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3.2 Setup Group
In the setup group, there is a button to open the START UP panel, which is used to boot the
modules. The Open Panels popup menu leads to one of the following panels: PARAMETER SETUP,
OSCILLOSCOPE, CHASSIS SETUP, FILES/PATHS
3.2.1 PARAMETER SETUP Panel
The PARAMETER SETUP panel is divided into 7 tabs, summarized below. Settings for all four
channels of a module are shown in the same tab. At the upper right is a control to select the
module to address. At the bottom of the panel is a More button, which will make all advanced
panel controls visible as well.
The Pixie-4 being a digital system, all parameter settings are stored in a settings file. This file is
separate from the Igor experiment file, to allow saving and restoring different settings for
different detectors and applications. Parameter files are saved and loaded with the corresponding
buttons at the bottom of the PARAMETER SETUP panel. After loading a settings file, the settings are
automatically downloaded to the module. At module initialization, the settings are automatically
read and applied to the Pixie module from the last saved settings file.
In addition there are buttons to copy settings between channels and modules, and to extract
settings from a settings file. Two large buttons at the lower left duplicate the buttons to call the
START UP panel and the OSCILLOSCOPE.
3.2.1.1 Trigger Tab
The Trigger tab contains controls to set the trigger filter parameters and the trigger threshold,
together with checkboxes to enable or disable trigger, to control trigger distribution (see section
7.2.1), and to set time stamping options for each channel. Except for the threshold, the trigger
settings have rarely to be changed from their default values.
The threshold value corresponds to ¼ of the pulse height in ADC steps, e.g. with a threshold of
20, triggers are issued for pulses above 80 ADC steps. This relation is true if the trigger filter
rise time is large compared to the pulse rise time and small compared to the pulse decay time. A
pulse shape not meeting these conditions has the effect of raising the effective threshold. For a
modeled behavior of the trigger, you can open displays from the OSCILLOSCOPE and the LIST MODE
TRACES panels that show trigger filter and threshold computed from acquired waveforms using
the current settings. The threshold value is scaled with the trigger filter rise time, therefore it is
not limited to integer numbers.
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PIXIE-4 User’s Manual V2.50
 XIA 2012. All rights reserved.