Agilent Technologies N5980A Operating instructions

Agilent
3.125 Gb/s Serial BERT
N5980A
Programming Guide

2 N5980A Programming Guide
Notices
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cturing_BERT
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WARNING

Safety Summary
General Safety Precautions
The following general safety
precautions must be observed
during all phases of operation of
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or with specific warnings
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General
This product is a Safety Class 1
instrument (provided with a
protective earth terminal). The
protective features of this
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used in a manner not specified
in the operation instructions.
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Class 1 LEDs as per IEC 60825-
1.
Environment Conditions
This instrument is intended for
indoor use in an installation
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environment. It is designed to
operate at a maximum relative
humidity of 95% and at altitudes
of up to 2000 meters.
Refer to the specifications tables
for the ac mains voltage
requirements and ambient
operating temperature range.
Before Applying Power
Verify that all safety precautions
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device to disconnect from the
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When the instrument is rack
mounted the rack must be
provided with an easily
accessible mains switch.
Ground the Instrument
To minimize shock hazard, the
instrument chassis and cover
must be connected to an
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connected to the ac power mains
through a grounded power cable,
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power outlet. Any interruption
of the protective (grounding)
conductor or disconnection of
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cause a potential shock hazard
that could result in personal
injury.
Do Not Operate in an
Explosive Atmosphere
Do not operate the instrument in
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or fumes.
Do Not Remove the
Instrument Cover
Operating personnel must not
remove instrument covers.
Component replacement and
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made only by qualified
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Instruments that appear
damaged or defective should be
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against unintended operation
until they can be repaired by
qualified service personnel.

4 N5980A Programming Guide
Safety Symbols on
Instruments
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Safety requirements for electrical
equipment for measurement,
control, and laboratory use
CAN/CSA C22.2 No. 1010.1
(1993) UL 3101, 3111 (First
Editions). This equipment has
also been evaluated to IEC 61010
edition 1 including amendments
1 and 2.
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This product complies with the
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Environmental Information

Introduction
N5980A Programming Guide 5
Contents
Contents 5
1Introduction 6
2Programming Basics 8
3Setting Up The Environment 10
4A Typical Remote Program 13
5SCPI Command Reference 18
6Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ) 21

6 N5980A Programming Guide
1 Introduction
Introduction This document provides the information you need for remote programming
the N5980A Serial BERT.
Communication
Overview
To communicate with the N5980A Serial BERT from a remote computer, you
have to connect the USB port on the rear of the instrument to a USB port of
your PC.
Figure 1: N5980A Serial BERT setup diagram
Note: the N5980A Serial BERT does not have a LAN or a GPIB interface.
Controller PC
USB

Introduction
N5980A Programming Guide 7
Agilent I/O
Libraries
To communicate with the N5980A Serial BERT, you do not need the Agilent
I/O Libraries! The communication with the instrument is not done using the
VISA libraries.
The remote access can only be done by directly using Windows Sockets.
The N5980A Serial BERT is not visible with the Agilent Connection Expert,
i.e. it does not provide USB API programming through or with the Agilent IO
Libraries!
Because the N5980A Serial BERT does not use the Agilent IO Library
infrastructure you cannot use e.g. the VISA Assistant or the Interactive IO
program to send SCPI commands to the instrument.
Please refer to the Sample Code in the enclosed examples to control the
N5980A from within a remote program.

8 N5980A Programming Guide
2 Programming Basics
SCPI Compatibility The SCPI commands represent the instrument’s advanced analysis, and
pattern generation features that can be controlled from within the remote
programs.
The N5980A Serial BERT is not is fully SCPI1997 standard compliant.
The remote programming language is close to SCPI. The instrument does
not have full featured SCPI parser.
The missing standard SCPI features are:
•Status handling/registers
No commands are available to query or set the status of the
instrument.
•Support of short and long form of SCPI commands
Commands may only sent in the exact format given below.
Example: :SOUR1:PATT PRBS7
You may not use: :SOURce1:PATTern PRBS7
•There are no default suffixes
You always have to add the suffix to the command
Example: :SOUR1:PATT?
You may not omit the “1” in “SOUR1”.
•Multiple SCPI commands in one line
You always have to specify the full command.
SCPI standard allows: :SOUR1:PATT PRBS7;EADD ONCE
N5980A needs: :SOUR1:PATT PRBS7; :SOUR1:PATT:EADD ONCE
The commands must always be complete, even for the second
parameter that belongs to the same root node inside a transaction.
•Only a few of the standard SCPI commands are available,
e.g. *OPC is missing.
Please refer to the Sample Code in the enclosed examples to control the
N5980A from within a remote program.

Programming Basics
N5980A Programming Guide 9
Remote Access
Using Windows
Sockets
The N5980A Serial BERT does not use the Agilent IO Library infrastructure.
You therefore cannot send SCPI commands to the instrument using that
infrastructure (e.g. with the VISA Assistant or the Interactive IO program).
However, you can send the commands “directly”. You have to send them
directly to the IP address (and a certain port number) of the PC that is
controlling the N5980A Serial BERT.
The software controlling the N5980A Serial BERT will receive the commands
and forward them to the USB interface the Serial BERT is connected to.
In other words the N5980A Serial BERT software (running on the PC that is
controlling the instrument) acts as “gateway”: it receives the commands
over the network and forwards them to the Serial BERT via the USB
interface.
As a consequence the remote programming software needs to take the SCPI
commands and send them to the IP address (and a certain port number) of
the PC that is controlling the N5980A Serial BERT.
The remote programming software will do this using Windows Sockets.
The details will be shown in the examples below and in the Sample Code in
the enclosed examples.

10 N5980A Programming Guide
3 Setting Up The Environment
Introduction This section describes step by step the setup required to programmatically
access the N5980A Serial BERT.
Controller PC
Requirements
The N5980A Serial BERT software runs on a controller PC which is
connected to the instrument using an USB link.
The PC has to meet the following requirements:
•Pentium III with > 450 MHz
•Minimum RAM: 256 MB
•20 MB of free disk space
•Operating System:
oWindows 2000 SP4
oWindows XP SP2
•Microsoft .NET 2.0 Framework
(If the .NET 2.0 Framework is not already installed, download it from
the Microsoft Download Center or alternatively execute the program
dotnetfx.exe that is included on the installation CD).