The MICROQ black is a compact high quality 3 channel data acquisition system which measures electrical and physical quantities. Designed for the measurement of ICP® signals and able to connect to a CANbus network, the MICROQ black acquires data through built-in signal conditioning channels. The device includes built-in Power over Ethernet and DC Power. The device also includes embedded software which can be used to set up, configure and control your measurement.
The sections that follow will help you power up your MICROQ black, understand your startup LEDs, and configure your MICROQ black settings with the Web Server and our embedded QuantusSeries measurement configuration software, QAcquire.
The MICROQ black can be powered through either DC Power or Power over Ethernet (PoE).
The MICROQ black will draw power, from whichever sources are connected and ready for use, in the following order:
If all possible power sources are connected, only DC Power will be used to power the MICROQ black. DC Power will have to be disconnected for the MICROQ black to be powered using PoE.
Please note:
Each power source status is indicated by a status LED. To find out which status LEDs represent the power source currently being used by your MICROQ black, see “Power LEDs” in the full MICROQ black User Guide.
The MICROQ black can be powered with DC Power using the LEMO® connector next to the On / Off switch on the front panel. The table below provides a summary of the DC Power specifications:
| Category | Specification |
|---|---|
| Connector | LEMO® EHG.0B.302 |
| Input Voltage Range | 10 - 30 VDC |
| Power required | Up to 40 W |
| Recommended Power Supply | Mean Well GST120A24 |
When powering your MICROQ black with the recommended Mean Well AC/DC Power Adaptor, connect power by doing the following:
Please note:
Additional DC Power cables and accessories are available, please contact your supplier for more information.
The MICROQ black can be set up and powered via IEEE 802.3 PoE. In order to facilitate this, a PoE Injector is supplied for cases where the device does not require industrial surge protection (e.g. in an office environment).
When powering your MICROQ black with PoE, connect power by doing the following:
Warning:
Beware of ground loops that could be created through the shield of the shielded Ethernet cable.
The table below provides a summary of the MICROQ black’s PoE specifications and may serve as a reference when choosing the right PoE Injector for a specific measurement application:
| Category | Specification |
|---|---|
| Design based on PoE standards | 802.3at Type 2, LTPoE++ |
| Connector | RJ45 |
| Input Voltage Range | 42 - 57 VDC |
| Power source required | Up to 40 W |
When choosing the right PoE Injector one should consider the potential power consumption of the system. For example, if all channels are in use, a specific PoE Injector with a higher power capacity should be used.
Please note:
If you intend to use PoE in an industrial environment, request advice from your laboratory manager regarding which third party PoE Injector would be most appropriate. Additional options, including external solutions for battery PoE Injectors are available. Feel free to contact your supplier for more information.
Before switching on the MICROQ black, make sure it is connected to DC Power or PoE.
Switch on the MICROQ black by pressing and holding down the Power On / Off button until the PoE (and DC Power LED if connected) turns solid blue.
Switch off the MICROQ black by pressing and holding down the Power On / Off button until the PoE (and DC Power if connected) turns red, indicating the MICROQ black is shutting down. This will take about one second. Release the button once the LEDs turn red.
The system should take about five seconds to power down. If the shutdown sequence has been initiated after a measurement has begun (and data is still being written to the SSD), the system shutdown sequence will take longer than five seconds.
System Boot
These three blue LEDs indicate the progress of system initialization (1 - 3). Each LED will blink and then turn solid blue until all three LEDs are on, indicating that initialization is complete.
System Active - Ready to Measure
The LED sequence will typically take place in the following order:
The MICROQ black connects to the user’s computer through an Ethernet network.
There are three options when connecting your MICROQ black to the network using Ethernet. The most common configuration is to connect your MICROQ black to the Ethernet switch which connects your computer to the rest of the network (with a DHCP Server). If your company has strict rules regarding devices on the network, you can also use an isolated network that does not contain a DHCP Server. In this case the MICROQ black can be connected to your computer either directly with an Ethernet cable or through a network switch.
Most networks have a DHCP server that will provide your MICROQ black with an IP address when setting up for the first time.
A typical network structure if a DHCP server is available on the network looks like this:
In this configuration, your computer should be receiving its IP address from the DHCP server. Once your MICROQ black is connected to the network, it should also receive an IP address from the DHCP server.
In this configuration, your computer is on an isolated network that does not contain a DHCP server. The device can either be connected directly with an Ethernet cable or through a network switch.
Here is a diagram of an isolated network through a network switch:
And here is a direct connection:
In these configurations, the MICROQ black will detect the lack of a DHCP server present on the network. It will fall back to the AutoIP protocol and choose a random (free) IP address in the 169.254.xxx.yyy range. If your computer is set up to use DHCP (you are connected to the company network and you temporarily connect to the device for configuration), then your computer would behave similarly. Your computer should also choose a free IP address in the same range.
If your computer is set up to have a static IP address, you will have to change the address to 169.254.1.1 for the initial configuration.
Before you can communicate with your MICROQ black, you first have to discover it on your network.
By default, all devices are shipped with the following settings:
Note that your device serial number is printed on the bottom of your MICROQ black.
All MICROQ black devices are shipped with mDNS enabled. mDNS is the primary method used to discover devices. There are a couple of options available:
prodIdent field populated with the keyword Quantus. At the moment the only service being advertised is the device’s Systems Settings (“_http._tcp" on port 80), but in the future the list will be more complete.We will use the QDeviceDiscovery tool as an example. The output of the application is a JSON string containing a list of MICROQ black devices on the network. After turning on your device, open the command line (or terminal in Linux) in the QDeviceDiscovery folder located in the QuantusSoftware package. Invoke the application by typing QDeviceDiscovery (or ./QDeviceDiscovery in Linux). The application will discover devices on the network within the next 10 seconds. After that it will output the list:
> QDeviceDiscovery
{
"numberOfentries": 1,
"entries": [
{
"deviceName": "Quantus_0718S8880",
"deviceIp": "10.0.0.202"
}
]
}Once you have discovered the IP address or name of your device, you will be able to access your MICROQ black’s System Settings.
MICROQ black devices have a built-in Web Server which includes System Settings pages. To access the Web Server, open your preferred Web Browser and enter either of the following in the address bar:
http://<SystemIpAddress>, for example, using the MICROQ black discovered in the previous section http://10.0.0.202http://<Name>, for example, using the MICROQ black discovered in the previous section http://Quantus_0718S8880You will be greeted with the Landing Page. The Landing Page provides basic information about your MICROQ black and allows you to navigate to your System Settings and/or QAcquire.
The MICROQ black’s System Settings allows Users to configure the system as a whole:
All the system settings can be reset to factory default settings if your MICROQ black can’t be discovered or the network settings / passwords are lost.
Please refer to the MICROQ black User Guide for steps how to reset the system settings to factory default settings.
QAcquire configures, controls and monitors your measurement in a modern and effortless way. It is an alternative method for setting up measurements for clients that do not require OEM Software Packages.
QAcquire is a web-based graphical interface hosted on the device. You can launch it by opening the Web Browser, navigating to the MICROQ black’s Landing Page and clicking on the QAcquire link.
With QAcquire the system can be configured online. However, it still requires a streaming client to retrieve the data stream for analysis.
To use QAcquire, enter the URL of your MICROQ black (as directed in previous sections). This will open the Landing Page of the Web Server with an option to launch QAcquire.
Once it has been selected and loaded, the system can be configured for the measurement task:
Step 1: Select the Master Sampling Rate (eg 131072 Hz).
Step 2: Select the channels tab to configure the channel parameters and display settings for each channel.
Step 3: Change the settings of the channel if desired.
Step 4: Once you have all the channels configured, click apply to sync the changes to your MICROQ black device.
QAcquire will now show the live data stream for each configured channel. It can display either the time history or FFT spectra for each channel.
Now that you are connected and ready to measure, you can start to configure your measurement.
For more information, use the User Guides (including the QuantusSoftware User Guide) found on your device’s Landing Page or on the QuantusSeries website. To access hardware information such as functionality diagrams, create an account on QuantusSeries website and go to Support –> Product User Guides.
Use this link to create your account: Create an Account
Contact your distributor or Product Expert for more information about our compatible OEM software packages to find out which software package will suit your unique acquisition and data analysis needs.
The MICROQ black’s front panel supports two ICP® channels and one CAN / CAN FD channel. Please consult the MICROQ black User Guide for more information.
The MICROQ uses LEMO® connectors for many of its interfaces, including the DC Power connector and S-Port. These connectors have a latching sleeve to protect the cable from being damaged when it is being connected / disconnected.
To plug in and unplug:
Use the latching sleeve (the rough metallic cover) when you push / pull the connector.
Do not pull on the cable itself:
Pulling on the cable could damage the cable and compromise the connection.
