SCPI for Power Sources
The SCPI (Standard Commands for Programmable Instruments [wiki]) defines a standard for syntax and commands for use in controlling electronic devices such as measurement devices and power supplies.
Since mid 2021, all MCB Electronics products (AC Power Sources, DC Power Sources, Current Generators, …) come with this standard protocol over RS-232 and Ethernet, thus replacing the old (custom) ASCII protocol.
SCPI Programming Guides
Here you can find our Programming Guides, grouped by product family. The first chapters are a review of the standards and are based on
- “IEEE Standard Codes, Formats, Protocols, and Common Commands for Use With IEEE Std 488.1-1987, IEEE Standard Digital Interface for Programmable Instrumentation”. In: Dec. 1992. doi: 10.1109/IEEESTD.1992.114468 (URL)
- “Standard Commands for Programmable Instruments (SCPI)”. In: 1999 (URL)
while the other chapters are product specific.
SCPI Guides for DC Power Sources
Communication Interfaces Setup Guide
SCPI is accessible over two different interfaces (RS-232 and Ethernet) on all our new Power Sources, as described in this guide:
Communication Interfaces Setup Guide
The document presents the available communication interfaces, their configuration, how to change their settings, and procedures to communicate using SCPI over each one of them.
Demo SCPI Client
We developed a super lightweight application (single window, no installation required) to easily test your settings and to try SCPI commands both over RS-232 and Ethernet (TCP/IP).
This software is distributed only as a demo and without any guarantees, in order to prove that the Power Source interfaces work as expected, and it should not be used in production environments. We encourage our customers to develop their own software or to integrate the Power Source in their existing software systems.
Download our Demo SCPI Client (Windows .exe)
LabVIEW Compatibility
National Instruments Laboratory Virtual Instrument Engineering Workbench (LabVIEW) is systems engineering software for applications that require test, measurement, and control with rapid access to hardware and data insights. Considering that our Power Sources uses SCPI, the integration in LabVIEW with NI-VISA is straightforward.
We developed demo drivers to test our products with NI LabVIEW (Plug and Play drivers, project-style, version 20.0.1).
These drivers are distributed only as a demo and without any guarantees, in order to prove that the Power Source interfaces work as expected, and they should not be used in production environments. Only a few commands have been implemented. We encourage our customers to develop their own LabView drivers to integrate our Power Sources.
Proprietary ASCII protocol over RS-232 (obsolete)
Here you can find our communication packages for old MCB machines. Each zip contains a Windows executable and instructions (Italian only).
For any comment, question, suggestion or bug report about the information presented in this page, get in touch with us!
