dScope Series III Functions and Capabilities

The dScope Series III is the result of many years of continuous development. Getting the hardware architecture right from the start has allowed the instrument to evolve in software to include a huge range of measurement capabilities with more being added regularly in free software updates. The below is just a snapshot view of some of the main ones. Many of these capabilities are available in combination - for example, a user defined FFT detector could be used in a nested sweep which uses regulation to keep distortion constant. The result could then plotted relative to another trace and the result limit checked. Because of the number of permutations such as this it is impossible to list all the capabilities, therefore the below should not be regarded as an exhaustive list.

Signal Analyzer

The Signal Analyzer is a two-channel real-time instrument operating in DSP in the dScope hardware that reads the RMS amplitude, the frequency and the inter-channel phase of the incoming signal. A range of units is available for each reading

• Amplitude
  
• Frequency
  
• Phase
  

Continuous-Time Detector

The Continuous-Time Detector is a two-channel real-time voltmeter operating in DSP in the dScope hardware. It measures the amplitude of a signal in conjunction with high-pass, low-pass and band-pass filters, weighting functions, and different meter responses. Many more specialised measurements than those listed here are possible, e.g., PSRR, gain, etc. etc. and are available in a wide range of absolute and relative units.

• Amplitude
  
• Distortion
  
• Intermodulation
  
• Noise
  
• Cross-talk
  

FFT Detectors

An FFT Detector is a two-channel programmable software analyzer. They are supplied loaded with a wide range of common (and not-so-common) measurements, but are user programmable using data from time domain or frequency domain buffers - if you can describe it mathematically from the sample or FFT data, you can measure it. Furthermore, you can have up to 40 FFT detectors simultaneously.

• Amplitude
  
• Distortion
  
• Intermodulation
  
• Noise
  
• etc. etc. etc.
  

Graphical results

The trace window is capable of showing many kinds of dissimilar traces simultaneously. Traces can be created from user data (scripting), copied, saved, reloaded, compared to limits and transformed (Normalization, smoothing, inversion, trace relative). There are cursors, markers, tools for exporting to graphics files, printing and exporting as data. Traces can be accessed from the scripting interface for custom traces, analysis and automation.

• Scope
  
• FFT Spectrum
  
• Residual
  
• Residual FFT
  
• filter
  

Swept results

The sweep functionality of dScope is extremely flexible - almost any readings including user FFT readings can be swept against two of a wide range of other parameters including amplitudes, frequencies, filter frequencies, time steps, jitter amplitude and frequency, digital carrier DC offset, sensed frequencies and amplitudes, input channel arrays (switchers), and user data tables. At each step, the dScope can perform regulation and execute user scripts. 4 parameters on two channels can be swept simultaneously. Sweeps can be appended and limit checked.

• Frequency
  
• Amplitude
  
• Time
  
• Filter
  
• Nested
  

Generator Functions

As well as a range of standard waveforms such as sine, square, white noise etc., dScope is capable of generating specialised signals such as bin-centres, and multi-tones. Additionally, completely arbitrary user waveforms can be loaded as WAV files or calculated from scripts.

• Standard
  
• Twin-tone
  
• Noise
  
• Multi-tones
  
• Bin-centres
  
• User
  

Digital Parameters

Both the digital carrier and the digital data can be analyzed and controlled

• Digital Inputs
  
• Digital Carrier
  
• Carrier Display
  
• Jitter Spectrum
  
• Channel Status 1
  
• Channel Status 2
  

And that's before we mention reliability checking, the Event Manager, Digital carrier checks, Channel check, Distortion (CTD) checks, Limit line checking, Bin centres near-real time frequency response, Comprehensive multi-tone results (TD / noise / frequency response etc), Digital Carrier Analysis Frame rate, Frame rate deviation, Carrier quick checks (unlocked, biphase etc), Bit activity, Bit transparency, User bit transparency, Carrier amplitude, Carrier phase WRT generator, Jitter (Fs, data, eye narrowing), Delay script (single domain) Impulse response measurement Log swept sine, Quasi-anechoic measurements, QC testing, Pass / fail limits, Automation, Weighting filters, AES17 scripted tests, Dolby / DTS encoded stream generation, Dolby 2.1 / 5.1 testing, etc., etc., etc...