Heiland densitometer TRD2 USB option?

The Heiland TRD2 densitometer has an option for an USB connection (option 03, DE-OPT.03), and it also has the DensePC software (DENSPC) to get the data from the densitometer via the USB.

My impression is that the densitometer saves a file to disk via USB when making measurements. I would like to access this file (possibly by custom made software) without using the DensePC software.

Can anyone tell me if the data from the densitometer is indeed available on disk as a file independently from the DensePC software. If so, what is the format of this file, is it plain text (possibly comma-delimited)?

To clarify this, currently I have no Heiland densitometer but I want to buy one early next year and I must decide which options to include.

In this case my question is if I can use the USB option without the DensePC software. I assume a file with data is saved to disk when a connection is made, in the same way as a modern camera, but I would like to have a confirmation before possibly spending money on the (outdated) software.

Preferably I would also like to know the format of the file.

Have you tried contacting Heiland directly & asking them?

Lachlan Young said:

Have you tried contacting Heiland directly & asking them?

Click to expand...

Not yet, I didn't think of it actually because there are quite a few Heiland users on Photrio. They indeed have an e-mail on the web site and I will ask them directly (and post the answer here).

I wrote an e-mail to Heiland with my questions and promply got an answer the next day (from Juergen Heiland himself). So, good service!

I'll add the info here for Photrio members searching on this subject.

1. The USB option (DE-OPT.03) for the Heiland Heiland TRD2 densitometer can be used independently from the DensePC software.
2. The USB output emulates a RS232 (COMx) connection and sends data out automatically after a stable measuring value has been detected.
3. The data format is described on page 15 of the user manual TRD2_Uman_V64.pdf which can be downloaded from the Heiland web site (http://heilandelectronic.de/home/lang:en).

From this info I derive that the USB is acting like a serial port connection, it is not making a new disk on the connected PC from which the data can be copied (like a camera or external drive).
So custom made software must access the data via serial port, there is no file on disk which can be opened.

For now my strategy is to buy the USB option without the DensePC software and see if I can write a routine to get the data. That would allow me to implement any calculations I can think of and automate the process instead of collecting and processing density values by hand.