Product Description

The GPS170PCI has been designed to synchronize the system time of computers with PCI/PCI-X bus interface and to provide an API (Application Programming Interface) which allows you to read the time with great accuracy and precision from within your own application.

The IRIG output of the GPS170PCI can be used to synchronize IRIG time code receivers. Using TCR167PCI slot cards provides a convenient solution to synchronize more than one standalone (non-networked) computer system – eliminating the need of deploying several GPS antennas.

The drivers package for Windows contains a time adjustment service which runs in the background and adjusts the Windows system time continuously and smoothly. A monitor program is also included which lets the user check the status of the device and the time adjustment service, and can be used to modify configurable parameters, if run with administrator rights.

The driver packages for Linux and FreeBSD contain a kernel driver which allows the board to be used as a reference time source for the NTP daemon which is shipped with most Unix-like operating systems. This also turns the computer into an NTP time server which can also provide accurate time to NTP clients on the network. Some command line tools can be used to setup configurable parameters and monitor the status of the board.

For usage of the card on other operating systems please contact Meinberg support: techsupport@meinberg.de.

The device’s serial port is not required for operation but can be used to update the card’s firmware, or provide another computer with the current time via a serial time string.

If you are going to use the GPS170PCI in your own applications, please use our software development kit which shows how to access the card from within your software.

All drivers and SDKs can be downloaded free of charges from our website and we are happy to assist you if you face any difficulties in using the Meinberg driver API in your software development process.