What Vision Acquisition Software Should I Use for My Frame Grabber?

Updated Aug 8, 2023

Reported In

Hardware

  • Frame Grabber Device

Driver

  • Vision Acquisition Software
  • NI-IMAQ
  • NI-IMAQdx
  • NI-IMAQ I/O

Issue Details

  • I have a PCIe-1427 frame grabber, what Vision Acquisition Software (IMAQdx, IMAQ or IMAQ I/O) should I use with it?
  • I have a Camera Link camera connected to my PCIe-1427 frame grabber and I am trying to modify its attributes. I have realized that some attributes are stored at <Users>\Public\Public Documents\National Instruments\NI-IMAQ\Data and some others at <Users>\Public\Public Documents\National Instruments\NI-IMAQdx\Data, what folder should I use for this purpose?

Solution

Starting in Vision Acquisition Software (VAS) 18.0, support for certain Camera Link frame grabbers was added to IMAQdx. That allows you to use the IMAQdx VIs to acquire from your Camera Link cameras. Under the hood, IMAQdx is still calling into the IMAQ lower-level functions.

If you are using VAS 18.0 or higher, you still need to have NI-IMAQ installed. In this case, some attributes will be stored in the IMAQ ICD file (<Users>\Public\Public Documents\National Instruments\NI-IMAQ\Data), and others in the IMAQdx ICD file (Users>\Public\Public Documents\National Instruments\NI-IMAQdx\Data). 

If you want to modify an attribute either from the IMAQ ICD file or the IMAQdx ICD file, using the IMAQdx property node is enough. There is no need to open an IMAQ session.

Additional Information

If you want to load or save your configuration files, the IMAQdx Read Attributes (load) and IMAQdx Write Attributes (save) functions will help you with this task. These functions will load/save both the IMAQ and IMAQdx ICD files depending on where the attribute resides. As a reference, you can consider the Advanced Functionality with Attributes LabVIEW example.

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