National Instruments 8330 Series Introduction

©NationalInstruments Corporation 1-1 PXI-PCI8330 Series User Manual

Introduction

This chapter describesthe PXI-PCI 8330 Series, lists what you need to

get started, and explainshow to unpack and set up your hardware. The

four products in this series are the PCI-8330, the PXI-8330, the PCI-8335,

and the PXI-8335. The PXI-PCI 8330 Series incorporates MXI-3

technology.The terms MXI-3,MXI-3 card and MXI-3 system in this

manualrefer to both the PCI MXI-3 and PXI MXI-3 cards and systems,

unless otherwise noted.

MXI-3 is a PCI master/slave system implementing the PCI-PCI bridge

registerset. It couples two physically separate buses with either a copper or

fiber-opticdata link capable of 1.5 Gbit/s serial data rates. With the MXI-3

system, you can do the following:

•Controla PXI/CompactPCI b ackplanewith either a PCI or

PXI/CompactPCI hostsystem

•Increase the availablenumber CompactPCI o r PXI slots for your

application

•Physically separatethe measurement or automationsystem from the

host PC

•CombinePCI, CompactPCI, and PXIdevices in the same system

Note YourMXI-3 card will work in any standard CompactPCI chassis adhering to the

PICMG CompactPCI 2.0 R2.1 specification.

You can use MXI-3 to control PXI-PCI devices on up to 255 buses from

any PCI-based system, provided the BIOS supports such a configuration.

You can useeither a daisy-chain or a star configuration, with maximum

bus-to-busdistances of 10 meters (copper cable) or 200 meters(fiber-optic

cable).