LXI C Class Device Design in LAN Based ATE

Testing instruments are usually integrated into ATE (automatic testing equipment) systems. A lot of factors should be taken into account, such as size, weight, cost, speed, modularity and interoperation and so on. So the interface of the instrument device is important in design. LAN is a popular standard industry I/O. The high speed can meet the needs of ATE. It will provide a good tool to establish an automation testing system, especially distributed system. The research on establishing ATE with LAN will be hot in measurement and testing industry. LXI (LAN extensions for instrumentation) , which is a LAN-based modular instrumentation platform standard, takes advantages of VXI bus and LAN to provide users a well-defined platform. It will play an important role in next-generation LAN-based ATE. The paper discusses conventional instrument and LXI instrument. Obvious advantages of LXI instrument are given out. A LXI C class digital multimeter example is given out. The hardware and software block diagram is discussed. The LXI compatibility Web page is shown. It provides an approach to design a LAN-based instrument. At last, a conclusion is drawn that LAN-based instrument will play an important role in the next-generation automatic test system.