HP5890 SeriesII Parts and Installation

Discussions about GC and other "gas phase" separation techniques.

39 posts Page 2 of 3
mckrause wrote:
For G1701AA and G1701BA you really need to use the ISA cards; this can be a bit tough to find from a computer standpoint.


Hi guys,

I am bringing several 5890 Series IIs back out of storage and the computers are long gone. I have secured a copy of G1701BA and have the HPIB cables, so I am curious as to why the Agilent 82350-66511 would not work? I assume that it would, but I could certainly be wrong. I see some available on Ebay, and I would much rather go with PCI over ISA.

I will be chiming in often as the 5890 revival unfolds.
according to Agilent it will work.

https://www.agilent.com/cs/library/supp ... 05241a.pdf

according to a couple of olds threads I've seen here you just have to tell configuration it is a HP82341 even though it is a 50.
viewtopic.php?t=48304
viewtopic.php?t=12310&start=15

Most of my experience is with older systems (hard to believe, right? hehe) but one of the oddities that I ran into when setting up IO Libraries with an 82350 card is when you load the IO Config and select the 82350 card I have to change the SICL interface name to hp82341 (lowercase), which is crazy counter-intuitive. I dunno if that is applicable but I might give it a shot.
MSCHemist wrote:
according to Agilent it will work.

https://www.agilent.com/cs/library/supp ... 05241a.pdf

according to a couple of olds threads I've seen here you just have to tell configuration it is a HP82341 even though it is a 50.
viewtopic.php?t=48304
viewtopic.php?t=12310&start=15

Most of my experience is with older systems (hard to believe, right? hehe) but one of the oddities that I ran into when setting up IO Libraries with an 82350 card is when you load the IO Config and select the 82350 card I have to change the SICL interface name to hp82341 (lowercase), which is crazy counter-intuitive. I dunno if that is applicable but I might give it a shot.


I just got an email from Agilent that had a few documents that I will see if I can post on this forum, and the rep did say the card would work as well. I will be setting it up as soon as I get the computer cards in from good old Ebay and post my experience here. Thanks for the reply!
Update:

I've got the boards, cables and software for the GC. The good news is that the GC seems to be happy with it's self test, so now the problem is connecting the GC to the PC.

For the software (Chemstation B), I've had to backdate a computer to Windows NT (2000 SP4). The problem now is that I can't get the computer to recognise the PCI-GPIB interface. Is there anyone else running this software or OS and can tell me what drivers they're using? I've tried NI 488.2 version 1.3 but to no avail.
I use HP IOlibs H version. I think the only trouble I had was figuring the 5890's HPIB address.
I've now got the computer to speak with the GPIB card, and that seems to be working alright. The problem I now have is getting I/O Libs to work with the NI GPIB board.

I've already tried this https://forums.ni.com/t5/Instrument-Control-GPIB-Serial/NI-GPIB-card-for-HP-5890-GC/td-p/601384 and this http://digital.ni.com/public.nsf/allkb/122F2F9080BD8424862571BC005508D4, but the board doesn't appear, so I'm unable to configure it.



[EDIT]
The board now appears, and I've changed the details mentioned in the links above but it still won't communicate. Frustratingly close, but not sure what needs changed.

Any advice anyone has on the matter would be appreciated.
Thinking back a long time ago. A couple of things.

Are you using drivers from NI or off the chemstation installation disk? If you have the choice use the chemstation drivers for the GPIB card?

I recall something else has to be set correctly in addition to the card. Is it GPIB0 or something? I think the Agilent PDF on the installation disk may give more. As others have mentioned the settings listed in the manual have to be used even if they don’t appear important.

I thought that I was able to have a 5890 series ii working on Windows XP and use it routinely. If you need to go that way let me know and I will try to find my notes.

Kevin
Hi guys,

So, I'm now checking in because I need to buy at least a few old Windows XP computers for the 5890 project. I did end up getting a HP 82350 Card and the have the cables, but alas, the Windows XP box that I scrapped together from the parts room is a Dell with amazingly small memory (128mb lol). The reason I am writing this is because I had multiple comms issues with at least the G, H, and J Keysight I/O libraries. Upon reading some Agilent instructions for comms issues with the 82350, I found that there are several conflicts with Dell computers, as well as the Compaq DeskPro 6000.

Furthermore, the literature states the following " If the HP-IB card was ordered from HP, it could have the G drivers with the HP-IB Card. The F.01.02 drivers are the only drivers that work with G1701AA, G1701BA, and G2710AA. DO NOT USE the G drivers".....

So when you search for the F.01.02 libraries, they are not even listed- the oldest libraries on the Keysight "previous editions" is G.

After messing around with this old PC, I decided it would be better to start off with a somewhat newer Windows XP desktop that at least has "reasonable" RAM etc. The Dell box I have is just too old and slow to even proceed with further attempts at configuring the Driver configs.

So 2 questions: first, what would be the BEST Keysight Library set to run with Chemstation G1701BA, and second, what would be an appropriate Windows XP box to look for locally or more likely on Ebay?

Thank you all for your time!
I still have the old HP Kayak XA which is a pentium II. I put a big hard drive and a usb extension cord from the rear to front and Windows 2000 SP4. I use HP IOLibs H version which seems to work well but I have the 82341 ISA card. Did you try renaming the SCSI interface name to hp82341?
MSCHemist wrote:
Did you try renaming the SCSI interface name to hp82341?


Yes, even made sure the HP was in lower case. My biggest problem seems not to be the Libraries per se, but the wanky computer and it's utter lack of resources. My observations were that before loading the drivers, the computer had sluggish but (barely) tolerable performance. After I load the drivers, I get super erratic behavior and the computer slows to a crawl, and can't even open Chemstation for long, if at all.

Also, I looked at the email that you sent @MSCHemist and I saw that you recommended using the H libraries. I am virtually certain that this old Dell workstation is just not up to the task in terms of CPU/RAM. Depending on the driver library used, the computer behaves slightly different; in all cases worse lol. But, I am now reassured that the H library should be good to go. Thanks for all your help @MSCHemist!

Next step, buy a few clunker Win XP boxes from Ebay, avoiding Dell per Agilent instructions, and maybe avoiding Compaq too....

Here is a tidbit from the Agilent HPIB driver instructions "We are currently NOT able to get a 82341C HPIB card to function with a Compaq DeskPro 6000, 266MHz Pentium-II"
For what it's worth, we have the GC Chemstation running on Windows XP on HP Compaq dc7700 boxes with the 82350 PCI HPIB card.
We support HP-5890 with all flavors comm board
* HPIB/RS-232C communications - HP part 19257-60010
* RS-232C communications - HP part 19242-60030

HPIB communication can work on any Agilent IOLibs supported host controllers either ISA, PCI, USB.
Older 82335 will not work on windows XP and higher but would work on Linux
82341 probably would work on XP and bigger
newer 82350 should work on XP, Win7
USB 82357 should work even in Win10.

All of these HPIB host controllers should work under Linux.

Download our UniChrom and test in demo mode
http://www.unichrom.com/chrom/ucdle.php
GC configuration notes here: http://www.unichrom.com/hpx890/hp5890%2 ... %20eng.pdf
Maybe helpful to OP, maybe not- here's how I did it with UniChrom an an RS-232 interface board. I run Windows 7 and it does fine.

viewtopic.php?f=2&t=18812&p=90869&hilit=unichrom#p90869

There are three 19242-60030 boards listed on eBay, and I may have one or more extras in storage, I'm not sure. Anyway- with my configuration, I am able to control and manipulate data using UniChrom, with USB connectivity, which is pretty sweet.
Thanks for the suggestions. I'm currently trying a range of options (Chemstation, UniChrom, Labview), and still having little success.

OSP, I might try your suggestion next. Can I ask what pins the 19242-60500 cable uses on both the 60030 and the DB-25 connector? I doubt this would be much different from connecting a DB-25 to DB-9 via the 19257-60015 & 19257-60020 boards, but given this is currently not working it might be worth a try. It does, however, sometimes register that the GC is in pre-run mode, before losing the connection, but I've no idea why.

The pre-run mode leads me to my next question. If I disregard the PC, and just look at the GC as a standalone piece of equipment, once I turn it on and it goes through all it's checks, the not ready light turns on. Even when all the temperatures reach their set points, and the detectors are on, the system will not run, instead stating it is still in pre-run. If I press start the 'not ready' light just flashes. Bearing in mind I've never used one of these GCs, so the answer might be simple, is there something I need to do to get out of this pre-run mode?
For what it's worth, I've got a 5890 Series II running on the latest version of Win 10 x64 with a USB to GPIB adapter (works with the A or B model) and running Chemstation B.04.03 and IO Libs 16.3.17914.4. The newer Keystone versions of IO Libs were trouble. So it is possible to use newer computers - mine is even a Dell.

I believe all I had to do is use Corflags.exe - available from Microsoft - to change the header on ChemMain.exe to 32-bit. Might have had to do that to the setup wizard executable too.

The 1090, though, was a bit more trouble to get working since B.04.03 completely removed it as an install-able instrument and B.04.01, which is the last version that had the 1090 - wasn't really 64-bit compatible.
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