Signal capture and serial protocol decoding with a PicoScope 2406B
Four analog channels at up to 1 GS/s and 50 MHz bandwidth, with the decoded protocol overlaid directly on the electrical waveform. That means a marginal I2C rise time, a glitch on a chip select line, or a CAN bus with reflections shows up next to the bytes it produced, not in a separate tool.
Send me your problem See services| Time (us) | SCL | SDA | Layer | Decoded event |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 0.0 | high | falling | I2C | START condition |
| 1.2 | clocking | 0x68 | I2C | Address 0x68, Write |
| 3.6 | clocking | ACK | I2C | Slave acknowledged |
| 4.8 | clocking | 0x00 | I2C | Register pointer 0x00 |
| 7.4 | clocking | NACK | I2C | Missing acknowledge, bus stall follows |
Services
Engagements combine oscilloscope-grade signal capture with protocol-level decoding.
- Serial bus debugging
- Decode and inspect I2C, SPI, UART and CAN traffic with the underlying waveform in view, to catch timing violations, bus contention and signal-integrity faults that a logic-only analyzer would miss.
- Signal integrity checks
- Rise time, ringing, overshoot and crosstalk measurements on digital lines running at or below 50 MHz, to explain intermittent communication faults.
- Automotive and industrial bus analysis
- CAN and LIN capture and decode, including arbitration and error-frame behavior, for diagnosing bus faults on vehicle or industrial control networks.
- Mixed analog and digital troubleshooting
- Correlating an analog event, such as a supply droop or a noisy sensor line, with the digital protocol activity happening at the same moment.
- Timing and glitch capture
- Deep-memory capture at up to 1 GS/s to catch intermittent glitches and timing violations that only appear occasionally, and confirm whether they correlate with a bus event.
- Deliverables
- A written findings report, exported waveform and decode captures, and specific recommendations for firmware, wiring or hardware changes.
Supported protocol decoding
Decoding is provided by the PicoScope 6 software and is included at no extra cost. The protocols below are all supported by the software; those marked with a dashed border run at signal speeds beyond this scope's 50 MHz bandwidth and 4-channel analog front end, so they are listed for completeness rather than offered as a service.
Embedded and field buses
- I2C
- SPI-MISO/MOSI
- SPI-SDIO
- UART / RS232
- Extended UART
- 1-Wire
- PS/2
- Quadrature
- Parallel Bus
- Manchester
- Differential Manchester
- I2S
- I3C BASIC v1.0
- SMBus
- PMBus
Automotive and industrial networks
- CAN
- LIN
- CAN J1939
- MODBUS ASCII
- MODBUS RTU
- CAN FD
- CAN XL
- FlexRay
- PSI5 (Sensor)
- SENT Fast
- SENT Slow
- SENT SPC
- MIL-STD-1553
- ARINC 429
Lighting, AV and specialty
- DALI
- DMX512
- DCC
- NMEA-0183
- SBS Data
- Wind Sensor
High-speed data and networking
- USB (1.0/1.1)
- Ethernet 10BASE-T
- Fast Ethernet 100BASE-TX
- 10BASE-T1S
- BroadR-Reach
Engagement process
A defined process with clear outputs at each stage.
- ScopingYou describe the symptom, the bus or signal involved, and access to the board. I confirm whether this equipment fits the problem.
- Capture and analysisThe relevant lines are probed and captured while the fault is reproduced, then decoded and correlated to the waveform.
- ReportingYou receive the findings, exported captures and recommended corrective actions.
Scope of work
Services cover signal capture and protocol decoding on lines within the instrument's 50 MHz bandwidth and 1 GS/s sample rate, across up to four analog channels.
High-speed protocols such as full-rate USB 2.0, standard Ethernet and FlexRay exceed what this scope can reliably capture, and are not offered as a service even though the software supports their decoder.
Request an engagement
Send a short description of the board, the bus involved and the symptom. I will reply with an assessment of whether and how this can help.