Two-channel digital scope claims breakthrough

Yokogawa is claiming a price/performance breakthrough with the addition of a new two-channel instrument to its SignalExplorer family of compact digital oscilloscopes.

Yokogawa is claiming a price/performance breakthrough with the introduction of a new two-channel instrument in the SignalExplorer family of compact, high-performance digital oscilloscopes.

The new DL1720 combines a sampling rate of 1Gsample/s, an analogue bandwidth of 500MHz and a memory length of 1Mword.

Despite its high level of performance, the new instrument, which is small enough to occupy an A4 size footprint on a test bench and weighs only 5.5kg, is priced as a mid-range model.

A number of innovations based on components designed in-house by Yokogawa are responsible for these significant improvements, including high-performance A/D convertors, high-speed data-processing circuitry and a single-chip input amplifier.

The combined effect of these new circuits is a big reduction in component count, very low power consumption, minimal heatsink requirements and therefore considerable cost savings.

Using the DL1720's 6.4in colour TFT liquid crystal display, the repetition frequency of waveform data can be determined by using brightness.

This emulates the behaviour of analogue oscilloscopes, but with the additional capability of distinguishing frequency of occurrence by colour.

The design philosophy behind the DL1720 is to provide 'smart search' functions so that the user can rapidly locate relevant data from captured waveforms using facilities such as history memory; history search; 'search and zoom'; and dual-zoom.

Auto-measure and statistical measurements speed up analysis, and an additional unique function allows the user to designate two areas of the waveform for waveform parameter measurement and calculate both together.

A wide range of communications capabilities includes USB compliant interfaces as standard, allowing keyboards and USB printers to be connected.

The ability to use a keyboard has greatly improved the instrument's ease of use, and screen images from the colour display can be easily output to a colour printer.

The Waveform Viewer software provided allows the user to exchange waveform data and screen images between the oscilloscope and a PC.

Other interfaces include GP-IB, RS-232 and an optional SCSI link.

A 100BaseTX Ethernet interface is available for LAN compatibility, and an e-mail transmission function will provide 'go/no-go' determination results and error messages, as well as measurement data at designated time intervals sent to a specified e-mail address.

A 250Mbyte Zip drive meets the need for large-capacity built-in storage, necessary to take full advantage of the long memory capability of the oscilloscope.

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