Application-configurable PicoSample 3 oscilloscope software
Designed for ease of use
The PicoSample 3 workspace takes full advantage of your available display size and resolution. You decide how much space to give to the trace display and the measurements display, and whether to open or hide the control menus. The user interface is fully touch- or mouse-operable, with grabbing and dragging of traces, cursors, regions and parameters. There are enlarged parameter controls for use on smaller touch displays. To zoom, either draw a zoom window or use the more traditional dual timebase, delay and scaling controls.
A choice of screen formats
When working with multiple traces, you can display them all on one grid or separate them into two or four grids. You can also plot signals in XY mode with or without additional voltage-time grids. The persistence display modes use color-coding or shading to show statistical variations in the signal. Trace display can be in either dots-only or vector format.
Eye-diagram analysis
The PicoScope 9300 Series scopes quickly measure more than 30 fundamental parameters used to characterize non‑return‑to‑zero (NRZ) signals and return-to-zero (RZ) signals. Up to ten parameters can be measured simultaneously, with comprehensive statistics also shown.
The measurement points and levels used to generate each parameter can optionally be drawn on the trace.
Eye-diagram analysis can be made even more powerful with the addition of mask testing, as described below.
Pattern sync trigger and eye line mode
When a repeating data pattern such as a pseudorandom bit sequence is present, an internal trigger divider can lock to it. You can then use eye-line mode to move the trigger point, and view point, along the whole pattern, bit by bit. Eye-line scan mode is also available to build an eye diagram from a user-selected range of bit intervals through to the whole pattern. These features are useful for analyzing data-dependent waveshapes.
Mask testing
PicoSample 3 has a built-in library of over 160 masks for testing data eyes. It can count or capture mask hits or route them to an alarm or acquisition control. You can stress-test against a mask using a specified margin, and locally compile or edit masks.
There’s a choice of gray-scale and color-graded display modes to aid in analyzing noise and jitter in eye diagrams. There is also a statistical display showing a failure count for both the original mask and the margin.
The extensive menu of built-in test waveforms is invaluable for checking your mask test setup before using it on live signals.
Measurement of over 100 waveform parameters with statistics
The PicoScope 9300 Series scopes quickly measure well over 100 standard waveform and eye parameters, either for the whole waveform or constrained between markers. The markers can also make on-screen ruler measurements, so you don’t need to count graticules or estimate the waveform’s position. Up to ten simultaneous measurements are possible. The measurements conform to IEEE standard definitions, but you can edit them for non-standard thresholds and reference levels using the advanced menu or by dragging the on-screen thresholds and levels. You can apply limit tests to up to four measured parameters.
A dedicated frequency counter shows signal frequency at all times, regardless of measurement and timebase settings.
Powerful mathematical analysis
The PicoScope 9300 Series scopes support up to four simultaneous mathematical combinations or functional transformations of acquired waveforms.
You can select any of the mathematical functions to operate on either one or two sources. All functions can operate on live waveforms, waveform memories or even other functions. There is also a comprehensive equation editor for creating custom functions of any combination of source waveforms.
- Choose from 61 math functions, or create your own
- Add, Subtract, Multiply, Divide, Invert, Absolute, Exponent, Logarithm, Differentiate, Integrate, Inverse, FFT, Interpolation, Smoothing
FFT analysis
All PicoScope 9300 Series oscilloscopes can calculate real, imaginary and complex Fast Fourier Transforms of input signals using a range of windowing functions. The results can be further processed using the math functions. FFTs are useful for finding crosstalk and distortion problems, adjusting filter circuits designed to filter out certain harmonics in a waveform, testing impulse responses of systems, and identifying and locating noise and interference sources.
Histogram analysis
Behind the powerful measurement and display capabilities of the 9300 Series lies a fast, efficient data histogramming capability. A powerful visualization and analysis tool in its own right, the histogram is a probability graph that shows the distribution of acquired data from a source within a user-definable window.
Histograms can be constructed on waveforms on either the vertical or horizontal axes. The most common use for a vertical histogram is measuring and characterizing noise and pulse parameters. A horizontal histogram is typically used to measure and characterize jitter.
Software Development Kit
The PicoSample 3 software can operate as a stand-alone oscilloscope program or under ActiveX remote control. The ActiveX control conforms to the Windows COM interface standard so that you can embed it in your own software. Unlike more complex driver-based programming methods, ActiveX commands are text strings that are easy to create in any programming environment. Programming examples are provided in Visual Basic (VB.NET), MATLAB, LabVIEW and Delphi, but you can use any programming language or standard that supports the COM interface, including JavaScript and C. National Instruments LabVIEW drivers are also available. All the functions of the PicoScope 9300 and the PicoSample software are accessible remotely.
The SDK consists of the PicoSample 3 software download and a comprehensive programmer's guide, both available from picotech.com, and example code freely available from our GitHub organization page, github.com/picotech. The SDK can control the oscilloscope over the USB or the LAN port.
