First wireless lab management solution for education

Farnell element14 now supplies the industry’s first wireless lab instrument management solution from Tektronix, for quickly setting up and efficiently managing basic electronics engineering laboratories at colleges, universities and other educational facilities. The new TekSmartLab TSL3000A solution supports up to 120 instruments (30 test benches) on a single platform. At many education institutions, implementing productive and fully integrated instrument networks in classrooms can be a daunting task. Using LAN cables to set up a network for example is costly, time consuming and limits flexibility and many instruments lack LAN ports. The TekSmartLab eliminates cabling hassles by converting instruments’ USB ports into a wireless interface using a Wi-Fi-USB converter while giving professors the software tools they need to efficiently manage large, busy classrooms. TekSmartLab eliminates many repetitive manual tasks, saving valuable class time. Features such as intuitive laboratory layout emulation, automatic instrument configuration, and push-button report generation mean that professors and students can focus on learning. Running on a lab server, TekSmartLab is set up without any LAN cables or special instrument configuration. Professors can load instrument configurations associated with different course requirements and then distribute them to up to 120 instruments with a single mouse click from one central dashboard. Professors can easily check the instrument status and measurement contents of a specific test bench remotely and save student results into a report. TekSmartLab automatically records and displays asset information and tracks usage time improving overall lab management. Most Tektronix and Keithley instruments intended for education applications are supported by TekSmartLab including Tektronix TBS1000B-EDU series, DPO/MSO2000B series and MDO3000 series oscilloscopes; AFG2021 and AFG3000C series arbitrary function generators; and Keithley DMM2110 multi-meters and 2231A-30-3 power supplies, says the company.