Scanaplus vs Digiview vs Other Logic Analyzers

[Electro Fan]

Just checking to see if anyone has any experience or opinions you would like to share regarding these two LAs or others you consider to be superior?

https://www.ikalogic.com/scanaplus/

http://www.tech-tools.com/DV3109-logic-analyzer.htm


Key serial protocols include UART/RS232, I2C, SPI, and CAN with ability to decode ASCII, Binary, Hex, Decimal.

Nice to have would be parallel bus support.


Among the features/considerations are:

1) search functions - how flexible and useful is the search capability?  This is #1 on the list - without this no need to consider a LA.  Not to say a LA with no or limited search has no utility but I'm looking for a LA that is very capable of searching.

2) accuracy/reliability/dependability

3) overall UI ease of use/attractiveness

4) performance/speed/responsiveness

5) memory/compression

6) any vendor support - likeliness of bugs being addressed and likeliness of new features being added

7) other - feel free to suggest

Price:  All else being equal, lower would be better

[0xdeadbeef]

I have a ScanaPlus and I really like(d) the GUI (v2.3x). The new version (v2.4x) is not quite there yet, but the guys are working hard on it and are open for suggestions - well, to some degree at least.

I like that you can write your own decoder in JavaScript, there's also a hex and packet view where you can search for data. Finally, in the new v2.4x GUI there's also a protocol trigger for some protocols.
I'm not quite sure if it will be (easily) possible to also implement a protocol trigger for your own decoder.
Generally, the trigger setup is pretty good (multiple stages, supports timings) but not perfect. It seems only half thought-out but most USB LAs are much worse.
Generally you have to be aware that triggering is done completely on PC side. Up to now I found it to be reliable, but for complex patterns and slow PCs I would think chances are there could be issues. Besides there is no trigger output possible of course.

There is some kind of simple (RLE?) compression done in the FGPA before the data is sent to the PC, but it's not ultra-effective. I did successful traces of 10MHz SPI data with 5 signals in sum (ILI9341 display: clock, miso, mosi, CS and data/command) but at some point the USB2 bandwidth will simply lead to data loss - and my understanding is that this will happen without warning. I have V1 at home and V2 at work where V2 allows to capture fewer channels so you can increase the bandwidth per channel. But honestly I never used that feature because usually the default 9ch setting is good enough and the ILI3941 example shows that you need more than 4ch quite often.
So for me the bandwidth limitation is not so much of an issue, but it has to be considered.

Also the recording time is not endless. As far as I can tell the maximum capture time is 2000s. I also consider it a major problem that you can't stop the capturing while maintaining the captured data. So with 2000s capture time you need to sit there and wait 2000s until you can see any data. If you stop the acquisition, all the data captured until then is lost. I suggested more than year ago to implement a manual trigger so you can inspect the data that was captured instead of throwing it away but unfortunately despite of initial interest of the developer, nothing happened there. It should be possible to achieve something like this by using one of the unused channels as trigger input though. It's still not quite clear to me why it's so hard to implement this or even better: a circular buffer where you e.g. always get 1s of data whenever you stop. Especially as the triggering on the PC also needs some kind of circular buffer.

Last but not least: the FPGA of Scanaplus is not upgradable (by the customer). I can't update my V1 to get the V2 features and if they decide tomorrow to add a 6ch mode or something, V2 will be also obsolete.

[ikalogic]

Hi,

I know this thread have been dormant for a couple years, but i just wanted to inform that ScanaStudio V3.0.x is available with many many features and fixes.

We have now several persons working 100% on ScanaStudio software, and we can maintain cross platform versions of the software.

Thank you

[0xdeadbeef]

Since the ikalogic forum was closed down a year ago or so, I take this chance to utter my thoughts.

First of all, the new software looks really nice but it seems to come a little late. My last post in this thread was from 2015 - even back then the beta for v2.4.x was going on for quite some time. Now it's two years later and we got 3.x even though (AFAIK) 2.4.x never left beta.
The good thing is that some improvements from 2.4.x made it like the update and protocol download works behind a company firewall.
But there are no ScanaPlus devices available anymore since quite some time and it's unclear when the successor will be available. BTW: It was originally announced for 2015 as well as far as I recall.

Secondly, the fixed capturing is still like it always was even though 2014 or whenever I suggested to change this to a more user friendly approach (keep a ring buffer of N samples so you can stop manually at any time and still have N sampled values instead of having no samples at all) it sounded as if this was possible and considered for a future release.

Thirdly, the trigger menu looks confusing and crippled compared to what we had in 2.4.x. IMHO it's not possible anymore to define complex triggers (mix of time and edge conditions) the way this was possible in 2.4.x ... and even that was far less flexible than what you could do with an HP logic analyzer from the 90s. Again: other USB LAs are even worse, but that shouldn't be an argument.

Then there's the point that the Ikalogic user forum was shut down. Actually, the decline of the forum began when it was converted to some weird Web2.0 question/answer thing without threads or filtering or working search function. I understand that administration of a forum needs some work, but for me an active community is vital to a proper product. I.e. there's no place anymore to discuss/exchange user written protocol decoders or collect and evaluate SW/HW improvement ideas.

Last but not least, I don't really understand Ikalogic's product policy. The ScanaPlus was a very good product but it had some issues. Me and many other people would have willingly thrown their money at Ikalogic to get an upgraded version (upgradable firmware, local memory and/or USB3, clock input, trigger output, 16ch). Instead the next product was ScanaQuad which limited the channels to four and the promised (yet somewhat obscure) device to connect multiple SquanaQuads through USB was never released. Letting aside that connecting four SquanaQuads to get 16 channels would be very expensive and it always sounded like a so-so idea to somehow try to synchronize multiple devices through USB timestamps or whatever.

Anyway, I thought to myself "let's assume there was a market for the ScanaQuad but now they will develop that ScanaQuad successor". Instead the next product was a single channel wireless pen oscilloscope. Well, again, there might be people who have actually looked for something like this, but I wouldn't honestly know what to do with it even if I got it for free. And I'm working with a scope on a daily basis. But who wants a scope probe which doesn't even seem to have a sprung hook? How are you supposed to use the GUI (and/or some other tool to e.g. trigger a test condition) if you always have to hold the probe in one hand? Actually I avoid it like the plague to hold scope probe with my hand. Letting aside that 4000 Points memory sounds like a Tek scope from the 90s.

Whatever, I wouldn't care if I thought that Ikalogic was a company big enough to not delay development of a ScanaPlus successor or even endanger their future because of products with a limited target audience. But well, I'm not so sure about this. At least the ScanaPlus successor is already delayed for more than two years and I guess it will be at least three years in the end.

So there we are now: there is this nice looking new SW version (even if I didn't really notice any actual functional improvements and IMHO it's a step in the wrong direction regarding trigger setup) but there is no ScanaPlus device anymore to use it with.

Don't get me wrong: I wish only the best for you and Ikalogic as company and if the "ScanaPlus-x" will be released in 2018, there's a high chance that I'll buy one or two even if it won't be exactly the hardware I would like to see and the SW improvements I asked for so many times so log ago will never make it in ScanaStudio. But it's kinda hard to keep my hopes high and it's more the lack of proper competition (in that price range) that keeps me waiting.

[As a side note: the limitations of ScanaPlus and capturing issues on my laptop at work kinda forced me to buy a DSLogic Pro (well, actually two) which features more or less everything I ever wanted in a logic analyzer HW-wise but which is held back by the SW. Even though the (Python) decoder speed was improved at some point, the project is effectively dead and most probably there will never be a certified Win10 driver]

[Giuss]

I have  a Scanalogic 2 (an old version now discontinued) and it is a very good product, no problems with it

[egonotto]

Hello,

it seems Scanalogic 2 is not supportes by ScanaStudio V3.0.x

Best regards
egonotto