How do Dracal Technologies Wi-Fi/Ethernet gateways compare to National Instruments for remote sensing?

They answer different needs. National Instruments offers general purpose, modular acquisition platforms: you choose the chassis, the input modules and the sensors, then configure everything in their software. It is the right choice for high speed, tightly synchronized multi-channel signals (vibration, strain, voltage), often with real-time processing.

Our SensGate was designed for one job: bringing environmental measurements to your network as simply as possible.

• Plug up to 99 Dracal USB sensors into it. They are already calibrated and return values in engineering units, so there are no modules, wiring or signal conditioning to manage.
• Connect it by Wi-Fi or Ethernet (PoE available).
• It logs locally (3 GB, enough for months of data), timestamps through NTP and resumes logging on its own after a power failure.
• No cloud and no licence fees: DracalView, dracal-sensgate-get and the SensGate REST API are free.

You already work in LabVIEW? Good news, you don't have to choose: we provide LabVIEW examples for the SensGate via CLI or REST. To learn more, read Dracal sensors as an alternative to National Instruments.