R&S SMB Hardware Interfaces
1407.0806.32 8.5 E-2
LAN Connector
The unit is equipped with an LAN interface as standard. The LAN connector is at the rear of the
instrument. Provided the appropriate rights have been assigned by the network administrator, files can
be transmitted via the network, and network resources, e.g. a network folders, can be used. The
instrument can also be remote-controlled and manually operated in the network. It is connected by
means of a commercial RJ45 cable.
The network card functions with 100 MHz Ethernet IEEE 802.3u. The TCP/IP network protocol and the
associated network services are preconfigured. TCP/IP ensures connection-oriented communication,
where the order of the exchanged messages is adhered to and interrupted links are identified. With this
protocol, messages cannot be lost.
Connection of the Vector Signal Generator is described in Chapter 1, section "Connection to the
Network", remote control via Ethernet in Chapter 5, section "Remote control via Ethernet ". The
architecture of a LAN remote-control connection is described in detail in the following.
Remote control of an instrument via a network is based on standardized protocols which follow the OSI
reference model (see Fig. below).
SCPI
XDR (VXI-11)
ONC-RPC
TCP / UDP
IP
Ethernet/802.3
802.3/10BASE-T
Application
Presentation
Session
Transport
etwork
Data Link
Physical
SCPI [3]
RFC 1014 [1,2]
RFC 1057
RFC 793
RFC 791
8802-3
8802-3
Fig. 8-2 Example for LAN remote control based on the OSI reference model
Based on TCP/UDP, messages between the controller and the instrument are exchanged via open
network computing (ONC) - remote procedure calls (RPC). With XDR, legal RPC messages are known
as VXI-11 standard. Based on this standard, messages are exchanged between the controller and the
instrument. The messages are identical with SCPI commands. They can be organized in four groups:
program messages (control command to the instrument), response messages (values returned by the
instrument), service request (spontaneous queries of the instrument) and low-level control messages
(interface messages).
A VXI-11 link between a controller and an instrument uses three channels: a core, abort and interrupt
channel. Instrument control is mainly performed on the core channel (program, response and low-level
control messages). The abort channel is used for immediate abort of the core channel; the interrupt
channel transmits spontaneous service requests of the instrument. Link setup itself is very complex. For
more details refer to the VXI-11 specification ("TCP/IP Instrument Protocol Specification VXI-11,
Revision 1.0 VMEbus Extensions for Instrumentation, VXIbus", and "TCP/IP-IEEE 488.2 Instrument
Interface Specification VXI-11.3, Draft 0.3 VMEbus Extensions for Instrumentation, VXIbus").
To Next Page
Loading...
