Cogan, S. Lidia, S.M. Webber, R.C. JACoW Geneva, Switzerland 978-3-95450-177-9 10.18429/JACoW-IBIC2016-WEAL03 English 573-577 WEAL03 diagnostics hardware FPGA software data-acquisition Contribution to a conference proceedings 2017 2017-02 http://dx.doi.org/10.18429/JACoW-IBIC2016-WEAL03 http://jacow.org/ibic2016/papers/weal03.pdf Strategies for data acquisition and processing will be discussed in the context of the Facility for Rare Isotope Beams (FRIB). Design decisions include selecting and designing electronics hardware, data acquisition cards, firmware design, and how to integrate with EPICS control system. With over 300 diagnostic devices and 16 unique types of devices, timing for synchronous data acquisition is important. Strategies to accelerate development as well as reduce maintenance requirements will be dis-cussed, including using common hardware and firmware whenever possible, and defining a common data report-ing structure for use by most devices. MicroTCA.4 plat-form is used to integrate data acquisition cards, distribute timing information, and machine protection signals.