How to Use an Oscilloscope

Contributors: jimblom

Basics of O-Scopes

The main purpose of an oscilloscope is to graph an electrical signal as it varies over time. Most scopes produce a two-dimensional graph with time on the x-axis and voltage on the y-axis.

Controls surrounding the scope's screen allow you to adjust the scale of the graph, both vertically and horizontally -- allowing you to zoom in and out on a signal. There are also controls to set the trigger on the scope, which helps focus and stabilize the display.

What Can Scopes Measure

In addition to those fundamental features, many scopes have measurement tools, which help to quickly quantify frequency, amplitude, and other waveform characteristics. In general a scope can measure both time-based and voltage-based characteristics:

• Timing characteristics:
  • Frequency and period -- Frequency is defined as the number of times per second a waveform repeats. And the period is the reciprocal of that (number of seconds each repeating waveform takes). The maximum frequency a scope can measure varies, but it's often in the 100's of MHz (1E6 Hz) range.
  • Duty cycle -- The percentage of a period that a wave is either positive or negative (there are both positive and negative duty cycles). The duty cycle is a ratio that tells you how long a signal is "on" versus how long it's "off" each period.
  • Rise and fall time -- Signals can't instantaneously go from 0V to 5V, they have to smoothly rise. The duration of a wave going from a low point to a high point is called the rise time, and fall time measures the opposite. These characteristics are important when considering how fast a circuit can respond to signals.
• Voltage characteristics:
  • Amplitude -- Amplitude is a measure of the magnitude of a signal. There are a variety of amplitude measurements including peak-to-peak amplitude, which measures the absolute difference between a high and low voltage point of a signal. Peak amplitude, on the other hand, only measures how high or low a signal is past 0V.
  • Maximum and minimum voltages -- The scope can tell you exactly how high and low the voltage of your signal gets.
  • Mean and average voltages -- Oscilloscopes can calculate the average or mean of your signal, and it can also tell you the average of your signal's minimum and maximum voltage.

When to Use an O-Scope

The o-scope is useful in a variety of troubleshooting and research situations, including:

• Determining the frequency and amplitude of a signal, which can be critical in debugging a circuit's input, output, or internal systems. From this, you can tell if a component in your circuit has malfunctioned.
• Identifying how much noise is in your circuit.
• Identifying the shape of a wave -- sine, square, triangle, sawtooth, complex, etc.
• Quantifying phase differences between two different signals.