See discussions, stats, and author profiles for this publication at: https://www.researchgate.

net/publication/3050916

A Low-Cost PC-Based Virtual Oscilloscope

Article  in  IEEE Transactions on Education · June 2004

DOI: 10.1109/TE.2004.825527 · Source: IEEE Xplore

CITATIONS READS

29 1,747

5 authors, including:

Saikat Giri Prithwiraj Purkait

St. Thomas College of Engineering & Technology, Kolkata, India
1 PUBLICATION   29 CITATIONS   
71 PUBLICATIONS   1,201 CITATIONS   
SEE PROFILE
SEE PROFILE

Some of the authors of this publication are also working on these related projects:

Induction motor fault diagnosis View project

Transformer insulation condition monitoring using dielectric response techniques View project

All content following this page was uploaded by Prithwiraj Purkait on 27 November 2014.

The user has requested enhancement of the downloaded file.

IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON EDUCATION, VOL. 47, NO. 2, MAY 2004
A Low-Cost PC-Based Virtual Oscilloscope
Chandan Bhunia, Saikat Giri, Samrat Kar, Sudarshan Haldar, and Prithwiraj Purkait, Member, IEEE
Abstract—The integration of personal computers (PCs) with the
present-day measurement and instrumentation world has opened
up the door for “virtual instrumentation.” This paper describes the
development of a low-cost, PC-based, virtual digital oscilloscope. A
data acquisition device using the computer parallel port has been
fabricated with full analog interface and 8-b analog-to-digital con-
verter with associated control-logic and timing circuitries. A soft-
ware package aimed at managing the acquisition process and dis-
playing the acquired signal has also been developed. This device
has been conceived as a simple plug-in board to be incorporated
to any IBM PC parallel port—thus, in many cases, eliminating
the requirements of multiple, expensive, digital oscilloscopes. The
project, initially designed as an undergraduate thesis, is currently
being used for laboratory instructional purposes. The features of
this device make it suitable for implementing as an educational re-
source for undergraduate students from Electrical, Electronics, In-
strumentation, and Computer Science faculties.
Index Terms—Analog-to-digital (A/D) conversion, data acquisi-
tion, digital oscilloscope, parallel port, virtual instrumentation.
I. INTRODUCTION
I N today’s educational institutes, especially in electrical en-
gineering and allied streams, digital oscilloscopes have be-
come popular for signal acquisition and analysis. Because of
their inherently high-input impedance, digital oscilloscopes can
be used for analysis of both analog and digital circuits with high
accuracy. Another attractive feature of the digital oscilloscopes
over its analog counterpart, the cathode-ray oscilloscopes, is the
capability of the digital oscilloscopes for effective storage of the
data for subsequent analysis [1]. In recent times, digital storage
oscilloscopes (DSOs) have been implemented with the added
feature of PC connectivity, such that the signal can be stored in
the PC for later analysis [2]. However, with increasing features,
these oscilloscopes have become more expensive and less ac-
cessible for undergraduate-level novice students. The advanced
features of these commercially available oscilloscopes often are
underutilized in the low-power and low-frequency requirements
of common undergraduate laboratories. Moreover, the use of
PCs in almost every step of any laboratory course, from anal-
ysis to data representation to report preparation, motivated the
development of a device that will combine to a great extent the
features of the digital oscilloscope and the PC. The idea was to
Manuscript received October 8, 2002; revised May 11, 2003.
C. Bhunia is with Bengal Engineering College, Shibpur, India (e-mail: cb-
hunia@yahoo.com).
S. Giri is with Computer Maintenance Company (CMC), Ltd., Kolkata, India
(e-mail: saikatgiri@yahoo.com).
S. Kar is with Bhaba Atomic Research Centre (BARC), Mumbai, India
(e-mail: esamrat@yahoo.com).
S. Haldar is with BHaldia Petrochemicals, Ltd. (HPL), Haldia, India (e-mail:
sudarshan.halder@hpl.co.in).
P. Purkait is with the Department of Electrical Engineering, Haldia Institute
of Technology, Haldia, India (e-mail: praj@iee.org).
Digital Object Identifier 10.1109/TE.2004.825527
0018-9359/04$20.00 © 2004 IEEE
295
develop a low-cost, affordable, plug-in kind of data acquisition
card that can be used with any common-purpose PC with the as-
sociated software and can make the expensive DSO redundant
for elementary signal analysis purposes.
The main contribution of this paper is to present the integrated
system with PC-based data acquisition hardware, software, and
display modules, and highlight how it is being used for under-
graduate laboratory demonstration and instructional purposes.
II. PC-BASED VIRTUAL INSTRUMENTATION
The instrumentation industry is moving steadily and rapidly
in the direction of virtual instrumentation. Virtual instruments
are centered on a PC, used with as little specialized hardware as
possible to link it to the devices it must measure/control. This
hardware typically is plug-in boards for digitizing a signal di-
rectly or for controlling stand-alone instruments. Virtual instru-
mentation is known for its flexibility, modularity, and low cost.
Celma et al. [3] presented the idea behind development of a
PC-based spectrum analyzer suitable for use in undergraduate
laboratories. They pointed out that the requirements of such a
data acquisition system are not very high in view of the lim-
ited range of signals encountered in undergraduate laboratories.
Chickamenahalli et al. [4] presented an undergraduate research
project that involved the interface of a HP digital oscilloscope to
an IBM PC using National Instruments’ General Purpose Inter-
face Board. Smith et al. [5], [6] in their papers described the set-
ting up of a simple DSO integrated with a printer/plotter system
for quick reproduction of the signal. However, they were skep-
tical about the bench-space requirements for such a scheme in-
volving the DSO, printer/plotter, and the PC. This discovery led
to the concept of integrated DSO-PC-printer system described
in the present paper, one sufficient and affordable for most un-
dergraduate-level laboratories.
Several data acquisition systems through the parallel port
have been built in the past [7]–[9]—with various combinations
of hardware and softwares. However, either those works have
not been reported comprehensively or there have been too many
variations in the development approaches which confuse the
readers. The aim of this paper is to report a complete working
system with less complexity, yet reasonable usefulness in
undergraduate-level laboratories.
In recent times, the idea of a Web-based virtual laboratory
[10], [11] has led to the development of a variety of virtual
instruments, including virtual oscilloscopes [12], [13]. How-
ever, many of the virtual oscilloscopes do not come with asso-
ciated data acquisition hardware, are too versatile for common
undergraduate use, or are expensive. These are literally “vir-
tual” in nature—demonstrating only the front-panel function-
alities of the oscilloscope—without real-time data acquisition
296
and display. The contribution of the present paper is in devel-
oping a fully functional, PC-based oscilloscope with associated
modules of data acquisition hardware, software, interfacing, and
graphical user interface (GUI).
The LabVIEW virtual oscilloscope from National Instru-
ments [14] offers a versatile tool for PC-based data acquisition.
Truthfully speaking, however, the relatively high cost of such a
system (along with the National Instrument Data Acquisition
Card) often cannot be justified for undergraduate laboratories
where the requirements are not up to that level of sophistication,
accuracy, and speed. Therefore, LabVIEW is more suitable
for industrial/higher research applications than undergraduate
education/teaching.
With this background, the proposed system is intended to
provide a low-cost, simple, yet effective solution for integrated
multichannel data acquisition, display, analysis, and printing
operations in an undergraduate laboratory. It uses the conven-
tional PC parallel port, interfacing circuitry costing less than US
$10.00, and commonly used GUI development tool and other
programming languages, such as Visual Basic (VB) and Turbo
C. The system is ideal for use in undergraduate laboratories for
real-time applications and educational/instructional purposes as
well. Course and tutorial materials built around the developed
system are expected to provide sufficient insight into the topic
of PC-based real-time data acquisition hardware and software.
III. SYSTEM DESCRIPTION
The data acquisition system (DAQ) is designed for sensing
multichannel analog inputs and for converting them into digital
formats before transferring them to the PC. The digital data is
stored in the PC memory and displayed on the PC screen; the
provisions are kept for processing the data as well. An online
printing facility is also made available with the unit. The block
diagram of the developed system is shown in Fig. 1.
The hardware design is primarily intended to perform inter-
facing and input/output (I/O) functions. The system is capable of
acquiring and displaying eight signals at a time with additional
provisions for data storage and printing. The user-friendly GUI
enables teaching the students about the basic functions of an
oscilloscope, such as amplitude and time settings. In addition,
several other menu-driven functions for data-storage, display,
analysis, and printing can also be demonstrated.
A. System Requirements
In the given problem, the minimum requirement for the PC is
a Pentium processor, preferably 32-MB RAM, operating system
Windows 95/98 or higher, and parallel port connection; VB and
C were used to develop the system. For using/running the ap-
plication, only the executable (.exe) files are sufficient, and the
user need not have the compilers.
B. Parallel Port Basic Description
A PC printer port is an inexpensive and yet powerful platform
for implementing projects dealing with the control of real world
peripherals. It is found commonly on the back of the PC as a
D-Type 25-pin female connector. The port is composed of four
IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON EDUCATION, VOL. 47, NO. 2, MAY 2004
Fig. 1. Block diagram of the system.
control lines, five status lines, and eight data lines. The function-
ality of the printer port is achieved through use of these three
addressable ports corresponding to data, status, and control.
The IEEE 1284 Data Transfer Modes standard [15] provides
a high-speed bidirectional communication between the PC and
any external peripheral. The standard can communicate 50–100
times faster than using the original parallel port. This standard
defines five operational modes to enable communication with
external peripheral or data transfer. Each mode fixes a protocol
for transferring data in either the forward direction (PC to pe-
ripheral), the reverse direction (peripheral to PC), or the bidi-
rectional (half-duplex).
In the Compatibility (SPP) mode, the eight data lines are used
to send data to the peripheral. The Nibble and Byte modes can be
used create a bidirectional communication path between the par-
allel port and the peripheral. The Enhanced Parallel Port (EPP)
and Extended Capabilities Port (ECP) modes have bidirectional
capability as part of their protocol. In the current work, the EPP
mode is used for 8-b data acquisition from the 8-b analog-to-dig-
ital converter (ADC). The necessary control words for mode
selection are supplied to the control register through the inter-
facing software, written in Turbo C++, before the acquisition
process is initiated.
C. Interface Circuit
The interface circuit for the conversion of the eight analog-
input channel data to their corresponding digital values and as-
sociated modules are shown in Fig. 2. It shows the detailed con-
nection diagram of the interface circuit. The functions of the
different modules involved are described hereafter.
1) Clock Generator Module: This module is basically re-
quired for providing the clock input to the ADC chip. For this
purpose, the relatively simple LM555, which is a highly stable
device for generating accurate time delays or oscillations, is
chosen. The module can generate a maximum of 1.34-MHz (ap-
proximately) frequency. In the system designed, the clock gen-
erator module is adjusted to produce an output frequency of 1
MHz.
2) Analog-to-Digital (A/D) Conversion Module: For A/D
conversion, an option is required to take care of eight channels
of analog input signals, and all of these channels have to be
sampled at the same instant of time. For this purpose, the
economical option is to incorporate an eight-channel mul-
tiplexer between analog inputs and the ADC. The National
Semiconductor’s 0808 ADC, which has a built-in eight-channel
multiplexer, is suitable for this purpose. Its average conversion
rate per channel is 100 s, which is quite fast for the present
application. The IC 7493 [binary counter integrated circuit
BHUNIA et al.: LOW-COST PC-BASED VIRTUAL OSCILLOSCOPE
Fig. 2. Schematic layout of the interface circuit hardware.
(IC)] is used for selecting the eight channels of the 0808 ADC
for sequential data transfer. The IC 7404 is used as an inverter
for strobing the IC 7493 with proper level of signal coming out
of the PC parallel port. The A741 IC is used for the purpose
of providing adequate delay between the activation of the
0808 ADC input channel and the start of A/D conversion; this
corresponds to the normal response time of the 0808 ADC IC.
Further detailed description of the interface circuit is beyond
the scope of this paper.
3) Auto Ranging Module: The auto-ranging module is used
to convert the input analog signal range of 100 V to the range
of 2.5 V through a potentiometric arrangement. Another elec-
tronic clamping circuit using the LM324 IC-s is used to convert
this range of voltage into the required 0–5-V range for the ADC
input.
Adequate, zener-based protection circuits are used in critical
places so that the circuit does not get damaged because of ac-
cidental overvoltages. The positions of these zeners are not ex-
clusively shown in the Fig. 2 to avoid too much crowding in the
diagram.
D. Software—Data Acquisition and GUI
Fully dedicated software was developed for controlling the
data acquisition system. The software was written in Turbo C++
to run under DOS 6.0. The program is made up of a main func-
tion and several subfunctions for management of the associated
297
low-level tasks, such as parallel port configuration, timer pro-
gramming, handshaking with the ADC for data capture, data
acquisition, and data storage in the hard disk. The flow chart
corresponding to the main program is illustrated in Fig. 3.
The abbreviations used in the flowchart of Fig. 3, such as SOC
(start of conversion), EOC (end of conversion), and ALE (ad-
dress latch enable) are communication signals between the PC
and the data acquisition hardware indicating different timing
and control signals. The detailed functionalities of these sig-
nals can be found in [9], [15]. The GUI was developed in VB
5.0. Apart from real-time display of the eight different analog
signals, the GUI also allows demonstration of common oscil-
loscope tasks like time-scale and voltage-scale changes. It can
display the value at any point of the signal by simply placing the
cursor over the required point on the waveform. Fig. 4 shows
a sample GUI window of the developed system. Further anal-
ysis of the acquired signal, such as the root mean square (rms),
mean value, and average values can be obtained from the corre-
sponding submenus under the “Tool” menu.
IV. APPLICATIONS
The display systems available with most commercially avail-
able data acquisition systems usually provide single-channel or
at the most dual-channel simultaneous display. When the dis-
play system is needed to monitor three or more input channels
simultaneously (for example, when monitoring a three-phase
298
Fig. 3. Simplified flowchart of the developed software.
power supply), one must view three or more channels simultane-
ously. The system described in the present paper has provision
for simultaneous display of any four of the eight channels at a
time. Moreover, the user is provided with the option of viewing
IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON EDUCATION, VOL. 47, NO. 2, MAY 2004
Fig. 4. Screen shot of the developed GUI.
Fig. 5. Prototype system in operation.
the waveform of any one particular channel in enlarged format
if the need arises.
The prototype of the entire system with associated hardware,
interface cables, and the PC under operation is shown in Fig. 5.
The system developed can be easily used as a DSO, spec-
trum analyzer, digital multimeter, etc., by incorporating minor
changes in the display interface. Furthermore, the data read from
the ports can be suitably processed with the help of digital fil-
ters, fast fourier transformations, etc. Separate add-in software
modules can perform each of the signal-processing functions.
This project thus gives a solid ground work for further develop-
ment of software-based instruments and signal processors.
The system designed has several useful academic applica-
tions as well. In the laboratory, this package can be used for in-
structional purposes. The developed system introduces the stu-
dents to the basic functionalities, such as amplitude and time
settings of a real oscilloscope. Courses and tutorials on data ac-
quisition, PC-interfacing hardware and software, and GUI de-
velopment-related topics are being implemented with the de-
veloped prototype serving as the demonstration kit. Apart from
these basic day-to-day laboratory exercises, the system can lead
to new innovative ideas for teaching, such as the following.
1) Students can be quizzed on what they are doing.
2) Alternative visualizations can be presented.
BHUNIA et al.: LOW-COST PC-BASED VIRTUAL OSCILLOSCOPE
3) “Authentic” diagnostic problems can be presented based
on stored data.
4) Comparisons can be offered between different problem
solutions.
5) Virtual exercises can be planned around the technology.
Moreover, the detailed treatment of the topic PC interfacing by
using the PC printer port will enable interested students to im-
plement other innovative ideas.
V. CONCLUSION
A PC-based, low-cost, portable, plug-in-type virtual oscillo-
scope based on the communication features of the PC parallel
port has been developed. The user specifications of the devel-
oped system have been set up in accordance with the require-
ments of common undergraduate-level laboratories in electrical,
electronics, and computer engineering courses. The interface
circuit hardware has been developed with few affordable elec-
tronic components for conversion and processing of the analog
signal in the digital form before being acquired by the PC. In-
tegrated software has been developed to manage the acquisi-
tion, signal representation, and post-processing of the signal.
The system was successfully tested with several forms of input
waveforms, such as sinusoidal, square, and triangular signals.
The developed system has possible expansion capacities in the
form of additional signal processing modules. The virtual DSO
can be used for real-time data acquisition in most common-pur-
pose low-power- and low-frequency-range applications for un-
dergraduate laboratories. It can also be used as an instructional
tool for undergraduate data acquisition courses for illustrating
complex concepts concerning parallel port programming, A/D
conversion, and detailed circuit development.
REFERENCES
[1] Tektronix Inc. (2003, Mar.). [Online] Available: http://www.tek.com
[2] Gage—A Tektronix Technology Co. (2003, Mar.). [Online] Available:
http://www.gage-applied.com/tektronix.asp
[3] S. Celma, A. Carlosena, and P. A. Martinez, “PC-based spectrum ana-
lyzer,” IEEE Trans. Educ., vol. 35, pp. 204–210, Aug. 1992.
[4] S. A. Chickamenahalli and A. Hall, “Interfacing a digital oscilloscope to
a personal computer using GPIB,” in Proc. 27th Annu. Conf. Frontiers
in Education—Teaching and Learning in Era of Change, vol. 2, 1997,
p. 904.
[5] C. E. Smith and M. D. Tew, “Data acquisition in the undergraduate lab-
oratory,” IEEE Trans. Educ., vol. 38, pp. 95–96, Feb. 1995.
[6] C. E. Smith, M. D. Tew, and J. Aschberger, “Computer aided data acqui-
sition in undergraduate laboratories,” in Proc. 22nd Annu. Conf. Fron-
tiers in Education, 1992, pp. 710–713.
[7] P. H. Anderson. (2003, March) Use of a PC Printer Port for Control
and Data Acquisition. [Online] Available: http://et.nmsu.edu/~etti/
fall96/computer/printer/printer.html
[8] I. Harries. (2003, Mar.) Interfacing to the IBM-PC Parallel Printer Port.
[Online] Available: http://www.doc.ic.ac.uk/~ih/doc/par/
View publication stats
299
[9] M. Rodriguez, A. Ayala, F. Rosa, F. Herrera, S. Rodriguez, M. Diaz-
Gonzalez, and S. R. Buenafuente, “A low-cost interface circuit to enable
A/D conversion using the parallel port,” Int. J. Electr. Eng. Educ., vol.
38, no. 3, pp. 222–231, 2001.
[10] C. C. Ko, B. M. Chen, S. H. Chen, V. Ramakrishnan, R. Chen, S. Y. Hu,
and Y. A. Zhuang, “A large-scale web-based virtual oscilloscope labora-
tory experiment,” Inst. Elect. Eng. IEE—Engineering Science Education
J., vol. 9, no. 2, pp. 69–76, 2000.
[11] M. Shaheen, A. Loparo, and M. R. Buchner, “Remote laboratory exper-
imentation,” in Proc. American Control Conf., 1998, pp. 1326–1329.
[12] (2003, Mar.) Virtual Oscilloscope From NTNU Virtual Physics
Laboratory. [Online] Available: http://www.phy.ntnu.edu.tw/java/oscil-
loscope/oscilloscope.html
[13] B. R. Land, B. R. Johnson, R. A. Wyttenbach, and R. R. Hoy. (2003,
January) Stimscope: A Virtual Instrument for Neurophysiology in the
Teaching Lab. [Online] Available: http://www.nbb.cornell.edu/neu-
robio/land/PROJECTS/Poster2002/NS%2702StimScopePos.pdf
[14] (2003, Mar.) LabVIEW Overview From National Instruments.
[Online] Available: http://volt.ni.com/niwc/common.jsp?page=lab-
view_overview
[15] Standard Signaling Method for Bidirectional Parallel Peripheral Inter-
face for Personal Computers, IEEE Standard 1284-1994, 1994.
Chandan Bhunia received the Bachelor of Instrumentation Engineering degree
from Haldia Institute of Technology, Haldia, India, in 2002. He is currently pur-
suing the Master’s degree in the Department of Computer Science and Engi-
neering, Bengal Engineering College, Shibpur, India.
Saikat Giri received the Bachelor of Instrumentation Engineering degree from
Haldia Institute of Technology, Haldia, India, in 2002.
He is currently a Software Analyst with Computer Maintenance Company
(CMC) Ltd., Kolkata, India.
Samrat Kar received the Bachelor of Instrumentation Engineering degree from
Haldia Institute of Technology, Haldia, India, in 2002.
He is currently employed as Executive Engineer with Bhaba Atomic Research
Centre (BARC), Mumbai, India.
Sudarshan Haldar received the Bachelor of Instrumentation Engineering de-
gree from Haldia Institute of Technology, Haldia, India, in 2002.
He is currently employed as an Executive Engineer with BHaldia Petrochem-
icals, Ltd. (HPL), Haldia, India.
Prithwiraj Purkait (M’97) received the B.E.E., M.E.E., and Ph.D. degrees
from Jadavpur University, Kolkata, India, in 1996, 1999, and 2002, respectively.
He formerly worked with M/s Crompton Greaves, Ltd., Mumbai, India, as
a Design Engineer for one year. He served as Lecturer with the Department of
Electronics and Instrumentation Engineering, Haldia Institute of Technology,
Haldia, India, from 1998 to 2002, and he served as Postdoctoral Researcher with
the University of Queensland, Queensland, Australia, from 2002 to 2003. He is
currently an Assistant Professor in the Department of Electrical Engneering,
Haldia Institute of Technology. His current research includes transformer insu-
lation condition assessment techniques and advanced signal processing appli-
cations in high-voltage engineering.