Keysight DAQ970A

Mainframe, DMM and modules

The DAQ970A holds three plug-in modules and measures through an internal 6½-digit DMM that Keysight specifies as 22-bit, with 0.003% basic DC voltage accuracy. Its measurement types cover thermocouples, RTDs and thermistors, DC and AC voltage and current, 2- and 4-wire resistance, frequency, period, capacitance and strain. The 450 channels/s scan rate comes from the DAQM900A solid-state multiplexer. The DAQM909A is a different kind of module, a 4-channel, 24-bit digitizer with simultaneous, differential inputs at up to 800 kSa/s. The DAQM907A adds digital I/O, a totalizer and analog outputs. Scan memory holds up to one million points, and a USB flash drive can store data when no PC is attached. Keysight lists the mainframe at $2,917 in its standard configuration at the time of writing. The DAQ973A is the same system with GPIB added.

DAQ970A with Python and SCPI

The DAQ970A is programmed in SCPI, and Keysight describes it as program and configuration compatible with the 3497xA family, so existing 34970A scripts are a starting point. Over LAN you can send SCPI from any language that opens a TCP socket, or through a VISA layer such as Keysight’s free IO Libraries Suite, which supports Windows and Linux. In Python, either a VISA library or a plain socket works. Python data acquisition covers both approaches.

Vendor software

Keysight’s BenchVue Data Acquisition app supports the DAQ970A and DAQ973A. It runs on Windows 10 and 11 and needs a license after a free trial. Neither BenchVue nor the IO Libraries Suite lists macOS support, so on a Mac you use the LAN SCPI interface. DAQAtlas, which is in development, reads the DAQ970A as a SCPI instrument over LAN (raw socket, usually port 5025) or USBTMC and can record it in the same run as a USB DAQ. Building a mixed-vendor DAQ bench covers that kind of setup.