GBS Elektronik MCA166-USB - Manual (Page 10)

MCA166-USB
Typical errors which may be observed with the detector preamp signal are:
●
Rise time is too slow (>0.5 µs). This may cause that the pile up rejector does not
work correctly. There may be even a large amount of regular pulses rejected and
especially the high energetic part of the spectrum seriously affected. When using
such detectors switch pile up rejection off.
●
The fall time is too fast (time constant resp. 1/e fall time < 40µs). This causes that
the pole/zero setting cannot be correctly adjusted. Consequences may be peak
shift and peak broadening with higher count rates and increased low energy
spectrum cutoff. Try to use another preamplifier.
2.2.6 Additional external battery pack and Power Pack
Because of the changed charging mechanism of the MCA166-USB the older battery
packs and power packs cannot be used! The MCA166-USB offers a higher battery
capacity, improved efficiency and is able to supply more power on ±24V than the older
MCA166. So two main features offered by the battery pack / power pack are now partially
integrated in the MCA itself and makes this devices obsolete. If more battery capacity is
needed, please contact GBS-Elektronik GmbH.
3 Software
3.1 Overview
There are several programs to operate the MCA166-USB. All of them serve a special
purpose. There are programs for MS-DOS and Windows (32 Bit). The MS-DOS software
was originally developed for the HP 200LX, whose footprint coincident with the footprint of
the MCA166. The Windows programs were developed to operate the MCA166 more
comfortably. Besides, they are (together with at least Windows 98 or Windows 2000)
essential to connect the MCA166-USB via USB cable, for the rest, only RS232
communication is possible.
Furthermore, there are programs and software components to view and evaluate the
measured data.
The following sections give brief descriptions of the programs. You can find more detailed
information on the CD delivered together with the device. You should also use the online
help of each program.
The diagnostics menu of each program shows the primary currents of the preamplifier
power supply (±12V and ±24V). This are not the currents that draws the detector.
However, this currents can be easily calculated using the following formula:
10
I
out
≈ 0.8⋅I
Batt
⋅
U
Batt
U
out