OpenLab CDS .dx file converter: CSV and Excel (Beta)

OpenLab CDS 2 stores every injection as a .dx file. Inside is a ZIP archive with files named after long random IDs (7aa3654a-….UV, ff77c051-….CH, 04ee06fd-….IT) and an injection.acmd file that says what each one is. Renaming the .dx to .zip shows the parts, but no other program can read them. This converter opens the archive, decodes every part and names it after the signal it holds.

How to convert a .dx file

1. Export or copy the .dx file from OpenLab (one per injection) and upload it; several files at once are fine.
2. Choose the number format and, for diode-array data, the wavelengths you want as chromatograms.
3. Download the CSV files or the Excel workbook.

What is inside and what you get

• Detector signals (.CH parts): DAD wavelengths, RID and other detectors, each as a CSV with retention time in minutes and the response in its unit, named like DAD1A,Sig=210.0,4.0 Ref=360.0,100.0.
• Diode-array spectra (.UV part): a time × wavelength table in mAU and chromatograms extracted at the wavelengths of the run's own signals, including their reference wavelength.
• Instrument traces (.IT parts): pump pressure, flow, solvent ratios, column and sampler temperatures, lamp voltage and whatever else the method stored, each with its own time axis.
• Injection details from injection.acmd: sample name, operator, injection time with its UTC offset, method path, vial location, injection volume, sequence line.

Two details that matter

• The spectra in a .dx archive need the stored scale factor applied twice. Applied once, the absorbance comes out thousands of times too large; applied twice, it agrees with the single-wavelength signals of the same run, as checked on test runs.
• Instrument traces are stored as pairs of time and value, so each trace keeps its own time axis and sampling rate.

Pitfalls

• A .dx file is a result package of one injection. Sequences or whole projects are several .dx files; upload them together or as one ZIP.
• Processing results (integration, calibration) are not part of the raw data parts and are not exported.

For ChemStation .D folders see Open an Agilent .D folder without ChemStation.

More about what this tool reads and writes: Chromatography Data Converter (Agilent, Shimadzu, Waters, AIA).