Since its acquisition of Electronics
Workbench and its printed-circuit
board (PCB) design and analysis tools, National Instruments has sought
to meld those tools with the stuff of its
core competency—namely, virtual instrumentation and effective capture and
application of real-world signals in a simulation environment.
The result is embodied in Multisim
10.0 () and Ultiboard 10.0, which are the latest versions of NI's interactive
Spice simulation and circuit analysis
software for schematic capture, interactive simulation, board layout, and integrated testing.
In these tools, NI has gone deeper in
its efforts to incorporate virtual instrumentation into simulation to reduce iterations. It brings graphical system design,
a concept more often related to the
worlds of algorithm work, into the context of hardware design. Further, it paves the way for users without a great
deal of Spice expertise
Among the improvements in Multisim
10.0 is a greatly expanded model database. Over 1200 models for components
from Analog Devices, Linear Technology
Corp., and Texas Instruments have been
added. Over 16,400 components are now
represented. Also, a new "convergence
assistant" tool finds and resolves Spice-simulation setting errors not by changing
the circuit in any way, but rather by
changing simulation parameters.
Enhanced visualization tools
enable users to probe their circuits
and take measurements. This feature bridges the gap between interactive simulation and the advanced
analysis capabilities built into Multisim. With the visualization tools, interactive static probes can be placed
anywhere in the circuit for differential
measurements.
Multisim 10.0 can be purchased as
a complete, integrated design and test
platform that includes Ultiboard 10.0
and LabVIEW SignalExpress, the interactive measurement software that
improves productivity by controlling all
instruments on a benchtop. U.S. list
prices start at $1499.
National Instruments' Electronics
Workbench Group
www.ni.com
