Version 14.0
Thank you for using NI-USRP instrument driver software. This file contains important information about NI-USRP and is organized into the following sections:
Installed Software, Documentation, and Examples
Product Security and Critical Updates
Uninstalling/Modifying NI-USRP
Automating the Installation of NI Products
How to Use NI Software with Microsoft Windows 8
NI Software Support for Microsoft Windows Vista, Windows XP, and Windows Server 2003
NI-USRP 14.0 includes the following new features:
NI-USRP 1.3 adds the following features:
NI-USRP 1.2 includes the following features:
The following hardware products are supported under Windows 8.1 (32-bit and 64-bit1 versions)/7 (32-bit and 64-bit1 versions)/Vista (32-bit and 64-bit1 versions)/XP operating systems.
1 These software versions run within the 32-bit emulation layer, Windows on Windows (WOW64), or in a native 64-bit process.
2 The NI-USRP instrument driver supports WBX, SBX, XCVR2450, LFTX, LFRX, BasicTX, and BasicRX daughterboards on this device. Other daughterboards may also be compatible, but they have not been tested.
Device-specific information about these modules is included in the NI-USRP Help.
Note For NI 292x/293x devices, use LabVIEW 2010 or later. For NI 294x/295x devices, use LabVIEW 2013 or later.
Note You must update the firmware and FPGA images on your USRP module prior to using NI-USRP 14.0. Refer to the NI USRP-29xx Getting Started Guide for more information about updating the firmware and FPGA images.
NI-USRP 14.0 supports the following operating systems:
NI recommends that you have the most recent service pack for your operating system installed.
Note You should install ADEs, such as NI LabVIEW, before installing NI-USRP. To add support for ADEs installed after installing NI-USRP, modify your NI-USRP installation or launch the NI-USRP installer again.
NI-USRP 14.0 supports the following software versions, including service packs:
| Item | Installed Location |
|---|---|
| NI-USRP | <NIDir32>\NI-USRP\ |
| NI-USRP Utilities | <NIDir32>\NI-USRP\utilities\ |
| NI-USRP Examples | <NIDir32>\LabVIEW<version>\examples\instr\niUSRP\ |
| NI-USRP Header files | <NIDir32>\Shared\ExternalCompilerSupport\C\include |
| NI-USRP Import Library files | <NIDir32>\Shared\ExternalCompilerSupport\C\lib32\msvc |
| NI-USRP DLL | <SystemDir32>\niusrp.dll |
| NI UHD DLL | <SystemDir32>\niuhd.dll |
| NI USRP-RIO DLL | <SystemDir32>\niusrprio.dll |
| NI USRP-RIO RPC | <SystemDir32>\niusrpriorpc.exe |
| NI-USRP Firmware and FPGA images | <NIDir32>\NI-USRP\images\ |
Note The NI Example Finder does not include NI-USRP examples.
| Item | Installed Location |
|---|---|
| NI-USRP | <NIDir64>\NI-USRP\ |
| NI-USRP Utilities | <NIDir64>\NI-USRP\utilities\ |
| NI-USRP Header files | <NIDir64>\Shared\ExternalCompilerSupport\C\include |
| NI-USRP DLL | <SystemDir64>\niusrp.dll |
| NI UHD DLL | <SystemDir64>\niuhd.dll |
| NI USRP-RIO DLL | <SystemDir64>\niusrprio.dll |
| NI-USRP Firmware and FPGA images | <NIDir64>\NI-USRP\images\ |
| NI-USRP Examples (LabVIEW 2014 only) | <NIDir64>\LabVIEW 2014\examples\instr\niUSRP\ |
| NI-USRP Import Library files | <NIDir64>\Shared\ExternalCompilerSupport\C\lib64\msvc |
Documentation for NI-USRP 14.0 and NI USRP devices is located at Start»Programs»National Instruments»NI-USRP»Documentation. The documentation set is composed of the following documents.
For the most recent revisions of documentation and for newly released documentation, visit ni.com/manuals.
Note To view PDFs, you need to have Adobe Acrobat Reader installed. You can install the viewer from www.adobe.com/acrobat.
To access the LabVIEW sample project from the Create Project dialog, select Sample Projects in the left pane and navigate to the Simple NI-USRP Streaming project.
NI–USRP palette VIs are available from the Functions»Instrument I/O»Instrument Drivers»NI-USRP palette.
NI-USRP includes several example applications for LabVIEW. These examples serve as interactive tools, programming models, and as building blocks in your own applications. NI-USRP includes examples for getting started and other software-defined radio (SDR) functionality. You can access the NI-USRP examples from the following locations:
You can access additional examples from the Code Sharing Community at ni.com/usrp.
Visit ni.com/security to view and subscribe to receive security notifications about National Instruments products. Visit ni.com/critical-updates for information about critical updates from National Instruments.
NI-USRP versions are now aligned with the versions of major NI application software products. This alignment gives you information about the year the driver was released and the most recent software version the driver was designed to work with. Driver versions now start with a two-digit year indicator: <ProductName><Year-BasedVersion>. For example, NI-USRP 14.0.0 is the version released with LabVIEW 2014. The last version released under the old numbering scheme is NI-USRP 1.3. The first version released under the new numbering scheme is NI-USRP 14.0.0.
For Windows XP, complete the following steps:
For Windows 7/Vista, complete the following steps:
For Windows 8.1, complete the following steps:
As part of the NI-USRP 14.0 installation, the following software is installed. To completely remove the NI-USRP 14.0 installation from your system, you must also remove all of the following packages:
Caution Several of the software packages listed above are shared with other NI software packages. If you attempt to remove a piece of software that something else is dependent on, a message launches to warn you about the software dependencies. You can choose to either uninstall all of the software or to leave the shared software installed. If you choose to uninstall the shared software, some of your other NI software may no longer function correctly.
Note Do not attempt to uninstall by manually deleting files.
NI 294x/295x devices support both 1G Ethernet and 10G Ethernet using the connectors on the device back panel. With the default FPGA image, port 0 is designated for 1G, and port 1 is designated for 10G.
You can access the software and documentation known issues list online. Refer to the NI-USRP 14.0 Known Issues at ni.com for an up-to-date list of known issues in NI-USRP 14.0.
The following items are changes in NI-USRP 14.0 from NI-USRP 1.3.
| ID | Fixed Issue |
|---|---|
| 488044 | Fixed an issue that caused clocks derived from the Data Clock to result in invalid data due to the Data Clock changing rate. Refer to KB ID 6OBBPOR4 on ni.com. |
| 484898 | Fixed an issue that caused incorrect reference level settings when you configure the Rx reference level on NI 294x/295x devices. |
| 465859 | Fixed an issue that caused errors when you configure two sessions in LabVIEW to the same device in parallel fashion. |
The following items are changes in NI-USRP 1.3 from NI-USRP 1.2.
| ID | Fixed Issue |
|---|---|
| 460052 | Fixed an issue that caused the local oscillator to fail to lock when two devices connected by the MIMO connector transmit synchronously while one device also receives. |
The following items are changes in NI-USRP 1.2 from NI-USRP 1.1.
| ID | Fixed Issue |
|---|---|
| 376069 | Fixed an issue that caused the Number of Samples is Finite property to always return a "FALSE" value regardless of whether the task was set as finite or continuous. |
| 370383 | Fixed an issue that caused a multi-device session to fail. To work around this issue, remove any trailing semicolons in lists of devices. For example, use "192.168.10.2; 192.168.10.3" instead of "192.168.10.2; 192.168.10.3;". |
| 362726 | Fixed an issue that caused LabVIEW to crash after configuring the number of samples in niUSRP EX Rx Continuous Async.vi. |
You can automate the installation of most NI products using command-line arguments to suppress some or all of the installer user interface and dialog boxes. However, starting with the August 2012 releases (products using NI Installers version 3.1 or later), you may need to perform additional steps before or during a silent installation of NI software.
If the NI product you are installing uses Microsoft .NET 4.0, the .NET installer may run before any NI software installs and may require a reboot before the installation of NI software begins. To avoid a .NET reboot, install .NET 4.0 separately before you install NI software.
For more information about automating the installation of NI products, refer to the following KnowledgeBase articles:
When you install National Instruments software on Microsoft Windows 8.x, you will notice a few additional tiles in the Apps view, including shortcuts to NI application software products such as NI LabVIEW, Measurement & Automation Explorer (NI MAX), and NI Launcher.
NI Launcher helps you find and launch installed NI products. It provides you with a method of finding NI products similar to the Start menu in previous versions of Microsoft Windows. To use NI Launcher, click the NI Launcher tile in the Apps view. NI Launcher launches the desktop and opens a menu containing a list of NI products. Click any NI product to launch it.
| Note NI MAX does not appear as a desktop shortcut when installed on Microsoft Windows 8.x. You can launch NI MAX either from the Apps view or from within NI Launcher. |
For convenience, you can pin your most-used NI applications, such as MAX, to either the Start screen or the Taskbar on the desktop, as necessary.
| Current Application | Icon Location | Pin to Action |
| Windows 8.x Desktop | Desktop Taskbar | Right-click application and select Pin to Taskbar |
| Windows 8.x Desktop | Start screen | Right-click application and select Pin to Start |
| Windows 8.x Start screen | Desktop Taskbar | Right-click application and select Pin to taskbar from the menu bar on the bottom of the screen |
If you want to find a particular application or related files, such as documentation files, from the Start screen, you can access all installed files from the Apps view. To get to the Apps view, right-click anywhere on the Start screen and select All apps (Windows 8) or click the down arrow on the bottom left of the screen (Windows 8.1).
For more information about NI support for Windows 8.x, visit ni.com/windows8.
National Instruments NI-USRP will drop support for Microsoft Windows Vista, and Windows XP as of July 1, 2016. Versions of NI-USRP that ship after July 1, 2016 will not install or run on Windows Vista, or Windows XP. For detailed information about NI application software product life cycles, visit ni.com/info and enter one of the following Info Codes:
| Product | Info Code |
| NI LabVIEW | lifecycle |
| NI LabWindows™/CVI™ | cvi_lifecycle |
| NI Measurement Studio | mstudiolifecycle |
| NI TestStand | tslcp |
| NI DIAdem | ddlcp |
| NI SignalExpress | selcp |
| NI VeriStand | nivslifecycle |
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Patents
For patents covering the National Instruments products/technology, refer to the appropriate location: Help»Patents in your software, the patents.txt file on your media, or the National Instruments Patent Notice at ni.com/patents.
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