April 2023
This file contains installation instructions and compatibility information for NI-VISA 2023 Q2.
You can find more release information on ni.com.
Product Security and Critical Updates
Automating the Installation of NI Products
Using NI Software with Microsoft Windows 11
Using NI Software with Microsoft Windows 10
Unsupported Windows Operating Systems
NI no longer supports Phar Lap ETS Real-Time Operating System
NI-VISA is the NI implementation of the Virtual Instrument Software Architecture (VISA), a standard for configuring, programming, and troubleshooting instrumentation systems comprising GPIB, VXI, PXI, Serial, Ethernet, and/or USB interfaces.
NI-VISA 2023 Q2 supports the following operating systems:
While this distribution targets all of these platforms, you can run setup.exe only on the Windows variants.
Visit NI Hardware and Software Operating System Compatibility and NI-VISA Features and OS Compatibility pages to view supported operating systems for different releases and feature support for various operating systems.
NI-VISA 2023 Q2 supports the following application software versions, including service packs. If you are not using NI application software, refer to Microsoft Visual Studio Support.
Application Software | Versions Supported by NI-VISA 2023 Q2 |
---|---|
LabVIEW | 2020 SP1 and later |
LabWindows™/CVI™ | 2019 and later |
Measurement Studio | 2019 and later |
This product no longer supports LabVIEW NXG. Refer to LabVIEW NXG on ni.com for more information about LabVIEW NXG Life-Cycle Dates and driver version support.
If you are using the IVI-compliant NI-VISA .NET Class Library, the .NET 4.6.2 Framework (minimum) is required. You can use the NI-VISA .NET Class Library with the Visual C# or Visual Basic .NET programming languages in any Visual Studio version that can target the .NET 4.0 Framework or later. You can use the NI-VISA .NET Class Library in 32-bit or 64-bit applications.
To use the .NET API, you must install the .NET class libraries or the .NET wrapper in addition to the NI device driver. For information about versions of the .NET Framework and the drivers each supports, as well as the download location of the installer files, refer to .NET Resources for NI Hardware and Software.
Note: The Measurement Studio VisaNS .NET Class Library is being deprecated and superseded by an IVI-compliant NI-VISA .NET Class Library.
Download the NI-VISA installer from ni.com/downloads. NI software includes NI Package Manager to handle the installation. Refer to the NI Package Manager Documentation for more information about installing, removing, and upgrading NI software using Package Manager.
If Windows Update is enabled, the installation process might hang if Windows Update interferes with the installation of Microsoft Visual C++ 2015 Run-Time. Visit ni.com/r/exjq43 for more information and steps to resolve this issue.
Before you install NI-VISA 2023 Q2, NI recommends that you uninstall any versions of VISA prior to NI-VISA 2.0.1.
Note: The NI-VISA installer does not notify that a reboot is required on NI Linux® Real-Time targets. After installation, the NI Linux® Real-Time target must be restarted for the NI-VISA Server to start.
After uninstalling NI-VISA, some DLLs and executables may remain in the NI-VISA directories. To complete the uninstall process, you must restart your machine.
Note: The uninstaller application does not notify you when rebooting is necessary. If you plan to reinstall NI-VISA, you always should reboot the machine after running the uninstaller.
The "NI-VISA Support for LabVIEW" package supports applications using NI-VISA with LabVIEW 2022 or later. When installing NI-VISA, this package will be recommended if you have already installed LabVIEW 2022 or later and installs to the LVAddons directory.
LVAddons directory location: C:\Program Files\NI\LVAddons
NI-VISA now works with Agilent/HP GPIB and VXI controller cards. To use this feature, go into MAX, select Tools»NI-VISA»VISA Options, choose the Passports tab, and enable the NiVisaTulip.dll Passport. NI-VISA automatically finds and accesses any GPIB or VXI devices. However, NI-VISA does not configure the Agilent/HP hardware; you still must do that with the Agilent/HP I/O Config utility.
If you have both NI and Agilent/HP controllers in the same system, you must configure the cards at different system addresses, such as GPIB0 and GPIB1. If both vendors try to use the same interface address, NI-VISA reports an error from viFindRsrc or VISA Find Resources.
(Windows 10 or higher) If you generate an INF file using the NI-VISA Driver Wizard, you must create and digitally sign a Windows Catalog (.cat) file before you can install the INF file on a Windows 10 (or higher) machine. For more information about digitally signing a .cat file for Windows 10 (or higher), visit ni.com/r/infwin8.
For more information about creating and signing catalog files, please refer to Creating a Catalog File for Test-Signing a Driver Package.
Visit ni.com/security to view and subscribe to receive security notifications about NI products. For information about critical updates from NI, refer to Available Critical and Security Updates for NI Software.
Refer to the NI-VISA documentation, accessible from LabVIEW by selecting Help>>LabVIEW Help, for information about the NI-VISA.
Select Help»Find Examples from LabVIEW to launch the NI Example Finder. LabVIEW examples for NI-VISA are located in the labview\examples\Instrument IO\VISA directory. You can modify an example VI to fit an application, or you can copy and paste from one or more examples into a VI that you create.
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.
If the NI product you are installing uses Microsoft .NET 4.6.2, 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 4.6.2 separately before you install NI software.
For more information about automating the installation of NI products, refer to Automating an Installer in the NI Package Manager documentation.
Microsoft Windows 11 is the latest version of the Windows operating system and features significant changes compared to previous versions. For more information about NI support for Windows 11, refer to NI Product Compatibility for Microsoft Windows 11.
For more information about NI support for Windows 10, refer to NI Product Compatibility for Microsoft Windows 10.
NI-VISA no longer supports Windows Vista/XP/7/8.x, Windows Server 2003/2008/2012, or any 32-bit Windows operating system. Versions of this product that ship after May 1, 2021, may not install or execute correctly on these operating systems. For detailed information about NI operating system support, visit https://www.ni.com/r/win32bitsupport.
NI Software no longer supports Phar Lap ETS Real-Time Operating System. Versions of this product that ship after May 1, 2022, may not install or execute correctly on this operating system. For high-level information on the support roadmap for Phar Lap and its replacement, NI Linux Real-Time, visit ni.com/r/xf35k1. To find out what hardware is supported on PXI controllers running NI Linux Real-Time, visit ni.com/r/b7g5wi.