exxos blog - random goings on

[ijor]

I sent a email to Rigol technical support and they replied pretty quick so far...

Having a similar scope I am curious about this. Did you receive a reply? Is this really a bug or it was a configuration issue?

[exxos]

Having a similar scope I am curious about this. Did you receive a reply? Is this really a bug or it was a configuration issue?

I've had a few replies and event sent videos.. Not heard back from them for a few days.. At this point I'm not sure they understood the issue and don't get the impression they even know how to use their own stuff either.

[ijor]

At this point I'm not sure they understood the issue and don't get the impression they even know how to use their own stuff either.

This is how first level support works nowadays. You first interact with people that barely knows about their stuff. Sometimes even it could be AI. It could be a challenge to get escalated to higher support levels.

I have a similar scope, the DH0804. It is the little brother of your scope, or little cousin if you want. But I understand the hardware and the software is basically the same. So probably the behavior is the same ...

This looks blurred by default, even when stopped:

Default

ScopeBlurred-1.jpg (69.83 KiB) Viewed 193 times

You can fix this completely, but only when stopped by disabling WaveForm Freeze in the Display menu:

ScopeBlurred-Freeze.jpg (69.26 KiB) Viewed 193 times

Getting a "stable" display, even while running is a bit more complicated and depends on the signal. In some cases it is enough to change the mem depth:

Blurred with Mem Depth set to Auto

ScopeBlurred-2.jpg (74.45 KiB) Viewed 193 times

Change to max depth:

Change to max Mem Depth

ScopeBlurred-3.jpg (73.39 KiB) Viewed 193 times

You might still get some glitches. You might want to test the "Ultra Acquire" mode.

I found this thread at eevblog elaborating about the issue:
https://www.eevblog.com/forum/testgear/ ... #msg428166

[exxos]

You might still get some glitches. You might want to test the "Ultra Acquire" mode.

I found this thread at eevblog elaborating about the issue:
https://www.eevblog.com/forum/testgear/ ... #msg428166

Thanks will try your suggestions when I have the scope connected next..

That thread seems crazy.. I mean it does sound correct, as multiple data seems "stacked" one on top of the other.. the scope shouldn't be acting like that in the first place. If the screen can't keep up, it needs to frame skip or something, not merging tons of data on top of each other.. that's just simply wrong.. But that thread is 10 years old now.. It's been a issue for all this time......

EDIT:
I've sent the info to Dave.. Not expecting a result, maybe even a canned reply.. but he does review scopes.. So maybe he will look into it.. worth a shot I guess...

[exxos]

Found another use for AI..

Was to lazy to take another image, as the white foam was to close to the edges of the PCB for a good image crop..

BEFORE:

1.PNG (648.73 KiB) Viewed 148 times

AFTER:

2.PNG (307.26 KiB) Viewed 148 times

[ijor]

That thread seems crazy.. I mean it does sound correct, as multiple data seems "stacked" one on top of the other.. the scope shouldn't be acting like that in the first place. If the screen can't keep up, it needs to frame skip or something, not merging tons of data on top of each other..

If I understand correctly how this works, this is by design. The idea is that you won't loose any information, or at least that you'll loose as little as possible.

If you don't mind "loosing" data, skipping frames as you call it, you can increase the "holdoff" timing in the trigger menu. But usually increasing the capture Mem Depth is more convenient.

Personally I don't mind the "blurring" while is in run mode, as long as it is fine when stopped. So I just trigger with the "Single" button that as expected, avoids merging multiple waveforms altogether. I think this is essentially the same effect that you achieve when disabling "Waveform Freeze" and just stopping (instead of single triggering).

[exxos]

Not had chance to look into it more yet but Dave Jones replied..

That's because you are pressing Stop, which freezes the screen as it happens to be, persistence and all.
What you want is to Single capture the trace instead.
I think most scopes will act this way.

Seems a step backwards to me after using scopes for 30 years never used to have that problem

[exxos]

Rigol finally replied again..

May I kindly confirm whether you are still observing the issue under any conditions at the moment?
If yes, please let us know when it occurs so we can advise the next steps.

Like yeah, I had the problem once and decided to waste my time in emailing support and doing videos. So no, the scope didn't magically decide to fix itself.

It gets worse when they don't even suggest trying turning settings off. Even AI came out with some things to try based on what it found on the internet. People been moaning about it for ages. If it's a setting it should be turned off by default IMO to match the behavior of how older scopes behaved

[ijor]

Seems a step backwards to me after using scopes for 30 years never used to have that problem
People been moaning about it for ages. If it's a setting it should be turned off by default IMO to match the behavior of how older scopes behaved

I think it's a matter of getting used to new technology. You have to consider that your new scope is much more powerful and advanced than your old one. Your new scope can trigger ten, or perhaps even tens, times faster than your old one. It has much more memory and much higher bandwidth and sample rate. It can show much more data and information that you could in the older scope. Yes, it might have been useful to change the default config to match older scopes. But it is possible that the new defaults are closer to how high end scopes behave. I don't know, that might have been intentionally the reason. You can see that in the eevblog thread I linked, somebody mentioned that Tektronix scopes had this exact behavior for decades.

Again, as long as you want the "old" behavior only when not running. Just press "Single" instead of Stop. Or as I suggested earlier, if you are too used to use Stop and not Single, just disable "Freeze" in the display menu. Disabling Freeze will essentially bring the old behavior when stopped. But using Single is more flexible. You can still use "normal" Stop, with Freeze enabled, if you want to check jitter, i.e.

Getting a single waveform when running is a bit more complicated. Again, either Increase the Acquisition Mem Depth, or either increase (significantly) the HoldOff timer. For maximum control you might want to explore "Ultra Acquire" and segmented memory mode. I never actually used this mode. Seems very powerful but also very complicated and probably I don't really need it for my purposes.

[exxos]

Well this has been driving me nuts all day

Been having some right odd issues with my 16mhz booster on my H5. Long story short. after stripping the firmware back to CPU=CLK8 it still didn't boot.. The CPU in the MB worked fine.. So I connected the FORCE 8MHZ wire and it booted !! This is basically impossible.

So it seems Atmel programer has some bug

Capture.PNG (78.34 KiB) Viewed 79 times

So I use WINCUPL to compile the new code. Then I click program. However, while the program passes, I beleive its not read the updated file!!

My test code did not work with CPU=CLK8 without the wire, which is impossible as its not used in the code. Verified the firmware.. all fine. So I just clicked the Atmel load file box, selected the same file again, then programed, now it boots as it should without the wire !!

I don't remember having this trouble, but I wonder how many hours I could have wasted over the years not knowing it doesn't re-read the file automatically



@agranlund are you aware of that issue ?