Digital oscilloscope with pan and zoom produced from time stamped data

Abstract

Each acquisition record in a random repetitive oscilloscope is time stamped and stored in a location in the acquisition memory indexed by the associated value of trigger offset. Those acquisition records that are older than a selected and variable amount can be discarded instead of being used to contribute data to the waveform record. This has the effect of preventing old data from intruding into a new measurement. When reformulating the waveform record to pan or zoom while using data already acquired, it is possible to ensure that the newest waveform records are included in that reformulation. This has the effect of ensuring that new data is displayed. The time stamp may be a binary count of an elapsed time interval, in units of the sample clock, since some cardinal event, such as the last time ERASE or RESET was pressed. To maximize the random distribution of the trigger offsets represented in the acquisition memory, the rule for deciding which of m-many acquisition records receives this latest data is based on the trigger offset. The first of the acquisition records gets acquisitions whose trigger offsets are at least zero but less than 1/m of a sample period t, the second receives acquisitions whose trigger offsets are at least t/m but less than 2 t/m, and so on.