FEATURES
- Direct Time Measurement of Pulse Trains
- Measure Jitter, Frequency, Time Interval (Skew), Pulse Width, Risetime, Event Timing, Time Interval Error (TIE), and More
- 8ps Single-Shot Resolution (11 Digits/s Frequency)
- DC to 400MHz Frequency Range for all Measurement Functions Including Pulsewidth, Plus a Prescaler for Frequency and TIE Measurements to 2.5 GHz
- Up to 1 Million Continuous Zero Dead Time Measure-ments Per Second
- 1ns Minimum Pulse Width
- Highly Sophisticated and Flexible Arming (Triggering)
- PCI Interface for Super High Throughput
- On-board Memory for 8 Million Measurement Points – Can Be Read While Measurements are Taking Place
Full Specifications
More Tests in Less Time
The BI220 is a high performance time and frequency measurement instrument. Its high resolution and throughput,
combined with continuous measurement capability, allow you to make measurements that are not possible with
traditional time-interval counters. For example, it can timetag events (edges of an input pulse train) at a rate
of 1 million per second continuously to on-board memory, while each of the edges is measured with 8ps resolution.
This provides it with the capability to analyze the dynamic variations in pulse timing, pulsewidth, or frequency.
In other words, the difference between the BI220 and a traditional counter/timer is analogous to the difference
between a voltmeter and a scope. Measurements can also be streamed continuously over the PCI interface allowing
unlimited acquisition at high rates.
Full-Featured Instrument
The BI220 is a full instrument-on-a-card with all the features and capabilities you would expect in a bench-top
instrument including high quality inputs, built-in NIST traceable calibration, and software and hardware that deliver
fully computed results. The instrument has 10 measurement functions such as Frequency, Time Interval and Pulsewidth.
All functions work directly on the input signal at frequencies up to 400MHz without any prescaling. This means that
you can measure pulses as narrow as 1ns, occurring at frequencies up to 400MHz, or the skew between two signals at 400MHz.
There is also a prescaler for each input channel which allows frequency and period measurements to 2.5GHz.
The inputs of the instrument include programmable termination voltages. This feature is seldom found even in the
best of the bench-top instruments. You can select by software control either a 1M Ohm impedance to ground, or a 50 ohm
load which is terminated to an accurately programmable volt-age between -3V and +3V. This allows you to connect ECL, PECL,
or CML sources directly to the instrument with the proper loading. The input comparators have a fixed hys-teresis of 25mV
which is useful for signals with slow risetime or high noise levels. It sets different threshold levels for the rising edge
and the falling edge which prevents false triggering.
APPLICATIONS
- PLLs and frequency modulation – measure jitter, time interval error and settling time
- Ultrasonic and radar pulse timing
- Optical and magnetic disk drive – measure jitter, risetime, and bit timing directly
- Oscillators and crystals – measure frequency, start-up time and time interval error
- Pulse width modulated signals – measure variations over time
- Time stamping of events in real time
- Nuclear physics
Easy to Use Software
The software for the BI220 is designed for ease of use and extremely high performance. The driver software
automatically manages the streaming of measurements at the high rates which are possible with the PCI interface.
The front panel software for Windows allows you to easily set up multiple simultaneous displays of the measurements.
This gives multiple views of the same data, or different functions from the same data. For example, you can
set up the display to show a graph of the frequency of the signal vs. time, plus a tabular display of the same results,
plus a graph of the time deviation of the signal vs. time, all from the same measure-ment acquisition run. The
front panel can also run multiple instruments simultaneously. All Brilliant Instruments models use the same software
for easy migration between models.
The screen image below is from an actual measurement of a 400 MHz clock. One thousand single channel measurements
were taken. The tabular display shows 1000 frequency measurements and the times and event numbers when they were
taken. The digital display shows the statistics on period calculations of the same data. The graph display shows
the TIE (Time Interval Error) calculations vs. time. Note that all 1000 measurements were taken in less than 1 ms.
In addition, the resolution of the instrument is clearly evident with the Y axis of the graph at 5 ps per division.