Technical data

Instrument Preparation 2

TOF and Q-TOF preparation – calibration and tuning

Agilent 6200 Series TOF and 6500 Series Q-TOF LC/MS System Concepts Guide 51

TOF and Q-TOF preparation – calibration and tuning

See the Installation Guide for

instructions on how to install and

start the TOF or Q-TOF and perform

an initial autotune.

After you start the instrument, you calibrate and tune the TOF

and Q-TOF. This section presents the background information to

help you understand calibration and tuning as they are

implemented in the Agilent TOF and Q-TOF LC/MS system.

To learn how to tune and calibrate

the TOF or Q-TOF, see the Quick

Start Guide and online Help.

The following distinctions show how tuning, optimization and

calibration are related in the Agilent MassHunter Workstation

Software.

Tuning Tuning is the process of adjusting both the quadrupole (for the

Q-TOF) and TOF parameters to achieve the following goals:

• Maximize signal intensity and maintain acceptable

resolution, or

• Maximize resolution and maintain acceptable signal intensity

See “Tuning choices” on page 53

to learn more about Agilent tuning

tools.

The Agilent MassHunter Workstation software and its

documentation and online Help use the words “tuning” and

“optimization” interchangeably.

Agilent Autotune for the TOF and Q-TOF include Initial

Autotune, Checktune, Standard Tune, and Set Detector Gain for

TOF parameters. The tools for optimizing the TOF parameters

also include Quick TOF Tune. All of the TOF Autotune tools

perform both automatic calibration and tuning.

Agilent Autotune for the Q-TOF also includes Initial Autotune,

Checktune and Standard Tune for the quadrupole.

Calibration Calibration is the process of assigning accurate masses based

on the known masses of standard compounds, introduced either

prior to or while running the sample.

TOF mass calibration

Any time that you want to ensure mass accuracy of the

instrument, you do a calibration. You do mass calibrations by

passing a calibrant with known masses from the calibrant bottle

through the mass spectrometer.