Addressing legacy ATE system requirements with PXI

Beginning in the late 1960s, proprietary ATE systems were deployed by a wide range of customers for the functional test and verification of high value, mission critical products including board & box level avionics, depot level test & repair of armament and avionics electronics, and communications / satellite subsystems. These test systems are now obsolete, however the products (and their derivatives) originally tested on these platforms are still in use and need to be maintained. Consequently, there is an on-going need to either maintain these obsolete systems or migrate the applications and the legacy system´s capabilities to a modern test platform. The paper provides an overview of how the PXI architecture, and associated instrumentation and software can provide the basis for a modern functional test platform that can effectively support both legacy ATE functionality as well as future functional test needs.