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NS1

A compact, headless, 62.5M sample per second, 7MHz bandwidth oscilloscope.

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NS1 is a compact, headless, single channel oscilloscope featuring 7MHz bandwidth and a sample rate of 62.5MS/s. NS1 is designed to be just enough for many common analysis and debugging tasks.

At its core, NS1 uses the RP2040 microcontroller for signal acquisition, leveraging its PIO and DMA peripherals to achieve a high 62.5 MS/s sample rate. NS1 is likely one of the few purely microcontroller-based oscilloscopes capable of this speed.

Given the oscilloscope is headless, waveform visualization and control are handled via Voltpeek - a custom PC instrument control application. Voltpeek is written in Python and talks to NS1 over USB serial. Voltpeek can also be used for direct Python scripting to automate waveform capture and control.

Specs:

  • 16384 point memory depth
  • 4 ranges 1V, 2V, 5V, 10V, all full scale
  • rising edge and falling edge trigger
  • 7MHz bandwidth
  • 62.5MS/s
  • Single Channel

Example Waveforms:

Here are some example waveforms captured with the NS1:

Triggering

The system has two triggering modes, force trigger and normal trigger. Force trigger starts the capture when the trigger is initiated, whereas normal trigger waits for a trigger edge event before starting the capture. With normal trigger mode, the trigger event is recorded at the center of the capture. Normal trigger is achieved with a comparator and a settable trigger voltage as shown below:

There is also a trigger correction algorithm in Voltpeek to properly center the trigger event.

Gain and Attenuation Settings
There are two attenuator settings and two gain settings. These are what scale the input signal to create the four possible ranges:

Voltpeek Software

Voltpeek is the software written to control and display the data that is sampled using NS1. Unlike other PC based oscilloscope software, Voltpeek is a command based UI. This is done because click and drag based UIs can be extremely annoying when they are controlling complicated processes. Voltpeek has a similar user interface to Vim. Different commands control the system, and the software can be put in adjustment mode. Adjustment mode is used to adjust the scales, cursors, and trigger level using the h, j, k, and l keys.

NS1_schematic.pdf

Latest revision schematic

Adobe Portable Document Format - 532.15 kB - 03/09/2025 at 04:31

Preview

  • Falling Edge Trigger

    schuyler409/29/2024 at 03:39 0 comments

    A falling edge trigger feature has been added. An RC discharge waveform is shown below demonstrating this:

  • Center Trigger Working

    schuyler408/30/2024 at 22:07 0 comments

    The trigger event is finally recorded at the center of the capture instead of the start. This is achieved using a more complicated PIO program, and a DMA ping pong configuration that creates a ring buffer. Here is an example RC circuit waveform that demonstrates this capability:

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