How to take simple measurement with Oscilloscope

MrChips

Joined Oct 2, 2009
30,824
On an analog oscilloscope, the electron beam spends a tiny fraction of the sweep time on the vertical up and down strokes. Hence the vertical traces are much less bright than the horizontal traces.

The digital oscilloscope is simply simulating what you would see on an analog oscilloscope. Rigol did not have to do that. They could have drawn the trace with uniform width.

The two vertical blue lines are time cursors. You use these to make time interval measurements as well as frequency. You can turn these off if you desire.
 

Audioguru again

Joined Oct 21, 2019
6,710
The 10x probe calibration squarewave has a curved and slanted top and bottom. It needs to be adjusted a little so that the squarewave has a perfectly flat top and bottom.
 

MrChips

Joined Oct 2, 2009
30,824
Is it good idea to check Debouncing time of switch with DSO?

EDIT
I think It would be helpful when I interface switch button with microcontroller
You could trigger the oscilloscope on the first transition of the switch signal. This will give you some insight to switch bounce. However, you don't have to so this. You can just take for granted that a delay time of 10-50ms will handle most cases of switch bounce.
 

Thread Starter

Kittu20

Joined Oct 12, 2022
474
You could trigger the oscilloscope on the first transition of the switch signal. This will give you some insight to switch bounce. However, you don't have to so this. You can just take for granted that a delay time of 10-50ms will handle most cases of switch bounce.
I have Arduino Uno and DSO.

Can you suggest some use cases on how to debug embedded system using DSO
 

WBahn

Joined Mar 31, 2012
30,087
Is it good idea to check Debouncing time of switch with DSO?

EDIT
I think It would be helpful when I interface switch button with microcontroller
It's educational to observe the kind of bouncing that occurs when you activate a switch to see that (1) the phenomenon is real, and (2) the time scale over which bouncing happens. This will let you confirm and become comfortable with the common rule of thumb that a switch-debounce circuit or software routine that assume that bouncing occurs for a couple dozen milliseconds is adequate in most circumstances.
 

WBahn

Joined Mar 31, 2012
30,087
I have Arduino Uno and DSO.

Can you suggest some use cases on how to debug embedded system using DSO
This depends on the embedded system and what the bug is.

You question is like someone buying an optical tachometer and then asking if someone can tell them how to debug their car with it.

A DSO is a tool that allows you to measure some kinds of things. If you are debugging something, you need to consider what the bug is -- what is it doing that it isn't supposed to be doing (or vice versa) and then consider what kinds of things can be measured to give you insight into either what the problem is or why the problem is happening. Then you can consider whether a DSO is a reasonable tool to make the measurement.
 

Thread Starter

Kittu20

Joined Oct 12, 2022
474
Your question is like someone buying an optical tachometer and then asking if someone can tell them how to debug their car with it.
I've read old forum threads in which members suggest that it is a good idea to use DSO for embedded system debugging.

I specifically saw two cases where it says so, one for switch debouncing and other for I2C
 

MrChips

Joined Oct 2, 2009
30,824
I've read old forum threads in which members suggest that it is a good idea to use DSO for embedded system debugging.

I specifically saw two cases where it says so, one for switch debouncing and other for I2C
An oscilloscope is a multipurpose tool just like a hammer.
You can crack small nuts. You crack big nuts.
Choose any size nut you want to crack.
 
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