As i needed a programmable function generator, I’ve bought a PCGU1000, and I’m testing its capabilities and software. (PcLab2000SE V4.00 and driver 5.4.0.0, FGU_link rev4, copied FGULINK.DLL to C:\windows\system32)
I found the following so far:
Netbook with windows XP, 32 bit.
Installation was OK, and the generator works perfectly with the FGU.exe and PCLAB2000SE.exe software.
Loaded the FGUlink_Demo_VB2008_express into visual studio 2008 profesional edition, and it worked perfectly first time, with full control of the PCGU1000.
Desktop PC with WIN7, 64 bit.
Following the workaround instructions to install the driver, the installation was OK.
The generator works perfectly with the FGU.exe and PCLAB2000SE.exe software, when ‘Windows XP SP3 compatibility mode’ and ‘Run as Administrator’ are enabled.
Loaded the FGUlink_Demo_VB2008_express into visual studio 2008 profesional edition, tried to run it, and got an exception in the Timer1_Tick subroutine (BadImageFormatException). This can be solved by right-clicking the FGULink_Demo in the Solution Explorer, select ‘Properties’, select ‘Compile’ and ‘Advanced Compile Options’, and set ‘Target CPU’ to ‘x86’. Now the demo will run normally.
However, when the ‘Start PCGU1000’ button is pressed, FGU.exe will start, but the generator does not respond to commands. The demo displays a ‘Generator not ready’ ‘status -1’ error.
Is a workaround available to get the Visual Basic 2008 demo program to properly communicate with the PCGU1000 in Win 7, 64 bit?
There seems to be a simple workaround: Run the Visual Basic 2008 compiler program “As an administrator” mode.
Here just info for other users - I think you have already done this:
The following files are in the subfolder \bin in the original demo.
In the x64 environment you (may) have to copy the files to the subfolder: \bin\x86\Debug
FGU.exe
fgu1000.bit
FGULINK.dll
If you later want to run the generator from the resulting FGULink_Demo.exe in the folder \bin\x86\Debug, you may either run the FGULink_Demo.exe “As an administrator” or run it in the compatibility mode “Windows XP (SP 3)”.
Thank you for the quick response, it now works perfectly with Visual Studio running ‘as Administrator’.
I knew it had to be related to administrator rights again, but did not think of running Visual Studio itself ‘as Administrator’.
Just for info, I did not copy FGU.exe, fgu1000.bit, FGULINK.dll to the \bin\x86\Debug folder, I did copy FGU.exe and FGULINK.dll to the \windows\system32 directory.
The PCGU1000 has proved to be a great product so far, good software, simple programmability, stable output signal with very low THD, a perfect supplement to my electronics measurement equipment.
I’m glad to see you got the software working fine and you like the features and the performance of the PCGU1000 function generator!
[quote]Just for info, I did not copy FGU.exe, fgu1000.bit, FGULINK.dll to the \bin\x86\Debug folder, I did copy FGU.exe and FGULINK.dll to the \windows\system32 directory.[/quote]Indeed, this is good and recommended alternative to place the files.
BTW: There may be problems in x64 environment. The main software may not find the DLL from the system32 directory.
If problems occur, you may copy the files to SysWOW64 folder instead.
