.ni.com/tutorial/52006/en for basic tutorial.

Please add more references if you have referred any.

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