Archived:Can I Use the ENET-232 or ENET-485 on Systems with VISA Support Only?

Updated Dec 23, 2023

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Reported In

Hardware

  • ENET-232/2
  • ENET-232/4
  • ENET-485/4
  • ENET-485/2

Issue Details

I need to access the serial ports on an ENET-232 or ENET-485 from an application running on a 64-bit Windows, LabVIEW Real-Time (RT), Linux, or Mac OS X operating system. Is this possible and how would I go about it?

Solution

As documented in the Serial Hardware and Software Help, ENET support for these operating systems is through NI-VISA only. You will thus not be able to use NI-Serial directly.

NI-VISA support means that the device can still be used from one of these systems with VISA commands, but NI-Serial cannot be installed or used to configure the device. Check the ReadMe file for the version of VISA installed on your target for compatibility with the Serial ENET devices.

To access the ENET-232 and ENET-485 devices from the one of these targets, the ENET device must first be configured from a system with NI-Serial and assigned an IP address. For details on configuring the ENET device, reference the ENET-232 and ENET-485 User Manual

In Measurement & Automation Explorer (MAX), only devices that support NI-Serial will be able to add the serial ports under the Devices and Interfaces category. This means the ENET-232/485 ports will not be visible in Devices and Interfaces. They will also not be visible under Remote Systems because they are not dedicated to a specific target.

For use on VISA targets, the ports must be accessed from the calling program by their complete VISA resource name. When using the VISA Open function to open a connection to the port, use the following VISA resource string format to access the ENET ports:

ASRL::IPAddress::PortNumber::INSTR

For example, the ENET-232/4 has four RS-232 serial ports, numbered 1-4. If your ENET-232/4 had an IP address of 10.0.0.1, and you were attempting to access port 2, your VISA resource name would be:

ASRL::10.0.0.1::2::INSTR

For more information on the ENET devices or how they are accessed with VISA, please refer to the Related Links section below.

Note: Windows XP 64-Bit is not supported in any version of VISA.