NetAcquire Family - Intelligent real-time data acquisition, signal processing, and networking

NetAcquire Family Overview

The family of NetAcquire products combines three key technologies: hardware input/output interface modules, real-time data processing, and high-speed networking. Together they offer a low-cost off-the-shelf solution to many high-performance distributed telemetry test and measurement applications that could only previously be handled by expensive custom equipment.

The NetAcquire family consists of over 40 configurations to support a wide variety of applications such as:

This page describes the general hardware and software capabilities of the NetAcquire product line. For more detailed information, please contact us or select a topic from the menu on the left. Click here to download this overview in Adobe Acrobat format (get Acrobat here).

NetAcquire Hardware

NetAcquire systems are powerful real-time input/output controllers with integrated processing and networking. They provide interfaces between the "real world" of analog, digital, and PCM serial signals and the "network world" of interconnected data analysis and display systems. Onboard processor options offer billions of cycles of processing in ruggedized form-factors as small as hand-held.

All hardware input/output interfaces are modular to allow convenient mix-and-match system configuration to support almost any application requirement. Expansion is available up to 512 input/output channels and all I/O interfaces are software-configurable without programming. Hardware configurability allows creation of a wide range of different instruments, from telemetry gateways to spectrum analyzers and communications bridges.

A NetAcquire system is designed for autonomous "always on" operation. No keyboard or monitor connection is required. Modular network interface hardware allows remote communication with a NetAcquire system over almost any type of network.

NetAcquire Software

Full-featured and well-integrated software is essential component of modern-day instrumentation in order to ensure mission-critical reliability, reduced development costs and risk, and ease-of-use in the field. NetAcquire systems include all the software needed to work "out-of-the-box":

Software	Benefit
Real-time operating system	Rapid, guaranteed response time with no dropped data
Building-block configuration architecture	No programming required to configure systems
Hundreds of predefined data processing components	Rapid application development of real-time functionality
Data archiving and storage management	Automatic backup of critical data with replay capability
Remote Web-based administration, configuration and status	Offers a graphical user interface that works from any operating system without installing software or runtime licenses
Open architecture and a programmer's Extension Toolkit	Flexibility to conveniently expand the system to support unique requirements
Interactive data visualization tools	View incoming data easily in graphical format
Advanced network data distribution and data sharing	Maximum interoperability, unlimited number of user interface machines, and no distance limitation
High-reliability extensions (watchdog support and optional hot failover)	Very high uptime (99.999%) for mission-critical applications
Extensive software qualification and test suites	High-assurance and controlled operating environment for mission-critical applications

Distributed Architecture

The NetAcquire distributed architecture is based on a network-connected client/server model that optimizes an application to run on the machine best suited for each application component:

Server-side	Core real-time activities such as data capture, buffering, processing and closed loop control are executed on the NetAcquire server close each hardware interface -- maximizes data quality and ensures timely data processing.
Client-side	Data display and operator interfaces are located on one or more desktop computers running Windows or Linux -- allows familiar desktop graphic user interfaces with no distance limitation or scalability constraints.

Even in applications where a NetAcquire system is physically close to the desktop operator interface, there are important benefits to the automatic NetAcquire partitioning of an application onto two processors each running its own purpose-built software environment.

Server-side Intelligence and Real-Time Processing

NetAcquire servers are equipped with powerful Gigahertz onboard processors. The advantages of this local intelligence are the ability to do extensive real-time data handling and analysis as well as simultaneous high-speed communication. The NetAcquire real-time operating system also avoids the timing limitations of Windows and UNIX.

NetAcquire servers include many predefined functions for data processing, routing, analysis, alarming, and display. Some processing is general-purpose and other processing is specific to individual application areas like telemetry. In addition to powerful predefined processing functions, user-supplied software extensions can easily be compiled and installed.

Onboard processing also enhances other server functions, including dynamic data buffering, high-speed data archiving, data simulation, and distributed time synchronization.

NetAcquire Architecture

Click to enlarge

Versatile Networking

NetAcquire networking runs over almost any network, including twisted pair, fiber optic, dial-up modem, WAN, and wireless connections. Unlimited simultaneous network clients are supported for flexible data sharing and display. A wide range of protocols are supported, including Web, UDP, TCP, publish/subscribe, and CORBA distributed objects. Data integrity is optimized with advanced network routing, error checking, and recovery.

Client-Side Options

NetAcquire "clients" are all other machines on a network that might want to exchange data with a NetAcquire system. Client machines often are Windows or Linux desktop machines, but also include other types of computers like file servers.

NetAcquire client machines often are responsible for operator interface and data display. Every NetAcquire system allows convenient graphic configuration and monitoring from anywhere on the network using a regular Web browser. Even real-time data display and graphing are available from within a browser using built-in Java applets.

In addition to the universal Web interface, many other options are available for creating user interfaces either with or without programming:

Visual Basic and Visual C/C++	Highly flexible customized interfaces
NI LabVIEW	Drag-and-drop icon-based graphical user interface without programming
NetAcquire Windows Client Toolkit	Read and display data directly in Microsoft Excel and other Windows programs
NetAcquire Java Client Toolkit	Create custom user interfaces that are viewable from any Web browser
Satellite Tool Kit and IADS	3-D visualization and data analysis
TCP/UDP sockets	Interface to your existing display software from using standard socket calls

More Information

NetAcquire offers a large number of product options which are available for many applications. We'd like to help -- please contact us by phone or e-mail. We'll quickly put you in touch with one of our application engineers that understands your unique requirements.