Sensor Control User Guide Version 2.6 Software for spectral sensors and devices User Guide Page 1
Disclaimer of Warranties IMPORTANT: Sensors, software, documentation, and other products offered by Spectral Engines Oy, hereinafter referred to as the Products, are not designed to be fault-tolerant and therefore they are not intended to be used for the purposes of life-critical or hazardous environments that require fail-safe performance. To the maximum extent permitted by law, Spectral Engines Oy disclaims any and all warranties, whether expressed or implied, including without limitation any implied warranties of title, merchantability, or fitness for any particular purpose, regarding the Products. Without limiting the foregoing, Spectral Engines Oy expressly does not warrant that: the Products will meet your requirements or expectations; the Products will be free of bugs, errors, viruses, or other defects; any results, output, or data provided through or generated by the Products will be accurate, up-to-date, complete, or reliable; the Products will be compatible with any third party software or products; or any errors in the Products will be corrected. To the maximum extent permitted by law, neither Spectral Engines Oy nor its suppliers will be liable for any damage or losses relating to the use of the Products, including without limitation direct, indirect, special, consequential, punitive or incidental damages, or losses of revenue, profit, or data. In any case the maximum liability of Spectral Engines Oy will be equal to the purchase price of the Products. If you have duly acquired a license to software, you shall have a limited, non-exclusive right to install the software and operate the software but solely in connection with the Products according to relevant specifications and user guides. Save for your limited license, title and all intellectual property rights to the Products belong exclusively to Spectral Engines Oy and its suppliers. Your limited license to the software will be governed by the substantive laws of Finland. This user guide is subject to revision without notice. 2015 Spectral Engines Oy. All rights reserved. User Guide Page 2
Welcome to Spectral Engines Sensor Control. This guide instructs you on how to set up your new sensor and use its key features. Spectral Engines offers different types of spectral sensors: N- and M-series. N-series sensors operate at near-infrared (NIR) spectral region, with sensor-specific ranges set between 1350 and 2150 nm. The M-series sensors operate at the Mid-infrared spectral region, where the Spectral Engines sensors operate from 3000 nm upwards. The NR spectral devices and NM type spectral modules are also available for the NIR spectral region. The NR-W devices have their own User Guide. The sensors are fully powered through the USB cable. For earlier versions of some Application Development Kits (ADKs) a separate power supply is needed for the LS-PRO light source. Picture: differences between the N-sensors, NR-devices, NR-W Wireless devices, and NM spectral modules. Before starting please check that you have the following accessories on hand: A suitable measurement PC, which has a compatible operating system, such as Windows Vista, Windows 7, Windows 8, and Windows 10. A USB cable, for connecting the sensor to the computer. In the case of N-, NR-, and M- series sensors and devices, the type is Type A Mini-B. In the case of NM Evaluation Kits and NR-W devices, the type is Micro B. Spectral Engines Sensor Control software installation package. Separate software packages are available for 32- and 64-bit versions of Windows. You may find the software either on a USB Flash drive supplied or you can download the software from Download section on the Spectral Engines website at www.spectralengines.com/downloads 1. Installation Do not connect the sensor to the computer before the Spectral Engines Sensor Control software has been installed. User Guide Page 3
To begin using your new sensor, you first need to install the Sensor Control software. The installation package contains the necessary USB drivers for the sensors, and the drivers will be found in the Sensor Control installation folder. NB: the ZIP file must be unzipped into a file folder. In latest versions of Windows it is possible to simply navigate into the ZIP file and attempt the installation from there. In most cases this will generate errors and you will not be able to finish the installation. 1.1 Software and Drivers Installation Run setup.exe in Spectral Engines Control Software root folder and follow the instructions. This will install the Sensor Control Software, drivers and documents. The default folder is C:\Program Files\Spectral Engines\. After the software installation has finished, the USB drivers must be installed. 1.2 USB Driver Installation Connect the sensor to the computer with the USB cable. The system automatically prompts you to search for the needed drivers. If not, a manual installation can be done in Device Manager in Windows Control Panel. An unidentified LPC device should be listed under Other devices category. Right-click on this item and select Update Device driver. Picture: In the Windows Device Manager, an unidentified LPC device can be found under Other devices category once the sensor has been connected to the system, but before the USB driver has been installed. User Guide Page 4
In the pop-up window, select Browse my computer for driver software. Then go to the Sensor Control Software installation folder and select the USB driver subfolder. Default path is C:\Program Files\Spectral Engines\USB Driver. Then click Next. After the driver installation is complete, the sensor will show up in Windows Device Manager under Ports (COM & LPT), with item name as LPC13xx USB VCom Port. During the installation, the Windows Security will possible notify that it cannot verify the publisher of the software. Ignore this alert by selecting Install this driver software anyway to continue installation. When Windows has successfully finished installation of the driver software, you are ready to use the software. NB: if you are using Windows 8 operating system, please see installation help in the Troubleshooting section at the end of this manual (p. 15). 2. Getting started After the Sensor Control software and USB drivers have been properly installed, you are ready to begin using your new sensor. Start the Sensor Control software by clicking on the shortcut in Windows Start-up à Spectral Engines à SensorControl. The software will automatically detect and set up the device with default settings, and will start to measure spectra. Suggested basic operation of the system: 1. Set the measurement settings: Wavelength points Averaging Mode (Averaging/Buffering) Averaging parameter. Recommendation is to use values between 100 and 500 at least. 2. Measure a dark signal: block all light from reaching the sensor. Then press the Dark button on the main screen to measure the dark signal spectrum. An alternative with certain products you may use the Auto Lamp Mode with Dark Subtraction and skip this phase. 3. Measure a reference signal. Turn on your light source. Press Reference button on the main screen to measure the reference spectrum. The raw signal should be less than 65000 DN units on all measured wavelength. 4. You can now measure and save sample spectra. User Guide Page 5
3. Sensor Control layout and functions Your new sensor is fully controlled by the Spectral Engines Sensor Control software. When the program is started, it will start measuring new spectra automatically. Basic functionalities include measuring dark level signal and/or reference signal levels, setting measurement parameters, saving measurement raw spectra, and selecting how to display the measured spectra on screen. Above: screenshots of the main view screens for N-series sensors and NM-series modules, respectively. Both display the Measurement tab. In the NM-series, the User Guide Page 6
The software view is divided into four view sections. Main view section and its functions are on screen all the time. Alongside the main view, a switchable subview will be visible at the center of the program screen. The three subviews are the Measurement, Settings and Analysis. Each of these subviews are on separate tabs. Depending on whether you are using an N-series or M-series sensor, some of the options in the software will not be accessible or relevant for you, and have been disabled. 3.1 Main view Main view and its components are related to basic measurement commands and status of the device. The Measure, Dark, Reference, Save and Exit buttons are on the top right part of the screen. Measure starts and stops the measurement mode. When measurement mode is active, the button color is dark grey. When mode is deactivated, color changes to white. Dark (only available for N-series) is the dark signal levels measurement button. The dark signal should be measured at the start of a new set of measurements, with the light source off. After a dark signal has been measured, the color of this button changes from white to green. Clicking on the button again after the dark signal has been measured forces the software to unload the value, so that a new dark signal can be measured Reference is the background or full signal level spectrum, which should be measured at the start of a new set of measurements, with the light source turned on. Clicking on the button again after the reference signal has been measured forces the software to unload the value, so that a new dark signal can be measured Save button starts and ceases a save cycle. The save cycle settings are under the Settings tab. When save mode is activated, the button turns from white to dark grey. Display mode dropdown menu at the lower left corner allows you to change the type of the displayed spectrum when Dark and Reference signals have been saved. Exit button ends the measurement and closes the Sensor Control program. Using the Exit button instead of the X button will save the device settings and also shuts down the device correctly. The buttons will have varying coloration depending on the status of the function: User Guide Page 7
Translucent: deactivated. This happens in the case of Auto Lamp mode with Dark Subtraction being enabled. More about this in Section 3.3 Settings Screen. White: inactive. The function is not in use, or signal has not been measured. If a dark/reference was measured previously, it has been released from memory. Grey: function is active, or signal is being measured at the moment. Green: signal has been measured successfully and saved to memory. On the upper right corner, below Sensor Control text, will be the general type identifier of the sensor in use. This will be automatically identified when the sensor has been found the software. More specific sensor identification data is found on the Settings tab. Finally, on the bottom part of the screen is the Status bar. This will display general status messages of the sensor, and possible operation errors. During sensor start-up, this part will display status of the automatic device search and setup. 3.2 Measurement screen The Measurement tab has a visual display of the latest measured spectrum, with user-selectable display value range, and fully configurable visual display options. The spectral Averaging mode and Averaging value are also displayed and changeable on this page. The lamp voltage control for Spectral Engines tungsten filament type light sources is also on this page, in the bottom left corner. The components visible on the measurement screen: The Status signals for System Status, Save Mode, and Measurement mode are visible on the middle right side of the screen. System Status light Unlit: a sensor has not been detected by the software. Lit: sensor has been detected is ready for operation. Save mode status light Disabled: sample saving is not active. Unlit: save cycle is active, waiting for next save timepoint in the cycle. Lit: a sample spectrum is being saved. Measurement mode status light Disabled: measuring mode has been disabled. Unlit: measuring mode active, sending latest measurement data, readying for next measurement. Lit: measuring mode active, measuring new data. Visual display of the latest measured spectrum. User Guide Page 8
X-axis values are by default different wavelengths, scaled automatically according to the sensor specification. Y-axis values are user-selectable with the Display Mode selector on the bottom left corner. Three default options are: Raw intensity signal value, which has a scale of 0 65535. Transmission/reflectance value (% units). Absorbance units, where absorbance A = -log 10(Reflectance). Changing the display mode during measurements will force next completed measurement to be displayed with the new display setting. The display settings can be modified through buttons on the bottom right corner of spectrum display. NB(1): right-clicking on the Y- or X-axis will show a menu, where it is possible to enable or disable the autoscaling for the axis in question. NB(2): the Display Mode selector is only available for selection if the Dark and/or Reference values have been measured (lit green). Otherwise only the Raw Intensity option will be available. The Measurement tab also contains the selectors for Integration time, Averaging value, and Averaging mode. Integration time (N-series only) per wavelength point in milliseconds (ms), for N-series sensors only. This parameter sets the general signal level. Minimum and maximum values are 0.1 and 100 ms, respectively. For example, if you measure 10 wavelength points with an integration time of 5 ms, then total integration time is 50 ms. The Averaging mode selector has two different settings: Buffering and Averaging. Buffering setting is a moving average calculation based on the latest measured single spectra. In this mode, the Averaging value sets the number of spectra that will be saved and used in the moving average calculation. So with a value of 500, 500 single spectra will be saved and used in the average calculation. The green light indicator next to the Averaging value will signal when the entire register is full of values for the calculation. Averaging setting tells the amount of measuring samples taken for every wavelength point. The displayed result will be updated once the averaging is completed. This mean value calculation is done in the sensor hardware. Minimum and maximum values are 1 and 10 000, respectively. For the NM-series, the following parameters will be visible instead of the Integration time and Averaging setting. Point Average setting tells the amount of measurement samples taken for every wavelength point. The displayed result will be updated once the averaging is completed. This mean value calculation is done in the sensor hardware. Minimum and maximum values are 1 and 10 000, respectively. Scan Average is the number of individual full spectra that will be used to calculate an average spectrum. The spectra will only be updated once all of the individual spectra have been measured. Minimum and maximum values are 1 and 1 000, respectively. User Guide Page 9
The Measurement time box will display the time needed for a measurement in seconds, but only in the cases where the Averaging mode is set to Averaging. On the middle bottom part of the Measurement screen are the Freeze buttons and the Scale button and wavelength selector. The main Freeze button is used to activate and deactivate the Freeze 1, 2 and 3 buttons. When the main function is active, pushing these three buttons will save the next measured spectrum into temporary memory, and the spectrum will be frozen on the screen. The individual spectra can be released by pressing the button again. Releasing the main Freeze button will release all the Freeze buttons at once. The Scaling function is used to scale the frozen and latest measured spectra on the screen. Pressing the button activates and deactivates the scaling to the set value. The Lamp Voltage control will allow you to set the voltage level of the Spectral Engines tungsten filament light sources. This applies to devices with integrated light sources. When the spectral device is first detected, this feature will be enabled. Clicking on the lamp voltage setting will reveal a dropdown menu, with settings for lamp voltage between 0 and 100 %, in 10 % increments. The new setting will be applied upon selection. The latest setting used for the spectral device will be saved in the Settings.ini file upon exiting the software via the Exit Button. 3.3 Settings screen On the Settings tab, the settings for spectral measurement points and saving data are displayed and configurable. The port settings for the sensor are on this tab, as are the sensor-specific identification data. Also, if a software error is encountered, a Clear Error button will be shown on this screen. Above: general view of the software with Settings tab open. The connected device is an NM2.2 spectral module evaluation kit. User Guide Page 10
Measurement settings subwindow contains the settings for the spectrum measurements. Two standard modes are offered: Full spectrum measures data points from the entire wavelength range of the sensor. By default the first and last wavelengths are the minimum and maximum wavelengths of the sensor. The step or separation of each consecutive spectral data point can be changed. After setting values and clicking the Update button, the number of sampled wavelengths will change. In Manual selection mode, the user can enter all the wavelengths that will be measured manually into a list. Simply type the wavelengths (in nm) to the list, press Return on the keyboard to add a new row. After clicking the Update button, the program will check the entered values against the sensor s wavelength range. The points outside of the sensor s range will be discarded. It is possible, however, to measure a single spectral wavelength multiple times in single measurement. NB! In Full spectrum mode, the step calculation is started from the first wavelength value. Example: if the first WL is 1605, last WL is 1800, and the step is 40 nm, then the spectrum wavelengths will be 1605, 1645, 1685, 1725, and 1765. Pictures: Full spectrum settings (left), and Manual selection settings (right). Port settings allow you to change the port selection of the software from automatic to manual. This must be done only when the automatic detection of the sensor does not work. To manually select the port from the list, change the Port Selection mode from Automatic Detection to User Selectable Port, the scroll the COM Port dropdown list to select the port manually. Picture: Port Settings on the Settings tab. User Guide Page 11
Save settings allow you to set the file path, file name, and general save cycle settings. Number of measurements is the number of spectra that will be saved in one cycle. Interval tells the time separation of each spectrum save, in seconds. Each save cycle is started by pressing the Save button on Measurement screen. This value can be set to 0, so every single spectrum will be measured. Example: with save count set to 10 and save interval of 6 seconds, a spectrum will be saved every 6 seconds, and the save cycle total time is 60 seconds. The save file name will be automatically updated when the Measurement settings are adjusted by pressing the Update button in the Measurement settings subwindow. The default file name is the current date and time in the format YYYY-MM-DD_hh-mm-ss. It is possible to save both the raw data and absorbance data values at the same time, as well as the results of the active Analysis method. All three datasets will be saved into separate files. The different saved files can be identified by their suffixes: raw, absorbance, and analysis. Default setting is that only the raw data is saved. Picture: Save settings subwindow on the Settings tab. Device Identification information is automatically updated for every connected sensor. This screen displays sensor-specific identification data, such as the type and version of the sensor, serial number, manufacturing date and firmware version. Picture: example of data shown in Device Identification for an NM2.2 device. User Guide Page 12
It is also possible to check the temperature of the sensor or module using the READ TEMP button in the Device Identification information. Pressing the button will prompt a single new reading from the device, and it will be updated once the measurement cycle is finished. In the case of sensor or software errors, a Clear Error button will be visible on the right side of the Device Identification window. Pressing this button will clear the Error from memory. Still should be done only after the Error has been solved. The measurement settings set by the user for every sensor used are automatically saved in a file called Settings.ini. The settings are automatically saved to this file upon quitting the program when the Exit button is used. The saved information includes: Integration time Averaging value and Averaging mode Measurement settings for both Full spectrum and Manual selection modes Lamp voltage setting in use This information is sensor-specific, and will be matched to the sensor s serial number. The Settings.ini can be found at the folder: C:\Users\ user \AppData\Local\SpectralEngines Please note that the AppData folder is typically hidden. The name for the first User folder depends on your Windows language version. user is your Windows username. 3.4 Analysis screen On the Analysis tab it is possible to use simple mathematical functions to track the variance of the measurement data. Currently two functions are available, Difference and Ratio. Both methods require input from the user, in the form of reference and measurement center wavelengths, and widths of these two ranges. On the Analysis tab the word Reference WL does not relate to the Reference Signal that has been measured for the measurements. The Reference WL and Meas WL are both simply wavelengths or mean values over multiple wavelengths in the same sample spectra that are measured from samples. The Reference WL is a baseline wavelength or baseline region in the measured spectrum. In an ideal case this Reference WL would not contain any variance over the samples, although in some cases this is impossible to achieve. The Meas WL is then the wavelength or wavelength region where the variance of the signal, in relation to the Reference WL, will be monitored. User Guide Page 13
The Reference and Measurement wavelength settings function as such: Center wavelengths are set by inserting the values into the corresponding selectors. These wavelengths do not need to be wavelength points that are measured in the current spectrum. For example, if the current spectrum contains points 1840, 1850, 1860 and 1870 nm, you can still insert any whole number from this range. The width parameter is the width of the range. If the center wavelength is 1850 nm, and width is 10, the range is 1845 to 1855 nm. All points that fall within the range defined will be used in the calculation of an average value that will be used in the Difference or Ratio value calculation, depending on which setting is chosen at the time. If the settings are such that no measured wavelength points are in the range, the system will automatically calculate a value using interpolation from the first lower and higher wavelength points available. Example: measured points are 1850 and 1860 nm. Center wavelength point is 1855, and range is 8. No points are reached, as the wavelength range covers only 1851 to 1859 nm. The system interpolates a single data point at 1855 from the values of 1850 and 1860 nm. The actual values used in the calculation can be either raw signal, transmission/reflectance or absorbance values. The currently used signal is displayed in the Display mode text box on the lower left corner of this screen. This mode can be changed from the Display mode selector on the Measurement screen. The Difference and Ratio values are calculated through the following equations: Difference: X = Measurement value Reference value Ratio: X = 345678494:; <5=74 >4?484:@4 <5=74 User Guide Page 14
As an option, it s also possible to scale the results of these methods with a simple linear function of the type Y = ax + b, where a is the slope, b is the offset, X is the calculated Difference or Ratio value. The calculated results are displayed both in the graph in the middle of the screen as a function of time, and the latest value is also displayed in the Results field on the right side of the screen. The result time graph can be cleared of all values using the Clear Graph button in the lower left corner of the screen. User Guide Page 15
4. Troubleshooting Problem: USB driver installation is cancelled, as Windows encounters a problem: The third-party INF does not contain digital signature information. Solution: Windows Vista/7/8 have by default a Security Policy due to which you might not be able to install the USB Driver directly. The solution is to circumvent the Security Policy temporarily by manually disabling driver signature enforcement in Windows start-up settings. To do this, you will need to access Advanced Start-up settings or Advanced Boot options of your Windows PC. There are at least two ways to do this: 1) Restart the computer, and during start-up (after BIOS prompt screens have passed), press F8. Advanced boot options will be displayed. As one of the last options will be Disable Driver Signature Enforcement. Select this option, and restart and proceed to Windows normally, and then install the USB drivers. 2) In Windows 8, open the Settings sidebar on Windows 8 Desktop (mouse cursor to top right corner, then wait), then select the following: Change PC settings à Update & Recovery à Recovery à Advanced Start-up A screen titled Choose an option should pop-up. Select: Troubleshoot à Advanced options à Start-up settings à Restart You will get to the same Startup settings screen as in the first method. Select the option Disable Driver Signature Enforcement, then reboot to Windows normally, and install the USB drivers as instructed. Problem: An error message on the Measurement settings states: Too many points. Cropped from the shorter wavelengths. Solution: The maximum amount of wavelength points for a single spectrum is 511. If the calculated amount of points exceeds this value, the datapoints corresponding with the shorter wavelengths on the demanded range will be removed. Problem: The sensor cannot be found, or computer has problems communicating with the sensor. Solution: Detach the USB cable from the computer, wait for 10 seconds, and re-attach. If the problem persists, contact Spectral Engines Oy. Up-to-date contact information can be found on the Spectral Engines website at www.spectralengines.com. Problem: An error is displayed on the status bar. User Guide Page 16
Solution: Possible error codes and their reasons: Error 4001 Error 4002 Generic data transfer error code. Check the cable connections, and reconnect the sensor to the measurement computer. You will need to measure dark and/or reference signal values again. Total measurement time has exceeded 1000 seconds. Lower the total measurement time by adjusting the values for Averaging, Integration time and number of wavelengths. Then Press the Clear Error button on the Settings tab before continuing measurements. Problem: When trying to save spectral measurement data, an error message shows up on the Status bar. Solution: Possible errors when trying to save data, and how to solve them include: Error 7 The Save file path is invalid, it does not exist. This function does not have the capability of creating a new folder. Solution: Change the file path to an existing location. Error 8 The Save file path is invalid, it is restricted by Windows Security Policy. Locations include root of main hard disk drive (C: by default) and Windows folder. Solution: Change the file path to a nonrestricted location. User Guide Page 17