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

Amplitude	Frequency	Inter-channel Phase

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.

Continuous-Time Detector

Amplitude	Distortion	Intermodulation	Noise	Cross-talk

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.

FFT Detectors

Amplitude	Distortion	Intermodulation	Noise	etc. etc. etc.

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.

Graphical results

Scope	FFT Spectrum	Residual	Residual FFT	filter

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.

Swept results

Frequency	Amplitude	Time	Filter	Nested

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.

Generator Functions

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

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.

Digital Parameters

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...

Specifications, features and functions above refer to dScope Series III. The presence of a feature above does not imply that the feature is available in other dScope versions. Any reference to digital parameters does not apply to dScope Series IIIA or dScope Series IIIA+. Please refer to the dScope Series III Features Page for a feature table for the different versions.

Specifications subject to amendment.