Measuring Frequency with the HPS140

Instruments HPS140 Handheld Pocket Oscilloscope
1

When I have my HPS140 in RUN mode, the time base shows time, not frequency. This is normal and the same as most any oscilloscope.

If I press HOLD, I can change Time Mark to Frequency Mark and I see Frequency in the status bar. This seems to work fine.

Two things, however:

  1. In HOLD mode, the display is not updating (that I can see).

  2. When I return to RUN, the frequency measurement disappears and I am back to time base.

So are my observations above correct? Frequency is a measurement in HOLD mode, RUN mode always uses time base.

Thank you.

2

1: No, the display does not update, hence the name ‘HOLD’.

2: Correct. Frequency is calculated between two time markers. In run-mode there are no markers, so frequency cannot be displayed.

3

Thank you for the assistance. You confirm my findings and all is well.

About my only observation now (not a question) is that with 40 Mega samples per second, the workable frequency in my work is about 5 MHz. It does work to 10 MHz but it is happiest at 5 and below. This is fine with me and what I purchased it for.

Thanks again.

4

Even if you only measure up to 100KHz, it is nice to have a 10MHz bandwidth, so that the edges of e.g. square wave are nice and steep.