Using a Scope on the LAN

[D from BC]

Neato...Looks like I can connect my DSO to the router and get pics on
my computer.
Often I just look at the scope and it's a case of "Works!" or "Doesn't
work".
I do my analysis on the spot.
Why make a scope print out or make a file?
I imagine the graphs might be good for published technical papers.
But what else?
Maybe I can email somebody someday with a scope pic and write "
Seeee...it makes a glitch! "

Also, I can't recall the last time someone posted an oscillograph on
SED. IIRC, awhile back, JL's post was a digital cam pic

Is 'Scope on LAN' practical?


D from BC
British Columbia
Canada.

 

[Joerg]

Neato...Looks like I can connect my DSO to the router and get pics on
my computer.
Often I just look at the scope and it's a case of "Works!" or "Doesn't
work".
I do my analysis on the spot.
Why make a scope print out or make a file?

I do. A lot.

I imagine the graphs might be good for published technical papers.
But what else?

Documentation, problem reports and so on. For example, my module specs
often contain real-life scope plots along the lines of "This is the
waveform you should see at the secondary of TR12". Then lots of
investigations for clients. "Look, this is what a transient on the
powerline does to the XYZ bus".

Maybe I can email somebody someday with a scope pic and write "
Seeee...it makes a glitch! "

Au contraire. Almost every day I receive scope pics from clients, asking
me what the cause of the glitch, jitter, whatever could be and
requesting mod suggestions. Without those plots I'd had a hard time
helping them, short of hopping on a airplane and visiting them. I can
consciously say that the ability to quickly exchange scope plots has
avoided dozens of costly business trips over the last few years. Those
to the east coast can eat up almost a whole day just to get there. I
only charge 50% rate for travel time but boy does that add up.

Also, I can't recall the last time someone posted an oscillograph on
SED. IIRC, awhile back, JL's post was a digital cam pic

The last time was this morning at 6:16am by Jamie Morken.

Is 'Scope on LAN' practical?

Absolutamente. Although USB works fine as well. GPIB is a royal pain in
the neck.

 

[Phil Hobbs]

I do. A lot.




Documentation, problem reports and so on. For example, my module specs
often contain real-life scope plots along the lines of "This is the
waveform you should see at the secondary of TR12". Then lots of
investigations for clients. "Look, this is what a transient on the
powerline does to the XYZ bus".



Au contraire. Almost every day I receive scope pics from clients, asking
me what the cause of the glitch, jitter, whatever could be and
requesting mod suggestions. Without those plots I'd had a hard time
helping them, short of hopping on a airplane and visiting them. I can
consciously say that the ability to quickly exchange scope plots has
avoided dozens of costly business trips over the last few years. Those
to the east coast can eat up almost a whole day just to get there. I
only charge 50% rate for travel time but boy does that add up.



The last time was this morning at 6:16am by Jamie Morken.



Absolutamente. Although USB works fine as well. GPIB is a royal pain in
the neck.

Until the first virus shows up, and your scope turns into a pumpkin, two
days after the warranty expires. It's USB keys plus Sneakernet for me.

Cheers,

Phil HObbs

 

[Phil Hobbs]

I do. A lot.




Documentation, problem reports and so on. For example, my module specs
often contain real-life scope plots along the lines of "This is the
waveform you should see at the secondary of TR12". Then lots of
investigations for clients. "Look, this is what a transient on the
powerline does to the XYZ bus".



Au contraire. Almost every day I receive scope pics from clients, asking
me what the cause of the glitch, jitter, whatever could be and
requesting mod suggestions. Without those plots I'd had a hard time
helping them, short of hopping on a airplane and visiting them. I can
consciously say that the ability to quickly exchange scope plots has
avoided dozens of costly business trips over the last few years. Those
to the east coast can eat up almost a whole day just to get there. I
only charge 50% rate for travel time but boy does that add up.



The last time was this morning at 6:16am by Jamie Morken.



Absolutamente. Although USB works fine as well. GPIB is a royal pain in
the neck.

Until the first virus shows up, and your scope turns into a pumpkin, two
days after the warranty expires. It's USB keys plus Sneakernet for me.

Cheers,

Phil HObbs

 

[Joerg]

Until the first virus shows up, and your scope turns into a pumpkin, two
days after the warranty expires. It's USB keys plus Sneakernet for me.

Thou shalt not use scopes that are Windows-based. Too slow for me
anyhow. I guess mine is quite impenetrable for a virus because it
doesn't have a mainstream OS.

 

[Martin Griffith]

Until the first virus shows up, and your scope turns into a pumpkin, two
days after the warranty expires. It's USB keys plus Sneakernet for me.

Cheers,

Phil HObbs

I think your PC must have a virus, it is posting messages twice



martin

 

[D from BC]

I do. A lot.




Documentation, problem reports and so on. For example, my module specs
often contain real-life scope plots along the lines of "This is the
waveform you should see at the secondary of TR12". Then lots of
investigations for clients. "Look, this is what a transient on the
powerline does to the XYZ bus".



Au contraire. Almost every day I receive scope pics from clients, asking
me what the cause of the glitch, jitter, whatever could be and
requesting mod suggestions. Without those plots I'd had a hard time
helping them, short of hopping on a airplane and visiting them. I can
consciously say that the ability to quickly exchange scope plots has
avoided dozens of costly business trips over the last few years. Those
to the east coast can eat up almost a whole day just to get there. I
only charge 50% rate for travel time but boy does that add up.



The last time was this morning at 6:16am by Jamie Morken.



Absolutamente. Although USB works fine as well. GPIB is a royal pain in
the neck.

Cool.. I didn't know that sort of thing was going on.

Also, I might look for Jamie's oscillograph too.
I don't catch all the posts on here..


D from BC
British Columbia
Canada.

 

[Joerg]

Cool.. I didn't know that sort of thing was going on.

Also, I might look for Jamie's oscillograph too.
I don't catch all the posts on here..

It's not as popular here as on other NGs. The German group
de.sci.electronics often tons of scope pics in some threads. I still
have to figure out how to do those "instant uploads". I always have to
fire up FTP and all that. But attaching s scope plot to an email only
takes seconds.

 

[Joel Koltner]

Absolutamente. Although USB works fine as well. GPIB is a royal pain in the
neck.

You know you'd own a Prologix GPIB adapter if that 2465 of yours could
actually dump plots out via GPIB.

(Yes, GPIB is a royal pain, no question there.)

 

[Phil Hobbs]

I think your PC must have a virus, it is posting messages twice



martin

Rats, and I was posting from my scope.

Joerg, I agree completely about Windows scopes...but you can't get
really quick digitizing scopes without it.

Cheers,

Phil Hobbs

 

[Mike Harrison]

Neato...Looks like I can connect my DSO to the router and get pics on
my computer.
Often I just look at the scope and it's a case of "Works!" or "Doesn't
work".
I do my analysis on the spot.
Why make a scope print out or make a file?
I imagine the graphs might be good for published technical papers.
But what else?
Maybe I can email somebody someday with a scope pic and write "
Seeee...it makes a glitch! "

Also, I can't recall the last time someone posted an oscillograph on
SED. IIRC, awhile back, JL's post was a digital cam pic

Is 'Scope on LAN' practical?


D from BC
British Columbia
Canada.

My Agilent 6000 has a web interfacem, which I find useful for a couple of things :
Printing & saving traces from any PC without having to use any special software
Sending SCPI commands to do things like setting unusual time intervals that can't quite be got from
the front panel (e.g. to make one bit of an unusual baudrate fit one division exactly)

 

[John Devereux]

[...]

I think your PC must have a virus, it is posting messages twice



martin

Rats, and I was posting from my scope.

Joerg, I agree completely about Windows scopes...but you can't get
really quick digitizing scopes without it.

Has anyone heard of an actual scope virus? Seems to me it could be
quite likely. I'm sure I have seen (pictures of) them running windows
2000. And who is going to go around making sure the scopes have the
latest and greatest service pack? That could wreck a $50,000
instrument.

 

[Joerg]

Rats, and I was posting from my scope.

Joerg, I agree completely about Windows scopes...but you can't get
really quick digitizing scopes without it.

Don't know what you mean by quick but my GDS-2204 does 1GSPS realtime
and is definitely not Windows-based. If it were I wouldn't have bought it.

 

[Joerg]

My Agilent 6000 has a web interfacem, which I find useful for a couple of things :
Printing & saving traces from any PC without having to use any special software
Sending SCPI commands to do things like setting unusual time intervals that can't quite be got from
the front panel (e.g. to make one bit of an unusual baudrate fit one division exactly)

I have no problem doing that via USB. If I'd have my druthers I'd even
try out one of those USB radio dongles. Now that would be cool.

 

[Phil Hobbs]

Don't know what you mean by quick but my GDS-2204 does 1GSPS realtime
and is definitely not Windows-based. If it were I wouldn't have bought it.

I have a 20 Gs/s Tek TDS7704B. Windows XP.

Cheers,

Phil Hobbs

 

[Joerg]

I have a 20 Gs/s Tek TDS7704B. ...

Wow! But your employer also allows for fat budgets.

... Windows XP.

Not so good. Why did they do that?

 

[D from BC]

I have a 20 Gs/s Tek TDS7704B. Windows XP.

Cheers,

Phil Hobbs

That TDS7704 is around the price of a really nice new car
(Driving a rust bucket? )
Financed... I bet it's like making car payments.

Just 2Gs/s real over here and fits the work I do.
I've yet to see a windows logo...


D from BC
British Columbia
Canada.

 

[qrk]

[...]

Until the first virus shows up, and your scope turns into a
pumpkin, two days after the warranty expires. It's USB keys plus
Sneakernet for me.

Cheers,

Phil HObbs

I think your PC must have a virus, it is posting messages twice



martin

Rats, and I was posting from my scope.

Joerg, I agree completely about Windows scopes...but you can't get
really quick digitizing scopes without it.

Has anyone heard of an actual scope virus? Seems to me it could be
quite likely. I'm sure I have seen (pictures of) them running windows
2000. And who is going to go around making sure the scopes have the
latest and greatest service pack? That could wreck a $50,000
instrument.

A few years back, LeCroy was suggesting that you load a virus scanner
in their Windoze based scopes if it was network connected.

 

[Joerg]

A few years back, LeCroy was suggesting that you load a virus scanner
in their Windoze based scopes if it was network connected.

Oh man ...

I've used one of their scopes at a client last year. For five minutes,
then I had enough of it. Frigging slow. I asked them whether they had a
real scope.

 

[Joel Koltner]

A few years back, LeCroy was suggesting that you load a virus scanner
in their Windoze based scopes if it was network connected.

We have an Agilent network and spectrum analyzers that runs Windows and they
suggest the same thing.

We also have a Tek spectrum analyzer with Windows, and interestingly Tek has
done a much better job than HP at optimizing the Windows start-up time... the
Agilent machines are well over a minute (like a regular desktop PC), whereas
the Tek is probably no more than 30 seconds. Somehow this alone makes me a
little more confident in Tek's ability to make Windows a viable OS for test
equipment than Agilent, even though logically I'm sure there are plenty of
good "Windows tweakers" at both companies, it was probably just a matter of
whether or not they happened to be on the design teams.