October, 2013

One of our biggest challenges as a company is to keep our partners informed of all the newest developments that are designed to help them become more productive. Hopefully the information and ideas expressed in these newsletters will be of benefit to you.

Please let us know how we are doing and if you would like to see anything specific addressed.

Before the Synergy, research labs and test facilities were filled with a combination of different types of instruments and signal conditioners all for similar yet distinct measurements. As the name implies, Synergy blends the unique capabilities of multiple instruments in an integrated, easy to use system.

The Synergy is a Transient Recorder as well as a Multi-Channel DSO, Data Acquisition System and Real-time FFT Analyzer with the ability to capture transient events (at speeds up to 100 MS/s) as well as streaming to disk (at up to 1 MS/s) for long periods of time, all at 16 bits/channel.

There are many reasons to consider upgrading to the Synergy notwithstanding the support for both the WINs and meDAQs being very limited.

Comparative advantages for Synergy include:
Math channel screens for the Synergy are identical (with some added functions) to that of the WIN, making the learning curve non-existent.

Please feel free to browse our website for more details on the Synergy family of Data Acquisition systems or contact your local representative if you would like to see one in operation.

The Synergy family of Data Acquisition products is offered in four different platforms allowing maximum input flexibility and system configuration.

Both the Synergy P and Synergy Qb have four input module slots while the Synergy 8 offers eight and the Synergy CS sixteen. Based on the type of input module installed, the Synergy mainframe can handle up to 256 channels.

The P and CS versions are designed more for the lab environments while the Qb and 8 more so for field applications. Each mainframe can accept all input modules and can be Master/Slaved (synchronizing the data) for higher channel count requirements.

One recurring comment we hear from our customers is the ease of startup and operation of the Synergy software providing, out-of-the-box operation. Much of this success is due to you the customers who provide continuous feedback on features and operation. We encourage you to continue providing that all important feedback on desired capabilities and we'll try to include as many as possible.

We are pleased to announce version 5.03 Synergy software that includes many new capabilities:
For a complete list of enhancements, check out the Version 5.03 release notes on our support page. It's easy and free to upgrade your Synergy software.

Please visit our software page to download this latest software version.

Contact us at (608) 221-7500 or email us at info@hi-techniques.com should you require necessary log-in credentials.

In this newsletter we will be reviewing two very popular features in the Synergy Software: Data Exchange by Drag & Drop and Slow-Fast Recording.

Data Exchange

Synergy software allows you to drag waveforms, cursor values and analysis results directly into many other applications such as FlexPro, OpenOffice, Microsoft Excel or Word (a keyboard and mouse are required). If you do not have Microsoft Office installed on your PC, we suggest using WordPad or the open-source Open Office from www.OpenOffice.org.

Open another application such as Excel, and resize the windows so that you can see both the Synergy display and the spreadsheet on screen. To copy the numeric values of all the waveforms displayed on screen, press and hold the Control Key on your keyboard, then click and hold the left mouse button in the waveform display. The mouse pointer changes shape to acknowledge your action. Finally, drag the mouse pointer to the other application and release. The Control-Drag operation is the same convention used by Windows Explorer to copy from one window to another. All data displayed on the current screen is transferred. You control the start and end points of the data transferred by scrolling and zooming to display the desired data. Number of samples copied per channel will depend on version of Excel you are using.

The same Control-click-and-drag operation from the Cursor box copies the table of cursor values.

You may copy a graphical (EMF) plot of the current screen instead by pressing both Control and Alt keys on the keyboard while clicking and dragging.

Slow-Fast Recording

Slow-Fast Recording allows any number of fast transient events to be captured at a high sample rate, while lower-speed samples are continuously collected in the background. Events as short as 5 microsecond duration can be recognized as a Trigger. This mode is useful for capturing infrequent events while simultaneously keeping a history of baseline values between events. The Fast Sample Rate can be as high as 200 k S/s, and is recorded for a user-set duration upon each Trigger Event (including a configurable pre-trigger amount). The Slow Rate can be any slower rate from 1 kS/s to 0.5 S/s, and is recorded continuously from the start of the Record.

During the next newsletter we will be: