Agilent Technologies 42A, 54621D, 24A, 54621A, 22A, 41A manual Acquiring Data, Single versus Run/Stop

MegaZoom Concepts and Oscilloscope Operation

Acquiring Data

Acquiring Data

The oscilloscope operates like an analog oscilloscope, but it can do much more. Spending a few minutes to learn some of this capability will take you a long way toward more productive troubleshooting.

Single versus Run/Stop

The oscilloscope has a Single key and a Run/Stop key. When you press Run/Stop (key is illuminated green when running), the trigger processing rate is optimized over memory depth. Single always uses the maximum memory available. When you press the Single key, the oscilloscope has at least twice as much memory as when running repetitively. Because more memory is available when using Single at slow sweep speeds, the oscilloscope will have a greater sample rate.

When the oscilloscope is running, pressing Run/Stop (key is illuminated red when stopped), the oscilloscope stops, and several triggers of information could be displayed on the screen. This will happen in several cases:

•At very fast sweep speeds (2 ∝ s/div and faster), you might see less than a full screen of data per trigger. In this case, we build a picture from several triggers. Doing this provides a more accurate and responsive display than mathematically interpolating between points.

•With Average acquire mode on, several triggers are averaged together to reduce noise.

•When using infinite persistence, all triggers remain on the screen.

•At very slow sweep speeds (1 s/div), part of the last trigger may still be on the screen when the oscilloscope is stopped.

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