Uvikon

Uvikon is a tool to control a Uvikon spectrophotometer conveniently from a personal computer.

Overview

The problems with the Uvikon 860

UVIKON offers a simple solution

Download information

Overview

The Kontron Uvikon 860 spectrophotometer has been a very popular instrument a few years ago and is still widely used. The UVIKON software provides a means to connect the instrument to a computer. This allows to remote control the instrument and to retrieve measured data and save them to a disk.. It is a 16-bit Windows software which runs on all PCs with Windows 3.1, 3.11, 95, 98 as well as on Windows NT.

The problems with the Uvikon 860

The Uvikon 860 was constructed in the early years of the personal computer. Inside there is a computer similar to the IBM XT (R.I.P.), but the capabilities of this computer are limited. However there is a serial port to hook up an external computer, and this can be used to control the instrument and to transfer the data.

If you ever have to make lots of measurements, especially with different methods on the same samples, you will suffer from numb fingertips due to the poor keyboard. The use of a regular computer keyboard and a mouse could take a lot of strain off your fingers.

UVIKON offers a simple solution

The UVIKON software is a simple Windows application and requires next to no training. You can select the measurement method from the menu and enter all parameters into a dialog box. Different settings may be stored as method files and retrieved at any later session. The settings are then transferred to the instrument with a mouseclick. Running auto-zero or running a baseline can also be done with a mouseclick. Finally you run your samples, again with a mouseclick. All data are transferred to the computer at the time of measurement. They can easily be copied and pasted into any spreadsheet software.

Download information

The latest version of the binary is 2.04. The sources (you'll need a M$ C++ compiler) are here.

The documentation is contained in the help file.