Multifunctional Configurable USB Data Acquisition System

In this paper we present a low cost implementation of the modular intelligent multi-channel data acquisition system as an alternative to existing commercial solutions. The system design enables simple reconfiguration and adaptation to various measuring requirements and it is particularly applicable for educational purposes, early-stage development and scientific research. Some of important requirements in modern electronic instrumentation design that our system satisfies are flexibility for different measuring scenarios, programmable input analog channels control and connectivity to standard communication interfaces available on today´s personal computers. Simple system adaptation to application-specific purposes is achieved by a careful choice of electronic components, with particular emphasis on programmable central processing unit. The implemented system also provides high level of protection against surges and overvoltages in the input measuring channel by means of analog input transient suppression and galvanic isolation between the measuring circuitry and the personal computer interface. The basic measuring hardware configuration may be extended by external plug-in analog boards.