Pico Technology Ltd. announced major updates and additions to their ground-breaking PicoScope PC-based 9000 Series oscilloscopes. Now featuring a 30 GHz bandwidth model, alongside updated 5, 16 and 20 GHz models, PicoScope is setting new standards in the Test and Measurement industry.

Alan Tong, CEO, emphasized Pico's commitment to offering "compact, low-cost and fully featured broadband oscilloscope solutions. Pico Technology has consolidated its position as a leading oscilloscope manufacturer with bandwidths ranging from 10 MHz to 30 GHz.”

PicoScope 9000 series consists of two distinct product architectures, both delivering high performance at reasonable prices:

• The PicoScope 9300 products are direct-to-sampler Sequential Sampling Oscilloscopes of 20 GHz and now 30 GHz bandwidth.  They sample with market leading 16 bit ADC resolution and with timing resolution down to 64 femtoseconds (equivalent sampling to 15 TSa/s). More than adequate detail for transitions and impulses down to 12/24 ps respectively.
• Truly unique to Pico, the direct-to-sampler PicoScope 9400 SXRTO products are a more traditional Real Time Oscilloscope that rely upon Random Equivalent Time Sampling to support bandwidths of 5 GHz and 16 GHz.  These sample with market leading 12 bit ADC resolution and with sampling intervals down to 200 picoseconds (2.5 TS/s).  Again, plentiful detail to address transition and impulse capture down to 22/44 ps.

These are unique and surprisingly fast and affordable measurement solutions that can accurately capture, and measure and characterise RF and microwave signals.  The PicoScope 9000s readily address Gigabit data stream quality, and RF and microwave modulated envelope and waveshape fidelities.  Signals that are now so widely proliferated across our communication and computing networks, imaging, diagnostic, tracking and control systems and right down to our homes, cars, pockets, wrists and possibly implants.

Unlike truly transient (single event) real time capture oscilloscopes, these distinctive Pico products do not carry the tremendous cost, footprint and energy munching burdens or channel sharing compromises of Nyquist compliant data capture.  They instead rely upon repetitive or clock based signal (as most real world signals are) to build and display precise and statistically rich captures of high speed waveshape and data eyes.  Which the Pico 9000 instruments achieve, without sample rate or resolution compromise, across multiple input channels.  Generally with greater resolution than their more costly transient real time peers can achieve; even when they turn to super-Nyquist Equivalent Time Sampling; as most do when transient capture data bandwidth proves too costly.

The supplied software unlocks the full potential of the PicoScope 9000 products in applications such as Gigabit Comms physical layer test and characterisation: 

• Contoured Serial Data Eye display with auto set-up and mask alignment
• Histogramming and 30+ statistical measurements to support standard NRZ / RZ eye characterisations
• 160+ built in standard protocol masks with hit count, alarms and acquisition control and full polygon user-mask or test limit editing, and with user applied margins for stress testing.

To Pulse and Waveshape characterisations, the PicoSample software presses home inherent direct-to-sampler signal processing advantage with: 

• 100+ IEEE 181 compliant pulse, impulse, transition and waveform auto-measurements
• 60+ algebraic, trigonometric, logarithmic, derivative and Boolean trace Math functions, complemented by a comprehensive nested functions equation editor
• Real, imaginary and vector FFT/IFFT Fourier transforms with six window functions, linear and logarithmic display and a comprehensive set of frequency domain measurements.

Also Broadband Modulated Envelope characterisations, for which the PicoSample software can build and measure a new live trace that accurately envelopes another (live) amplitude or pulse modulated carrier trace.  

• Particularly valuable to broadband pulse or data modulator and envelope track amplifier debug and verifications.

PicoScope 9000 Oscilloscopes can be purchased as two or four channel instruments with optional clock from data recovery (to 11.3 Gb/s, 5.65 GHz clock).  The 9300 2-channel, 20 GHz Sampling Oscilloscopes can be configured with an integrated 9 GHz optical to electrical convertor, or with internal 50 ps pulse generators to address single ended or differential TDT/TDR network fault detection and measurements.  In these cases PicoSample software supports a comprehensive set of optical and protocol masks, and distance and impedance measurements. 

 "PicoScope 9000 instruments and PicoSample software deliver a distinctive price, performance and feature combination, making them cost-effective choices across the 1 to 30 GHz oscilloscope market. Boasting a significant price advantages compared to competing, PicoScope 9000 devices redefine value in the industry," Tong concluded.