Chromatography Forum

Dear all,

I have just purchased a Varian 3900 GC with a Saturn 2000 MS WS 7.0.1 on XP machine.
All the drivers and software are installed, all cables and connections checked. In the System Control i can only find 3900 that is connected directly to the PC trough crossover lan cable but there is no sign of port 40 or Saturn 2000 module that is connected to the PC trough a Agilent 82357B GPIB-USB interface with National instruments GPIB driver ver 2.0.

Every piece of information is greatly appreciated.

Best regards
Alvin

Dear Alvin,

We're having a very similar problem to the one described here. We're using the same software and hardware. We can't find the option to configure anything from channel 40. Thus, in the workstation 'configuration' screen, the 3800.44 module shows up but the 2000.40 module does not.

The workstation manual does not seem to address this--were you able to solve the problem? If so, would you be very kind and share the solution?

Thanks!
Andrew

I'm stuck at exactly the same spot. Help!

Dear, I was for many years FSE of PerkinElmer, then I was ASP of Agilent.
I set up a service laboratory and bought 02 Varian GC-MS systems for use in my laboratory, I had communication problems just like you and I managed after many attempts to solve them.

I will try to be of some help in solving the connection problems CPU - GC - MS

We have 02 GC-MS Varian systems in the laboratory - Saturn

01 - GC 3800 with 02 FID detectors and 01 Saturn 2000 MS / MS
01 - GC 3900 with 01 Saturn 2100T Detector with 03 keys for MS / MS.

I faced many problems to be able to configure these instruments each time I upgraded Windows (95; 98, 2000; XP SP2; XP SP3), and the Saturn Workstation software (Versions 5.1; 5.4; 6.2; 6.42; 6.9 and 7.1)

I tried many CPU configurations with PCI-GPIB cards (Varian, Isatech, HP-IB, National Instruments), I bought SAP Waveboard control cards (Saturn control and communication board) without solution

When I was able to get the 3900 - 2100T to work with a set of hardware / software, the same configuration did not work on the 3800 - 2000 MS / MS.

Both systems were supplied with Dell Optiplex CPU with a PCI-GPIB National card and worked perfectly until Windows 2000 / Saturn V.5

These systems worked perfectly with Windows 2000.

When I upgraded Windows (2000 => XP) and the Saturn WorkStation Software from version (5 => 6.2) the 3800 - Saturn MS-2000 system stopped communicating with Saturn. I updated all the National card drivers, it still didn't work. I downgraded Windows (XP => 2000), and the system went back to working perfectly.

Not satisfied I upgraded to XP + Saturn Workstation 6.2; then 6.42, 6.9 and 7.1. No software communicated with the MS.

Then I installed Windows 7 with a virtual machine 2000 / Saturn Version 6.42, success!

However, I was not satisfied, some time later, we had an electrical problem caused by the power utility and the two CPUs had their source damaged.

I then bought two non-branded CPUs and installed both systems and surprise, both systems worked perfectly using XP-SP3 + Saturn WorkStation 6.9.

Finally the two CPUs we bought from DELL Optiplex arrived, so I migrated the systems to the new CPUs. Frustration, the GC-3800 / MS2000 system stopped working. When you put the CPU xingling the system worked, when you put the CPU DELL the system did not work.

Not satisfied with using a CPU with no defined brand, I decided to investigate the problem in depth and using a National program tool, supplied with the GPIB card driver, I found that the communication did not start, I verified that the DELL system + PCI-GPIB + network card 10-base-T ethernet is incompatible.

Then I bought a media converter from Black Blox 10-base-T ⇔ RJ45 and then it started working sporadically, sometimes it communicated, which forced us to never turn off the system to avoid headaches.

I bought new PCI-GPIB cards and it didn't solve anything.

I switched back to the non-branded CPU’s and everything worked perfectly, so by isolating the variables I verified that the DELL CPUs are incompatible with some Varian Saturn instrument configurations. However I was not satisfied, I wanted at all costs to put the system to work using the CPU’s DELL.

As we have an Atomic Absorption SpectrAA 240 that uses a USB-GPIB-HS card from National, I decided to use it to test on GC / MS and voilá !. All two systems working perfectly using Windows 7 + Saturn Workstation 7.1.

Lauro

Dear Lauro, i'm trying to install mw workstation 7.0.1 on w7 pc..without success. installer stuck during initial moments, and also gpib need to run in compatibility mode. how do you solve this problem? or is your installation fine?
Thks