Software addresses new serial communications standards

“The electronics industry is confronted with faster development cycles that require more advanced measurement tools and support for new serial communication standards” said Trevor Smith, Business Development Manager for Test & Measurement products at Pico. “The new version of PicoScope addresses many challenges with the addition of new mathematical waveform processing tools, decoding of popular serial protocols, and improvements to FFT frequency domain plotting. For users with touchscreens, Pico has introduced pinch and zoom support to enable easy panning and positioning of captured waveforms.”

Advanced waveform mathematics now includes user-configurable filters: High Pass, Low Pass, Band Pass and Band Stop. The filters can be used to model missing circuit elements on live waveforms, and to do “what-if” analysis using different design parameters.

Frequency and duty cycle versus time plotting is a new feature that enables analysis of “Big Waveform Data” at a glance. With those plots it is possible to measure clock jitter and wander, modulation depth and characteristics of FM signals on a cycle-by-cycle basis.

Serial buses are commonplace in embedded systems, with new standards frequently being introduced – each one optimised for a specific application class and a balance of performance, reliability and cost. PicoScope has support for a total of sixteen protocols including SENT, 10- and 100BASE-T Ethernet, DMX512 (lighting systems) and DCC (model railways). Support for older standards such as I²C, SPI, CAN and UART / RS-232 has been updated and improved.