Flood of new Agilent 82357B GPIB-USB adaptors on eBay the real deal?

[EHT]

Hi everyone. I have just got a 82357B from eBay. I chose one which was "used" thinking there may be greater chance that it is genuine, although it did come from China. It looks used and doesn't have any of the counterfeit trimmings pretending to be new. However, I can't get it to work properly so would be grateful for any advice; I want to work out quickly if i should return it.

I am using the latest Keysight software. I am trying to control an HP 3457A DMM. So far I can send commands to the 3457A but all reads timeout. I am trying this through the "Interactive IO" tool in Connection Expert 2018.

I realise the DMM doesnt support "*IDN?" so have turned off auto discovery. I have manually added an entry in Connection Expert with the correct GPIB address. Connection Expert says the instrument is connected. I gather this may be to do with getting the instrument configured as Listener and Talker but i can't find any relevant configuration either in CE or on the DMM...

Here is the detail:

• Keysight IO Libraries Version: 18.1.23218.2
• Windows Server 2016 & Windows 10 (2 PCs tried)
• Adapter appears in Device Manager with no errors
• LEDs on the adaptor cycle through expected pattern according to the manual
• Commands such as "ACV 10" are received by the DMM and I can see it changing range on the LCD.
• "ID?", "*ID?", "CALNUM?", "ERR?" just time out (not sure if i need the asterisk).
• The error shown in CE Reading is a timeout: Error VISA:viRead timeout
• The Status Byte is 0x38
• "REM" (remote) indicator on the DMM does come on after sending commands
• "ERR" indicator on the DMM comes on after trying some commands involving a read. e.g. "ERR?" causes the DMM to set the ERR flag and stop displaying readings on the LCD
• Tried using GPIB addresses 22 and 15. Same results

Thanks in advance.

[Jwalling]

How about "*IDN?"

[PA0PBZ]

[Jwalling]

Oops. 

[egonotto]

Hello,

perhaps Interactive IO does not detect the end of a read.
Can you see the read data?
Try to enable EOI (look Command Reference 4-51)

Search in google
ni-visa programmer reference manual
NI-VISA User Manual

There are much explained.

There exists sample programs from National Instruments.

perhaps this helps somewhat.

Best regards
egonotto

[Jwalling]

Termination should be with <CR><LF> or ;

[Nx-1997]

For HP 3457A. Install NI-VISA 18.0. Then, install python 3.7 as well as PyVISA. Then copy example code from hp 3457a.txt file into python and run it.

NI-VISA 18.0
http://www.ni.com/download/ni-visa-18.0/7597/en/

Make sure in the visa conflict manager change settings according to my screenshots.

[EHT]

Thanks everyone. I will try installing NI-Visa & connecting from PyVisa and report back. I had tried the various combinations of CR / LF in Connection Expert to no avail.

I thought that using the Keysight plain installation was going to be most likely to work given HP Adaptor & HP DMM! 

Ultimately i do indeed want to use the DMM for data logging in Python so this will be useful to setup anyway. Right now i just need to verify if the Adaptor needs to be returned.

Regards

[Nx-1997]

For those that didn't know, Tektronix Wavestar software works fine with the 82357B adapter on Windows 10. In my opinion, this is the best free software for controlling/getting measurement data from legacy Tek scopes, especially if you have a TDS 500/600/700 series scope. Installing it is tricky, you can't run NI-VISA and TEkVISA at the same time.

More info
https://www.tek.com/datasheet/wstro

Download
https://www.tek.com/oscilloscope/tds510a-software/wavestar-oscilloscopes

[bitseeker]

Hi everyone. I have just got a 82357B from eBay. I chose one which was "used" thinking there may be greater chance that it is genuine, although it did come from China. It looks used and doesn't have any of the counterfeit trimmings pretending to be new. However, I can't get it to work properly so would be grateful for any advice; I want to work out quickly if i should return it.

Whether or not to return it depends on (1) if it works (of course) and (2) if you mind having a "fake" one. Depending on what you're doing with it, the lookalike ones may work just fine as reported by others who have them.

Does yours have the coating on the inside surface of the shell for shielding? If you don't want to open it, you can see some of the coating if you look inside the opening where the thumbscrews protrude. There are photos earlier in this thread for reference. If yours isn't shielded, there is a high probability that it's not genuine. At least I haven't heard of anyone adding paint to the inside to fake that, yet.

[EHT]

OK, i have some progress which either may indicate the problem or my failure to follow the instructions correctly...

I've upgraded Python to version 3.7 (64 bit) and installed pyvisa and the NI VISA distribution.

I have the following problems:

• From Python (see attached debug info) or from NI's 'Measurement & Automation Explorer' tool only COM1, COM2 serial ports are listed not the USB 82357B
• rm.open_resource method throws pyvisa.errors.VisaIOError: VI_ERROR_LIBRARY_NFOUND (-1073807202): A code library required by VISA could not be located or loaded. Presumably due to installation order / setup of NI and NI VISA. Will continue to look at this.

I've added some debug to the py script - see attached text file. This shows the detail of the two errors above. It is weird that it says the visa32.dll is 64-bit but anyway, i am trying to run it all 64-bit.

To Bitseeker's points:
Yes, at present I'm not trying to determine if it is fake or not, just if it works. If it may be fake but works fine i wouldn't bother returning it (it seems so hard to find and verify a genuine one anyway..). I can't see the shielding protruding but am not intending to take it apart (well, ironically, unless it works!).

[bitseeker]

Yep, if it does what you need, it's good enough. I haven't done any GPIB via Python, so I'm unsure what might be going wrong there.

As for the Visa error, double check that you don't have different manufacturers' Visa packages installed at the same time. Although some can be made to coexist, it's easier not to deal with that headache for testing basic functionality of your GPIB adapter.

[EHT]

Thanks. I did not uninstall the Keysight VISA libraries and tools, although when NI installed it did warn it replaced the dll in Windows/System32 folder. I will try uninstalling all the Keysight packages and attempt to get the NI tools to connect.

At present the 82357B adaptor appears in the windows Device Manager as a GPIB adaptor (not a USB device) and appears healthy there, with the Keysight driver but the NI software doesn't see it.

Thanks for the help!

[egonotto]

Hello,

perhaps I can write you a little test program with VC6

Then I need some data:

for:
status = viOpen (defaultRM,  "GPIB0::2::INSTR", VI_NULL, VI_NULL, &instr);
Is this ok for you?
And which commands need you to send to your DMM?

My driver is agt357run.sys  Version 81.1.20011.4 from Keysight

Best regards
egonotto

[orin]

Thanks. I did not uninstall the Keysight VISA libraries and tools, although when NI installed it did warn it replaced the dll in Windows/System32 folder. I will try uninstalling all the Keysight packages and attempt to get the NI tools to connect.

At present the 82357B adaptor appears in the windows Device Manager as a GPIB adaptor (not a USB device) and appears healthy there, with the Keysight driver but the NI software doesn't see it.

Thanks for the help!

Keysight and NI will coexist and you do need the Keysight drivers installed to run the 82357B.

You do have to enable the NI-Visa Passport for "Tulip" for NI to see devices via the Keysight drivers - this may help:

https://knowledge.ni.com/KnowledgeArticleDetails?id=kA00Z000000P9t6SAC

At that point, it was 32bit only...  so you might have to install a 32bit version of Python.

It will work and I have done it.  I've even managed to make it work remotely over ethernet.  The important steps are:

Install Keysight libraries first.
Install NI VISA.
Enable Tulip Passport.

[EHT]

Thanks for the help Orin & Egonotto.

Keysight and NI will coexist and you do need the Keysight drivers installed to run the 82357B.

Great - thanks for the clarification.

Install Keysight libraries first.
Install NI VISA.
Enable Tulip Passport.

Install Keysight libraries first - Done
Install NI VISA - Done although as i mentioned it is weird that the 32 bit Visa dll is reported as being 64 bit.
Enable Tulip Passport - I hadn't heard of this will check. I'll try this first rather than uninstalling the Keysight software.

status = viOpen (defaultRM,  "GPIB0::2::INSTR", VI_NULL, VI_NULL, &instr);
...
My driver is agt357run.sys  Version 81.1.20011.4 from Keysight

Thanks for this Egnotto. At present i'm sure that viOpen() would throw due to either Visa library conflict or not being able to see the USB device.

[orin]

Install Keysight libraries first.
Install NI VISA.
Enable Tulip Passport.

Install Keysight libraries first - Done
Install NI VISA - Done although as i mentioned it is weird that the 32 bit Visa dll is reported as being 64 bit.
Enable Tulip Passport - I hadn't heard of this will check. I'll try this first rather than uninstalling the Keysight software.

Which visa32.dll is being reported as 64bit?  On a 64bit system, if it's in C:\Windows\System32, it should be 64bit!  The 32bit version, if any, should be in C:\Windows\SysWOW64.

One might consider this directory naming not to make sense... I assume it was to minimize the changes required to port an app from 32 to 64 bits - you don't have to change hard coded OS paths, but it makes an awful mess for running 32 bit apps on a 64bit system.

[EHT]

Which visa32.dll is being reported as 64bit?  On a 64bit system, if it's in C:\Windows\System32, it should be 64bit! 

I meant by the Visa get_debug_info() which was in the file attached above:

      Version: 1.9.0 (bundled with PyVISA)
      #1: C:\Windows\system32\visa32.dll:
         found by: auto
         bitness: 64
         Vendor: National Instruments
         Impl. Version: 18874368
         Spec. Version: 5244928
      #2: C:\Windows\system32\visa64.dll:
         found by: auto
         bitness: 64
         Vendor: National Instruments
         Impl. Version: 18874368
         Spec. Version: 5244928


Anyway - i think I've fixed it now! Now it shows this:

      Version: 1.9.0 (bundled with PyVISA)
      #1: C:\Windows\system32\visa32.dll:
         found by: auto
         bitness: 32
         Vendor: National Instruments
         Impl. Version: 18874368
         Spec. Version: 5244928

[EHT]

Thanks to all. I have it working now! 

Here is what I changed:

• Installed Python 3.7 32-bit. As expected this removed the error about failing to load dependent libraries
• Enabled "Tulip" in NI passport settings as described here: https://knowledge.ni.com/KnowledgeArticleDetails?id=kA00Z000000P9t6SAC
• Enabled "Enable Keysight GPIB cards for 488 programs" setting in Keysight CE as described here https://knowledge.ni.com/KnowledgeArticleDetails?id=kA00Z0000019L2jSAE
• Ensured the 3457A was on. I know it sounds stupid, but the Keysight CE was showing the USB adaptor whether or not the instrument was on. rm.list_resources() does not show an entry for the adaptor, but for the GPIB instrument.

The py script from Nx-1997 is working; it returns "HP3457A" from "ID?" and then it is returning voltage readings 

I haven't tried looking at the NI or Keysight GUIs again yet.

When I have time, I will extend this to cover the Rear Panel inputs. I have the HP44491 Multiplexer in it, which can only be used via GPIB.

[bitseeker]

Glad to see you got it working. Thanks for documenting your setup. I'm sure others will find it helpful as well.

[Joel_l]

Now I'm looking for  one of these interfaces. One of the ads I saw came with Functional Test Ceryficate. Now I suppose it's possible that some Agilent division missed the spelling errors, but more makes me question if they are genuine. But then there's the notion of, if they work, do I care.

Anyone get a confirmed counterfeit?

[HighVoltage]

Anyone get a confirmed counterfeit?

It looks like you did not read the full thread.

Yes, lots of us had a counterfeit 82357B.
I had one as well and it worked without problems.
But since I only wanted to have genuine adapters, I sold my counterfeit 82357B and the buyer was also happy.

However, there have been reports of none working 82357B counterfeits

[EHT]

I'll probably take mine apart and check the various signs out of interest but I'm afraid it won't help anyone else as it was a one-off listing. I chose one which looked like it was used, and in my thinking, perhaps original.  I paid more than the usual price of the dodgy listings. Any of them marketed as new (and cheap) must definitely be counterfeit.

[Joel_l]

You are right, I didn't, I read a handful. Now that I have looked at more, some of these are pretty bad. I think I will just buy something that's not trying to pretend it's Agilent.

Anyone get a confirmed counterfeit?

It looks like you did not read the full thread.

Yes, lots of us had a counterfeit 82357B.
I had one as well and it worked without problems.
But since I only wanted to have genuine adapters, I sold my counterfeit 82357B and the buyer was also happy.

However, there have been reports of none working 82357B counterfeits

[orin]

You are right, I didn't, I read a handful. Now that I have looked at more, some of these are pretty bad. I think I will just buy something that's not trying to pretend it's Agilent.

Anyone get a confirmed counterfeit?

It looks like you did not read the full thread.

Yes, lots of us had a counterfeit 82357B.
I had one as well and it worked without problems.
But since I only wanted to have genuine adapters, I sold my counterfeit 82357B and the buyer was also happy.

However, there have been reports of none working 82357B counterfeits

I'd trust those generic non-brand knockoffs even less.  I tried one and it did not work properly.  As I recall, it would not trigger the instrument.  It was last seen in a drawer in my office.  It's unlikely to come out again.