Hi Roger,
I have a suggestion re. using the NI GPIB in your WindBlowz
machine for auto-control with Linrad. Treat the Microsoft
box with the NI card as a RS-232 controlled instrument by
writing a small VB or C app (or LabVIEW, or HP VEE, etc.)
that takes serial commands from the Linrad machine via
RS-232, then routes them to the signal generator via GPIB.
Do just the reverse if you want to get a response from the
sig gen with Linrad. Same goes for any other I/O hardware
that works under Windoze but not under Linux.
I've actually done something very similar to this in my
professional life, and it worked very well. The bad news
is that I was a good boy and didn't take the code home
with me when I left that company several years ago. In
retrospect, that company no longer exists, but I still do,
so I guess it really wouldn't have mattered to anyone but
me in the long run.
I also have a NI AT-GPIB board, so I guess there really is
a good reason to keep my old ISA/PCI Pentium machines.
73,
Dan KB5MY