Introducing Multisim 12.0!

[Bhavesh]

Hello All,

February 6th 2012 is an exciting day here at National Instruments with the official announcement of Multisim 12.0! The NI team has been working hard for the past 2 years on this major new release and some of the features that are now available are expanding circuit simulation - whether in the domain of circuits education, or circuit design - into new application areas.

It is important that engineers, students and educators are successful when they use NI Multisim, so I would love for you to check out the new features and provide feedback. Some of the exciting new features you will in Multisim 12.0 include:

1. Multisim Snippets: Now you can place an image (.png) on a webpage, e-mail or any other place, which has a Multisim 12.0 file embedded inside of it. This means you can simply drag-and-drop images directly to Multisim and turn an image into a simulatable circuit (check out more here - http://zone.ni.com/devzone/cda/tut/p/id/13668)
2. More Power Components: Power applications continue to become more sophisticated. We are working with the world’s leading semiconductor manufacturers to add power devices such as power switches, controllers, transformers and non-ideal RLCs to an existing group of switch-mode-power-supplies from previous editions of Multisim (learn more at - http://zone.ni.com/devzone/cda/tut/p/id/13714)
3. Analog and Digital Co-Simulation: One of the great difficulties in simulation is being able to accurately simulate analog and digital systems together. For example, if defining a digital controller you will need to interface to analog circuitry (such as the power devices discussed above). Simulating the two of these together has traditionally been difficult (or impossible) with older tools. With Multisim 12.0 you can simulate analog circuitry with embedded code (LabVIEW FPGA) with accurate point-by-point co-simulation. This is a first, and create a new paradigm for teaching power, or designing sophisticated applications (read more at http://zone.ni.com/devzone/cda/tut/p/id/13663)
4. Design for CompactRIO, Single-Board RIO, DAQ (myDAQ): Defining a connector for your custom designs is difficult (you have to make sure your pin-mappings are correct, spacing is perfect etc...). We have seen engineers take hours (if not days) to make sure a connector is correct - and if not you're looking at wasting weeks in prototype iterations as well as thousands of dollars per prototype run. NI has made it easier and will save you days of work by providing 90+ connectors for NI products like CompactRIO, Single-Board RIO and DAQ devices in Multisim 12.0. Check out the connectors, as well as reference designs to get your work started at http://zone.ni.com/devzone/cda/tut/p/id/13717

This is but a glance of some big (and powerful) new features. Check out the rest at http://www.ni.com/multisim/whatsnew/

Since National Instruments acquired the Multisim product-line in 2005 (wow, 7 years go by quickly!) we have been working to bring new features into a rapidly changing environment - both in academia as well as in industry. During that time our releases have steadily incorporated more innovative features, more simulation capabilities, more usability enhancements, and finally more user requested changes. I continue to be taken aback by how our R&D team is able to incorporate so much into each release! This is when we get to see the true result of these efforts when the engineers of the world begin using these features to become more innovative and productive. I can’t wait to hear your feedback!

If you are ready to download and try out the software for the first time, go to http://www.ni.com/multisim/try/

Thanks for continuing to work with National Instruments. Multisim 12.0 is a big release for us, and we look forward to hearing how you have become more successful with our products!

Bhavesh Mistry

General Manager

National Instruments Toronto

Official News Release: http://digital.ni.com/worldwide/bwcontent.nsf/web/all/531352F15193F4BE8625799C00519211