Measurement Tools for Quick Automotive Serial Bus Debugging Using the HD3 Series Oscilloscopes
Application Notes
An oscilloscope has an inherent ability to characterize the analog quality of automotive serial buses such as Controller Area Network (CAN), CAN FD, and Local Interconnect Network (LIN). That is why engineers often use oscilloscopes to debug and characterize these signals. Performing analog characterization using an oscilloscope is known as taking physical-layer measurements.
When analyzing the physical layer, the oscilloscope must operate at its fastest speed so you can see any infrequent errors on your buses that could cause serious defects. You can only see these infrequent errors if your oscilloscope is doing serial decoding in hardware. Software decoding causes an oscilloscope to run too slowly to catch any rare events.
Many oscilloscopes on the market offer automotive-focused options. However, the Keysight InfiniiVision HD3 Series oscilloscopes offer unique hardware-based measurement capabilities for debugging and characterizing the physical layer of automotive serial buses.