Overview and Applications

NI 660x devices are timing and digital I/O (DIO) modules for PCI

and PXI. They offer up to eight 32-bit counter/timers and up to

32 lines of 5 V TTL/CMOS-compatible digital I/O. You can perform

a wide variety of buffered measurements or other counter/timer

tasks with NI 660x devices, including position or quadrature encoder

measurement, event counting, period measurement, pulse-width

measurement, frequency measurement, pulse generation, and pulse-

train generation.

Features

Counter/Timers

The NI 660x devices are equipped with the NI-TIO ASIC, a

National Instruments counter and digital I/O ASIC for advanced

timing and counting applications. Each NI 6602 and NI 6608 device

features two NI-TIO ASICs to provide a total of eight counter/timers.

The PCI-6601 board features one NI-TIO ASIC for a total of four

counter/timers. The counters are software-compatible with those

found on E Series multifunction DAQ devices, but NI 660x devices

offer additional capabilities.

Each counter has a gate, up/down, and source signal, which can be

controlled by external or internal signals. Each counter has one

output that can be routed externally or to other counters on the

device. 20 MHz and 100 kHz timebases are available on each device

for use with each counter/timer. In addition, an 80 MHz timebase is

available on the NI 6602 and NI 6608 devices. A hardware trigger can

be used to start multiple counters simultaneously. See Table 1 for

more information.

•Up to eight 32-bit counter/timers

• 80 MHz maximum source frequency

(125 MHz with prescalers)

•Debouncing and glitch removal

•High-stability timebase

(PXI-6608 only)

• GPS-based synchronization

(PXI-6608 only)

• NI DAQ driver simplifies

configuration and measurements

Models

•NI PCI-6601

•NI PCI-6602

• NI PXI-6602

• NI PXI-6608

Operating Systems

•Windows 2000/NT/XP

•Real-time performance

with LabVIEW (p. 134)

•Others such as Linux and Mac OS X

(page 187)

Recommended Software

• LabVIEW

• LabWindows/CVI

•Measurement Studio

Other Compatible Software

•Visual Basic

•Visual C/C++, C#

Driver Software (included)

• NI-DAQ 7

Calibration Certificate Included

See page 21.

NI 660x

32-Bit Counter/Timers

Debouncing/

Counter/

Max Source

Pulse

Buffered

Glitch

Oscillator

GPS

Family

Bus

Timers

Size

Frequency

Compatibility

Digital I/O

Generation

Operations

Removal

Stability

Synchr.

DMA

Interrupt

NI 6601

PCI

4

32 bits

5 V TTL/CMOS

Up to 32

✓✓

✓

50 ppm

–

1

3

NI 6602

PCI

8

32 bits

5 V TTL/CMOS

Up to 32

✓✓

✓

50 ppm

–

3

5

PXI

NI 6608

PXI

8

32 bits

5 V TTL/CMOS

Up to 32

✓✓

✓

75 ppb

✓

35

1

have higher throughput than interrupt transfers.

Table 1. NI 660x Products Specifications Summary (See page 393 for detailed specifications.)