Channel Settings

In Settings → Channels you can see the available names that can be assigned to the oscilloscope channels. Set a specific name for a channel is just a self reminder for the visualized data. No function is associated with the Channel naming.

If you don’t use some channel name of them you clicking on the eye and hide it.

You can add or remove custom names with the + and buttons. You can remove only custom names previously created.

When you modify this list HScope saves the current configuration in a file called Channel_Names.cfg under your HScope document folder.

By clicking on the document icon with the + on you can import a custom names list from file (from example a configuration saved on another phone).

Calibration

Calibration parameter are showed and can be adjusted just when the oscilloscope is connected on the phone.

1. Factory Reset

Set the calibration parameters according the calibration data stored in the oscilloscope (it works just for few models, check this possibility in the oscilloscope specific webpage).

2. Calibrate Zero Level (or Offset)

Allow to set the output to 0V when the probe is connected to its ground. It practically reduce the offset error.

3. Calibrate Multiplier (or Gain)

Allow to reduce the gain error of the oscilloscope, by using an accurate reference voltage.
You can also repeat this procedure with different reference voltages. In this case, for each channel, start from lower reference voltages to higher ones.

First it is necessary to calibrate the Zero Level, then the Multiplier Factor

4. Reset

Reset the calibration data.

5. Load

Load the calibration data from a file.

6. Save

Save the calibration data to a file.

For each channel is possible to calibrate the Zero Level (b) (so that when the probe is connected to the GND the result of the measure is 0 Volts) and the Multiplier factor (m). Assuming the ADC measured values are on a straight line the Multiplier factor allow to adjust the inclination of the ADC line according the equation y=(x+b)m.
First it is necessary to calibrate the Zero Level, then the Multiplier Factor.

Oscilloscope Settings

Here you have the settings related the oscilloscope and you can see the oscilloscope information (when connected).

Connections

Enable the WiFi or Bluetooth connection in case you have these kind of oscilloscope. If not disable them so the app would not search on these networks.

The IP Address (WiFi) configuration is currently used only for iDSO1070 oscilloscope in case the user assign a custom IP address to this device in the WiFi network.

Oscilloscope Info

Here you can see the hardware information when the oscilloscope is connected. This screen is refreshed in real-time.

Hardware Configurations

Here you can set additional oscilloscope hardware configurations, according the oscilloscope capabilities.

General Settings

In the General Settings you can see your device information.

Units

You can change the rate unit in the menu to show Samples/s or Bw (Bandwidth). The 2 units are equivalent.

Font Size, Line Thickness/Color

They change the graph and data aspect.

Graphic Quality

You can enable Antialiasing for the lines of the signal. Anti-aliasing is a method by which you can eliminate jaggies that appear in graph lines.

You can also enable the Phosphor effect which keep drawn the old signal patter on the screen for a certain time, like in the old oscilloscopes. With this effect you may see better the signal fast variations (eg. noise).

Decay Phosphor effect

Samples Interpolation

When the Scope acquire a signal we receive just samples but we don’t know what’s the signal shape between the samples. We can just connect the dots (Linear Interpolation) or better we can reconstruct the original signal according the Whittaker–Shannon formula (Sinc Interpolation).

Step Interpolation is generally used for digital signal, it shows one horizontal line for each sample.

High Brightness

Keep the screen at full brightness when using the app.

Immersive Mode

Allow the app to run in full-screen mode.

Invert Screen

Invert the screen visualizzation to be more convenient according the position of the USB cable on the Android device.

Alert Sound

Set the type of sound used for alerts (used in alarmed cursors to advice that the signal passed a certain threshold).

FPS/SPS

Enabling this option it is possible to know how many acquisitions are currently taken by the Scope (SPS: Scans Per Second) and how many time the screen is refreshed (FPS: Frame Per Second). This number may vary from device and rate settings.

Send anonymous usage statistics

It send to HScope website information about your phone model when successfully connect to an oscilloscope. In this way it is possible for all other users to know what phone model has been successfully tested to work with USB oscilloscopes. List of working phone models is available here.

CAN Decoder

CAN (Controller Area Network) Bus is a serial protocol used in automotive and industrial machinery to allow microcontrollers to communicate with each other. It uses differential signalling (with signals named CAN H and CAN L) to increase noise immunity.

HScope can decode only the CAN-H signal.

Decoder Specifications

ProtocolCAN 2.0 A and CAN 2.0 B (CAN FD not supported)
SignalsCAN-H
Max speedUp to 1 Mb/s
Frame parametersID, DLC, Data bytes, CRC Sequence, CRC Delimiter,
ACK Slot, ACK Delimiter

Oscilloscope requirements

The oscilloscope sampling rate must be at least 3 times higher than the CAN speed. In case the CAN speed is 1Mb/s, you need to set the rate at least 3-4MSa/s.

Activating CAN Decoder

1. Assign the name to the channel that acquired CAN-H signal. This will create e digital signal in the Digital Module from the analog data.

2. Select the CAN decoder for the digital signal.

Now you should see the decoded data.

Fields: (all numbers in Hexadecimal format)

Field nameLength
(bits)
Purpose
Start-of-frame (gray)1Denotes the start of frame transmission
Identifier (yellow)11A (unique) identifier which also represents the
message priority
Data length code (DLC) (pink)4Number of bytes of data (0–8 bytes)
Data field (white)0–64
(0-8 bytes)
Data to be transmitted (length in bytes dictated
by DLC field)
CRC (blue)15Cyclic redundancy check
CRC delimiter (gray)1Must be recessive (1)
ACK slot (green or red)1Transmitter sends recessive (1) and any receiver
can assert a dominant (0)
ACK delimiter (gray)1Must be recessive (1)
End-of-frame (EOF-gray)7Must be recessive (1)

Basic Operations – Digital Module

Digital Module requires its license in addition to the basic oscilloscope license.

Select Digital Module from the modules menu.

You can see a new panel for the digital channels*. In case your oscilloscope has digital inputs you will be able to turn ON/OFF the digital channels and see them on the screen with the analog channels.

* You can see this panel also if the oscilloscope has digital inputs but without the Digital License you cannot access the additional features of this module.

Analog to Digital converter

Even if your oscilloscope doesn’t have digital inputs, you can convert one of the analog channels to a digital signal with the last control on the panel.

The converted signal will be the Logic Channel 5 (or L5).

Protocol Decoding

Click on the blue channel cursors on the left. On the top on the screen you will see a Settings icon. There you can select the digital channel and apply a protocol decoder.

MODBUS Decoder

HScope provides support for Modbus RTU over RS485.

Frame Format

The set of function field and data field is called Protocol Data Unit (PDU) and represents the useful part of communication.

HScope can recognize the following functions:

Decoding in HScope

  • Input range: at least 5V
  • Sampling rate: at least 100KSa/s for a baud rate up to 19200, 500KSa/s for 112500
  • Use the digital module to enable the decoding

Sample of HScope decoded data:

LIN Decoder

The LIN Frame Format

In simple terms, the LIN bus message frame consists of a header and a response.
Typically, the LIN master transmits a header to the LIN bus. This triggers a slave, which sends up to 8 data bytes in response.

Header

Response

LIN Decoding in HScope

Use the following settings:

  • Input range: at least 16V
  • Sampling rate: at least 100KSa/s
  • Use the digital module to enable the LIN decoding

Sample of HScope decoded data:

  • In the HEADER part the module ID is in YELLOW color.
  • Data fields are in GREEN color.
  • Light BLUE fields are for parity and CRC control.

HScope LIN decoder performs automatically: LIN bus speed recognition, parity and CRC check. In case of problem the corresponding field will be in RED color:

UART Decoder

Frame Format

UART transmitted data is organized into packets. Each packet contains 1 start bit, 5 to 9 data bits (depending on the UART), an optional parity bit (can be used to detect single bit errors), and 1 or 2 stop bits:

Introduction to UART - Packet, Frame, and Bits

Decoding in HScope

  • Input range: at least 5V
  • Sampling rate: at least 100KSa/s for a baud rate up to 19200, 500KSa/s for 112500
  • Use the digital module to enable the decoding

Sample of HScope decoded data:

Digital Module

Before You Start

The Digital Module license is in addition to the basic HScope license for the supported oscilloscope model.

License Promotion

Support the development!

This module is currently under development (March 2020 – March 2021) and the this module license is currently available at half of the final market price.

What You Can Do

Transform an analog wave in digital signal

The analog oscilloscope can capture also digital signals and process with a decoder. This acquisition mode is not limited to TTL signals (0-5V) but it is possible to use an oscilloscope like a radio-wave sniffer to capture variations in electromagnetic field nearby a digital cable and capture / process the waveform.

Capture digital channels with oscilloscopes with this capability

This module support up to 4 digital input channels from those oscilloscopes which are capable of this input mode.

Current available decoders

  • UART (with parity check). Auto speed detection.
  • MODBUS over RS485
  • LIN
  • CAN

Screencast

Here is a suggested and performant method to screencast the phone/tablet to your Windows/Linux or macOS computer or a bigger screen connected to one of these machine.

This method also allows some control on the android interface by using PC mouse and/or keyboard.

This method requires no app on the Android device (just some system configuration) and it uses one App (scrcpy) on the computer with the native Android debugger, so the performances are good.

Requirements

1) On the Android device:

  • Developer Mode enabled (guide here)
  • USB Debugging and (for latest phones/tablets) WiFi Debugging enabled in the Developer options
  • On some devices, you also need to enable an additional option USB debugging (Security Settings) (this is an item different from USB debugging) to control it using a keyboard and mouse. Rebooting the device is necessary once this option is set.

2) Get the App on the Windows/Linux/macOS machine:

First Connection

With USB cable

  • Connect the phone/tablet to the computer with a standard data cable (not OTG). If the usb cable is correct your should see the phone shared folders on the computer after on the phone you authorize the files sharing.
  • Run the file scrcpy.exe
  • The first time the phone should ask authorization for the computer access

With WiFi

  • First connect the scrcpy app with the USB cable, keep the cable connected and close the app
  • Run open_a_terminal_here.bat and on the terminal run this command with the IP address of the phone/tablet:
    scrcpy --tcpip=192.168.1.100
  • Next times it should not be required to connect the USB cable first. Important is to keep the Developer options enabled.

Additional

  • You may create your own .bat files to open the screencast for your phones/tablets. This will work in case the phone will get assigned always the same IP address.
    Just copy the file scrcpy-console.bat and then you can change the content in something like:
    @echo off
    scrcpy.exe --tcpip=192.168.1.xxx --pause-on-exit=if-error %*
  • You can record a video using some scrcpy option. Check at this link for more information.

Basic Operations – Automotive Module

Automotive Acquisition Mode an Automotive Tools requires Automotive Module license in addition to the basic oscilloscope license.

Click on this control group to switch the mode from Oscilloscope to Automotive.

In the master section you can set the oscilloscope acquisition rate and start/stop the recording. Only the rates in White color can be selected and available rates depends from the oscilloscope brand/model.

The maximum recording time depends from the selected rate (greater is the rate, less is the available recording time). The maximum recording time depends also from the Memory allocated in the HScope Settings.

Channels controls are similar to the Oscilloscope mode.

Acquisition

After you start the recording, the rate and channels settings cannot be changed until the acquisition ends.

After pressing the REC button the app listens to the input channels waiting for any significative variation for starting the actual recording.
While waiting for the input signal, the interface show the channel levels in real-time. By clicking on the 0 button on each channel, you can set the offset of the input signal to 0.

Auto-Start vs Manual-Start

Auto-Start is the default option. The app wait for a significative input signal variation and then it start to record. But in Settings General you can also choose Recording Start as Manual. In this case after pressing the REC button the app show you the channels levels with another button to actually start the recording.

Filters

For Filters usage refer to the specific chapter. Particular in the Automotive module is that filters can be set before or changed even after the acquisition. The filter can be changed several times and it will consider always the first time raw acquired data, until you actually save the waveform.

Saved waveforms contain the filtered data so from this data is not possible to change the filtering parameters since the original data information is lost. Successive filtering will consider the filtered data contained in the loaded waveform.