Mikebits
Well-Known Member
For many hobby circuit builders, there comes a time when a circuit just does not work. Bewildered as you may be, you search for bad connections, solder blobs etc.
After hours of careful investigation and continuity checks, you wave your hands in despair and surrender. Frustrated at the sight of your blinky board that is not blinking at all.
Of course a oscilloscope would make things much easier, troubleshooting wise. But as you reach into your wallet, only a small amount of currency, and the few coins under the couch you find that the best you can hope for is the oscope ground lead.
Well, it occured to me that the long forgotton logic probe can serve many of your troubleshooting needs, and relieve many of your woes. Knowing whether or not a bit is flipping or flopping is a useful aid in debugging Mr. Blinky.
I Googled logic probe, and found many circuits. One in particular seemed useful as it detects narrow pulses, 50ns I think. I am sure there is a myriad of logic probe circuits out there for the taking, and if you do not own a scope, these little pen sized devices can assist you more than twice their weight.
This one looks pretty good. Don't bother with the piezo buzzer part though.
https://www.electro-tech-online.com/custompdfs/2008/06/k24.pdf
I am sure there are better ones out there, but bottom line is; if you do not own a scope and build digital circuits, you should get a logic probe.
After hours of careful investigation and continuity checks, you wave your hands in despair and surrender. Frustrated at the sight of your blinky board that is not blinking at all.
Of course a oscilloscope would make things much easier, troubleshooting wise. But as you reach into your wallet, only a small amount of currency, and the few coins under the couch you find that the best you can hope for is the oscope ground lead.
Well, it occured to me that the long forgotton logic probe can serve many of your troubleshooting needs, and relieve many of your woes. Knowing whether or not a bit is flipping or flopping is a useful aid in debugging Mr. Blinky.
I Googled logic probe, and found many circuits. One in particular seemed useful as it detects narrow pulses, 50ns I think. I am sure there is a myriad of logic probe circuits out there for the taking, and if you do not own a scope, these little pen sized devices can assist you more than twice their weight.
This one looks pretty good. Don't bother with the piezo buzzer part though.
https://www.electro-tech-online.com/custompdfs/2008/06/k24.pdf
I am sure there are better ones out there, but bottom line is; if you do not own a scope and build digital circuits, you should get a logic probe.
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