Support for Windows 8.1

Test for I-deas 6.5 has been validated to run with Windows 8.1. Windows 8 is not supported. Testing shows that a clean install of Windows 8.1 is preferred, upgrading from Windows 8 will require additional steps prior to installation. This validation only covers the Test application in I-deas.

Support for VTI Instruments SentinelEX

Test for I-deas now supports the SentinelEX frontend for Signal Processing. The supported hardware includes: Interfaces:

  • VTI EMX-2500
  • VTI EMX-2401 embedded controller

Modules:

  • VTI EMX-4250 16-channel 204.8 kSa/s IEPE Digitizer
  • VTI EMX-4251 8-channel 204.8 kSa/s IEPE Digitizer
  • VTI EMX-4350 4-channel 625 kSa/s IEPE Digitizer
  • VTI EMX-4380 4-channel 625 kSa/s IEPE Digitizer with charge and voltage
  • VTI EMX-1434 4-channel 192 kHz Arbitrary Waveform Source

Source Setup in Channel Spreadsheet

The Channel Spreadsheet utility has been expanded to include a dialog that you can use to set up and control source output.

 

  CTS_Sources

 

Normal Mode Tuning 2.0

The Normal Mode Tuning product has been rewritten to remove the dependency on HP VEE and to support additional front ends. The major features are:

  • Support for SentinelEX and VXI hardware from VTI Instruments.
  • Control for up to 20 sources.
  • Autoranging of channel input ranges with user specified overhead.
  • Master level control that allows you to adjust all excitation levels simultaneously. This allows investigation of effects of structural non-linearities.
  • Waveforms and mode shapes can be captured for further processing using Test for I-deas
  • Results displayed include:
    • Channel Magnitudes
    • Lissajous plot
    • Complex plane scatter plot
    • Waveform display
    • Force levels table

NMT

 

Time Capture for Step Sine Measurements

Time Capture is now allowed for Step Sine measurements. Step Sine uses a block mode so that the time data will be captured as one or more blocks at each frequency step.

Additional Enhancements

– UI improvements: allow Manage Bins in any Test for I-deas task, put the icons for “Frontend Calibration” and “Channel Spreadsheet” at the top of the icon stack. – If Exceed has been installed, it can be disabled for the Signal Processing task by setting an environmental variable TDAS_EXCEED_PATH=NONE. – Improvements were made to the VXI frontend driver to allow a larger number of channels to be used with the Firewire (IEEE 1394) controller. – The Test for I-deas tutorials have been updated to reflect the latest enhancements and utilities. You can find these in the I-deas Help under Training/Support->Tutorials->Test.

Bug Fixes

– The exponential window will remove any offset represented by the first value in each frame. This matches what is done for the impact window. – The Sampling Divider was creating incorrect frame sizes for Time Capture. – Reading dataset 55 (mode shapes) with a modal mass of zero was setting the amplitudes to zero. Set a default value of 1.0 for this case.