Matrox Meteor Installation And Hardware Reference
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Matrox Meteor Installation And Hardware Reference

Matrox Meteor Installation And Hardware Reference

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Matrox Meteor Installation And Hardware Reference

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  • Page 1 Artisan Technology Group is your source for quality new and certified-used/pre-owned equipment SERVICE CENTER REPAIRS WE BUY USED EQUIPMENT • FAST SHIPPING AND DELIVERY Experienced engineers and technicians on staff Sell your excess, underutilized, and idle used equipment at our full-service, in-house repair center We also offer credit for buy-backs and trade-ins •...
  • Page 2 0DWUR[ 0HWHRU D†‡hyyh‡v‚ÃhqÃCh…qh…rÃSrsr…rpr HhˆhyÁ‚à $!(HU Trƒ‡r€ir…à %à (('...
  • Page 3 All other nationally and internationally recognized trademarks and tradenames are hereby acknowledged. © Copyright Matrox Electronic Systems Ltd., 1998. All rights reserved. Disclaimer: Matrox Electronic Systems Ltd. reserves the right to make changes in specifications at any time and without notice. The information provided by this document is believed to be accurate and reliable.

  • Page 4: Table Of Contents

    ......7 Matrox Meteor ......8 Acquisition .
  • Page 5 Common problems and solutions ..38 Contacting Matrox ..... 41 Appendix B: Technical information .
  • Page 6 ......49 Appendix C: Glossary Customer support Note, when a reference is made to Matrox Meteor or Matrox Meteor/RGB, the information that follows also applies to the version of these boards that includes the integrated PCI-to-PCI bridge.

  • Page 8: Chapter 1: Introduction

    Chapter 1: Introduction This chapter briefly describes the features of Matrox Meteor.

  • Page 9: Matrox Meteor

    RAM (depending on the system and VGA board used) and provides support for live video-in-a-window. You can use the Matrox Imaging Library (MIL) or any of its derivatives to program Matrox Meteor. Matrox Meteor comes in four versions: Matrox Meteor, a standard monochrome and color frame grabber.

  • Page 10: Acquisition

    Meteor/RGB boards provide support for component RGB acquisition, with independent gain and offset controls for each channel. They support all of Meteor’s input capabilities, except for color video signals in Y/C format. This capability has been exchanged for support of a synchronous trigger input (by way of the Y/C connector).

  • Page 11: Data Transfer

    PC’s architecture (including the type of core logic chipset used). Software You can purchase one or more of the Matrox Imaging software packages that support the Matrox Meteor board. These are MIL and its derivatives (MIL-Lite, ActiveMIL-Lite and Inspector).
  • Page 12 Matrox Intellicam is an interactive Windows program that allows fast camera interfacing and provides interactive access to all the acquisition features of the Matrox Meteor board. Intellicam is included with both MIL and MIL-Lite. Environments supported are Windows 95 and...

  • Page 13: What You Need To Get Started

    For a Pentium Pro or a Pentium II system with a 440FX or 440LX chipset, you must use a Matrox Meteor/PPB or a Matrox Meteor PPB/RGB; other versions will not work. In addition, when using the 440FX chipset, a color grab will be limited to an RGB 5:5:5 (15-bit) format because of system memory bandwidth limitations.

  • Page 14: Inspecting The Matrox Meteor Package

    Note that optional parts might or might not be included, depending on what you ordered. If something is missing or damaged, contact your Matrox representative. Standard package If you ordered Matrox Meteor you should receive the following items: A Matrox Meteor board (METEOR, METEOR/PPB, METEOR/RGB, or METEOR/RGB/PPB).

  • Page 15: Handling Components

    Chapter 1: Introduction Handling components The electronic circuits in your computer and the circuits on Matrox Meteor are sensitive to static electricity and surges. Improper handling can seriously damage the circuits. Be sure to follow these precautions: Drain static electricity from your body by touching a metal fixture (or ground) before you touch any electronic component.

  • Page 16: Installation Overview

    For information on data transfers to Host memory or VGA display memory, refer to Chapter 4. For information on using multiple Matrox Meteor boards, refer to Chapter 5. Also, for information on using the trigger input on Matrox Meteor/RGB, refer to Chapter 6.
  • Page 17 Chapter 1: Introduction...

  • Page 18: Chapter 2: Hardware Installation

    Chapter 2: Hardware installation This chapter explains how to install your new Matrox Meteor board in your PC.

  • Page 19: Installing Matrox Meteor

    2. Check that you have an empty PCI (32-bit) slot that can host a full length board. If you do not have an empty slot, remove a PCI board from your system to make room for your Matrox Meteor board and take note of the slot number you choose. Caution Some computers have a large, black-ridged heat sink that prevents long boards from using most PCI board slots.
  • Page 20 Installing Matrox Meteor 4. Carefully position Matrox Meteor in the selected PCI slot as illustrated in the following picture. If you are using a tower computer, orient the board to suit the board slots in your computer. SCREW METAL PLATE 32-BIT PCI CARD SLOT 5.
  • Page 21 Chapter 2: Hardware installation 9. Attach your video sources. 10. Turn on your computer. Under Windows 95, when you boot your PC, Windows’ Plug-and-Play system will detect a new PCI Multimedia Video Device and you will be asked to assign a driver to it. At this point, you should click on Cancel.

  • Page 22: Attaching A Video Input

    No circuitry protection Warning The trigger signal on Matrox Meteor/RGB is not buffered or conditioned. The circuits on Meteor/RGB are sensitive to static electricity and surges. Please be careful about what is hooked to the trigger input of the board since there is no circuitry protection.
  • Page 23 Chapter 2: Hardware installation...

  • Page 24: Chapter 3: Installing Software

    Chapter 3: Installing software This chapter explains how to install the Matrox Meteor software.

  • Page 25: Installing The Software

    Chapter 3: Installing software Installing the software To install any Matrox Imaging software, place its CD in the appropriate drive, then: under Windows, the setup.exe file will run automatically. under DOS, using the appropriate drive letter, type at the prompt:...

  • Page 26: Chapter 4: Transferring Data

    Chapter 4: Transferring data This chapter discusses transfer speeds.

  • Page 27: Transfer Speeds

    35 MBytes/s up to 42 MBytes/s *32-bit color input data is RGBx (8:8:8:x) Although Matrox Meteor is capable of transferring data in real-time, this ability is dependent on the performance of your PC. The PCI’s maximum theoretical data transfer is 132 MBytes/second, however actual performance is generally much less;...

  • Page 28: Chapter 5: Using Multiple Matrox Meteor Boards

    Chapter 5: Using multiple Matrox Meteor boards This chapter explains how multiple Meteor boards can be supported in a single PC.

  • Page 29: Using Multiple Matrox Meteor Boards

    Using multiple Matrox Meteor boards This section describes how multiple Matrox Meteor boards can be supported in a single PC. The use of multiple Matrox Meteor boards allow you to grab multiple images simultaneously and display them. It is possible to grab from genlocked cameras or from non-synchronous sources (in the latter case, camera output formats can be different).

  • Page 30: Grabbing Simultaneously From Different Boards29

    You can simultaneously grab images from cameras attached to different Matrox Meteor boards, however the destination of the grabs must be to different memory locations or memory buffers. To grab at exactly the same time, the cameras must be genlocked (synchronous) and their camera definition formats must be the same.

  • Page 31: Number Of Cameras Per Board

    * the multiplexer is actually located on the board Grabbing from multiple cameras connected to each board On each Matrox Meteor/RGB, you can grab from one RGB camera or three standard monochrome video sources. Note that if you grab from multiple monochrome video sources, the video...

  • Page 32: Pci Bandwidth Requirements

    440LX. If a high performance chipset is used, you should not have any PCI bandwidth problems grabbing two full-sized images simultaneously from two Matrox Meteor boards in real time. However, grabbing more than two images simultaneously might result in PCI bandwidth problems.
  • Page 33 Chapter 5: Using multiple Matrox Meteor boards...

  • Page 34: Chapter 6: Using Matrox Meteor/Rgb's Trigger Input Capability

    Chapter 6: Using Matrox Meteor/RGB’s trigger input capability This chapter explains how to use Matrox Meteor/RGB’s trigger input capability.

  • Page 35: Using The Matrox Meteor Trigger

    Chapter 6: Using Matrox Meteor/RGB’s trigger input capability Using the Matrox Meteor trigger Besides software-controlled single-frame grabbing and continuous grabbing (available on all versions of the Meteor), Matrox Meteor/RGB can grab using an external hardware-controlled trigger. Signal paths and requirements...

  • Page 36: Ttl Pulse

    Using the Matrox Meteor trigger TTL pulse Matrox Meteor/RGB trigger input accepts a TTL level pulse. The TTL level signal must have a maximum amplitude of 5V. A signal over 2V is considered high while anything less than 0.8V is considered low. The transition of 0.8V to 2V is considered to be the rising edge.

  • Page 37: No Circuitry Protection

    There are several ways to provide circuitry protection. For example, you can add an opto-coupler between your TTL source and the Matrox Meteor/RGB input. This helps isolate the rest of the circuitry from any potential surges.

  • Page 38: Appendix A: Troubleshooting

    Appendix A: Troubleshooting This appendix gives suggestions to help you resolve potential problems. If your problem is not addressed here, contact your local Matrox representative, Matrox sales office, or the Matrox Imaging Customer Support Group.

  • Page 39: Troubleshooting

    Matrox Meteor will share with an another PCI device. If problems occur, try to reassign interrupt lines so that Matrox Meteor will use an interrupt line shared with a PCI device that will not interfere with Matrox Meteor’s operation.
  • Page 40 To do this, pass the initialization flag to the M_NO_INTERRUPT MsysAlloc() function at Meteor system allocation time. Please refer to the description of the function in the MsysAlloc() Meteor’s board specific notes.
  • Page 41 Appendix A: Troubleshooting Not enough memory to allocate buffer under Windows NT This is a message that you will receive if you allocate a grab buffer that is greater than the amount of the DMA memory specified at the time of software installation. This problem can be addressed by allocating more memory.

  • Page 42: Contacting Matrox

    Contacting Matrox Matrox Meteor doesn’t grab properly on my PCI-bus system In certain PCs, the bridge between the PCI bus and PC memory has fast PCI-transfer disabled. This is done automatically by the BIOS of the PC when the PC’s manufacturer judges it appropriate.
  • Page 43 Appendix A: Troubleshooting...

  • Page 44: Appendix B: Technical Information

    Appendix B: Technical information This appendix contains information that might be useful when installing your Matrox Meteor.

  • Page 45: Technical Information

    Technical features: Captures and transfers full-resolution, full-frame NTSC or PAL video input in real-time. Allows live display with a Matrox MGA display board (for example, Matrox Millennium-II or Matrox Mystique) or any other VGA that supports fast linear memory accesses.

  • Page 46: Data Transfers

    Software programmable black and white reference levels (Matrox Meteor/RGB only). Synchronization and control. External TTL trigger input (Matrox Meteor/RGB only). Synchronization even when grabbing from still video cameras and VCR’s in playback and pause modes. Data transfers Digital video to PCI interface supports the following data transfer formats: 8-bit monochrome, 15-bit RGB 5:5:5 and 32-bit RGBx.

  • Page 47: Board Input

    Matrox Meteor and Matrox Meteor/RGB have three connectors on the bracket for video input: DB-9 female connector The DB-9 female connector provides composite or RGB input to the Matrox Meteor board. The pin assignment is as follows: Signal Composite 1 or Composite 2 or...

  • Page 48: S-Vhs Connector

    Board input S-VHS connector The S-VHS connector provides Y/C or trigger input to the Matrox Meteor board. The pin assignment is as follows: Signal Ground Ground Y (Luma) In (on Matrox Meteor) Trigger In (on Meteor/RGB) C (Chroma) In You can use a standard video cable (available from local electronic stores) to interface to this connector.

  • Page 49: Specifications

    Appendix B: Technical information Specifications Electrical Operating voltage and current: 5 V ± 5%, 0.5A 12 V ± 5%, 350 mA -12 V ± 5%, 50 mA Environmental Power consumption < 7.5 watts. Board size is 23.55 cm x 10.55 cm (9.3” x 4.2”). Operating temperature from 0 to 55°C (32 to 131 °F).

  • Page 50: Appendix C: Glossary

    Appendix C: Glossary This appendix defines some of the specialized terms used in this Matrox Meteor document.
  • Page 51 Appendix C: Glossary Band One of the surfaces of a buffer. A grayscale image requires just one band. A color image requires three bands, one for each color component. Bandwidth A term describing the capacity to transfer data. Greater bandwidth is needed to sustain a higher transfer rate. Greater bandwidth can be achieved, for example, by using a wider bus.
  • Page 52 Digitizer Configuration Format. A DCF defines the input data format and among other things, how to accept or generate video timing signals such as horizontal sync, vertical sync, and pixel clock. Display memory See frame buffer.Exposure time Refers to the period during which the image sensor of a camera is exposed to light.
  • Page 53 Appendix C: Glossary A color space that represents color using components of hue, saturation, and luminance. The hue component describes the actual color of a pixel. The saturation component describes the concentration of that color. The luminance component describes the combined brightness of the primary colors. Host In general, Host refers to the principal CPU in one’s computer.
  • Page 54 PCI Primary/Secondary Bus A high-performance bus that provides a processor-independent data path between the CPU and high-speed peripherals. Programmable Logic Controller. A device used to automate monitoring and control of industrial plants. It can be used as a stand-alone device or in conjunction with data acquisition. Progressive scanning Describes a transfer of data in which the lines of the source input device are written sequentially into the destination...
  • Page 55 Appendix C: Glossary Synchronous function A function that does not return control to the caller until it has finished executing. See also asynchronous function. Vertical sync The part of a video signal that indicates the end of a frame and the start of a new one. See also horizontal sync.

  • Page 56: Customer Support

    If you have a question that is not answered in your manual, in the release notes, or in the readme files on the software CDs, contact your local representative, your regional Matrox office (if applicable), or Matrox Canada (corporate headquarters).
  • Page 57 Electronic Systems Limited. No other warranty is expressed or implied. Matrox is not liable for consequential damages. If you wish to return your board, contact the Matrox authorized dealer where you purchased the board for service. Do not return a product to Matrox without authorization.
  • Page 58 Resolution: Network Card: Network Software: Other cards in system: Software Specific Information Operating system: Rev: Matrox SW used: Rev: Compiler: Rev: Fill out only if you are returning a board RMA #: Who were you talking to in customer support?
  • Page 59 Describe the problem:...
  • Page 60 Artisan Technology Group is your source for quality new and certified-used/pre-owned equipment SERVICE CENTER REPAIRS WE BUY USED EQUIPMENT • FAST SHIPPING AND DELIVERY Experienced engineers and technicians on staff Sell your excess, underutilized, and idle used equipment at our full-service, in-house repair center We also offer credit for buy-backs and trade-ins •...

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