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Hello Pedro,
We are currently working on integration of a third party auto calibration module. The ETA for that support is TBD as the module is still unreleased. If you would like to be notified when we have added support for it, please email me at aj@signalhound.com.
For now, our software only supports mechanical SOLT cal kits.
Let me know if I can help with anything else.
October 9, 2025 at 3:44 pm in reply to: Spike sweep and real-time analysis modes display black screen above window size Thanks for the follow up and feedback!
I will pass this along to the team.
October 9, 2025 at 8:48 am in reply to: Spike sweep and real-time analysis modes display black screen above window size btlac,
We compile most of our Linux offerings on Ubuntu 18.04, and while we don’t list 24.04 I have many reports of success from customers. I will update our website to reflect this.
We have tested Spike on 4k monitors before. Do you see the issue when you put Spike on the main laptop display? If yes, does anything change if you disconnect the external monitor? Can you verify you don’t have any outstanding video drivers you can install for your machine? I haven’t seen your issue specifically, (black screen related to window size), but have seen customers report fully white/black windows, and usually updating video drivers resolves the issue.
Regarding the other issue, it should not be an issue, this is a longstanding output that seems benign, and resists our efforts to remove it.
We have a very limited number of command line arguments, help is not one of them. They are listed in the manual, but are generally unrelated to your issue.
You might need to increase the meter settings meas time. Try 1+ seconds. This will then be closer to the measurement you are seeing when you are dwelling at just one frequency with the meter enabled. When doing the auto scan, each frequency is only measured for the specified meas time.
Hello Mattia,
For the sweep measurement, only avg/max detectors are available. The QP measurements are relegated to single frequency measurements only. The workflow would ideally be, using a peak detector, finding all frequencies that exceed your limit, then testing those frequencies separately using the QP detector, one frequency at a time. In theory the reading from a peak detector will always be equal/greater than a QP detector. You’re saying you are seeing a larger value from the QP measurement than the peak detector. It might be the sweep isn’t dwelling long enough to characterise the signal. The dwell time can be modified on the sweep to help with this in the range table.
The API does not have a equivalent command for reference level offset (RLO). The logic for RLO is done entirely in Spike. Fortunately it is simply offsetting the reference level you set through the API. For example, a RLO of 20dB (implying something like a 20dB attenuator in line) would mean setting the reference level in the API 20dB lower.
Did you modify the network address of the SM200C and need to update the address specified in the sm_open_networked_device() function?
Sometimes we see the “ANY” address not work. You might consider changing the “ANY” 0.0.0.0 address parameter to your hardcoded NIC address.
I’m assuming Spike is not running at the same time?
Do you see any LED activity when the sm_open_networked_device() function is called?
I look forward to your response.
PK,
The API would be the recommended way to automate with the VSG25. The VSG25 software and device does not support SCPI. SCPI automation is only supported on the VSG60 software.
The VSG25 API exposes most of the functionality of the user interface. It can be found in our SDK, linked below. See the user manual for programming examples.
https://signalhound.com/software/signal-hound-software-development-kit-sdk/
Let us know if you have follow up questions.
No it does not.
We have now released ARMv8 API builds for the BB60, SP145, and SM200/435 devices. This is API only, no Spike. The README in the documentation mentions the platform and compiler used for each build. None of the builds will support Windows+ARM.
RSartell,
Porting Spike is definitely something we have talked about, but there isn’t a timeline for this right now. The work done on the APIs would benefit a Spike port.
From your previous post, it seems Windows on ARM is your target platform? As you’ve noticed, all my ARM compiles are for Linux or Mac. If we ported Spike, Linux would likely be the first target OS.
Andrew
After long delay, we are happy to announce the availability of ARM (AArch64) support for the BB60 API. The API was compiled on the Nvidia Jetson AGX Orin platform. It’s expected to work on many ARMv8 Linux based systems.
Library files and README can be found in the SDK.
https://signalhound.com/software/signal-hound-software-development-kit-sdk/
Nome,
For many PCs, the use of a non y-cable will be sufficient to run the VSG60. It is becoming more rare for a PC to not supply the necessary 6W over a typical USB type-A port. You will typically only have issues when using ultra portable laptops such as the surface pro (for example).
A micro-B to type-C cable should work fine on most PCs with the VSG60. If that doesn’t work, consider something like the Anker 555 hub. This will connect to the PC via USB-C, and give you 2 USB type A ports to connect a y-cable to.
Our MATLAB examples are convenience classes that wrap and call the functions in the DLL. You can see everywhere we call a DLL function, the “calllib” function is used. It’s all just standard MATLAB code. As to which functions to call in the DLL, you would want to reference the VSG60 API (link below). What I recommend, is looking at the C++ examples in the SDK, creating your own example, then porting that to MATLAB. Writing your initial example in C++ is even better as you can prove functionality before the port.
https://signalhound.com/sigdownloads/SDK/online_docs/vsg60_api/index.html
Thanks for the feedback Alan. I’ll get this into our request log. I think these are reasonable requests.
Thank you for sharing!
This bug was resolved in a release of Spike today (4.0.8). https://signalhound.com/spike/
If you continue to have issues with this release, please contact us at support@signalhound.com
Thanks
mmark,
There are a couple scaling factors you might need to consider when FFT’ing the I/Q data from our API.
– If you are requesting 16-bit I/Q data from our API, and you want to measure dBm, then you will need to get the I/Q correction and apply it via the equations in our API manual. If you are requested 32-bit floating point data (recommended), then the data is already scaled.
– The FFT itself. I would recommend scaling the Fwd FFT by N. What additional scaling you need to apply is dependent on which FFT library you are using. Some use scaling by default, some dont.
– If you are using a window function, you want to normalize the window before windowing the data.
– Once you have the above resolved, the output of the FFT can be converted to dBm using the equation
10*log10(I^2 + Q^2)
The problem with the 2 script approach is that all the resources associated with the handle and device are in the working memory of the first script. The second script can’t access those.
A couple alternative solutions,
– Go to a 1 script approach where after the initialization occurs, the script goes into a waiting for user input loop, and responds to the requests for data, all within one script. This is the easiest solution.
– Change the first script to act more like a service, which stays open and communicates with other scripts/programs that request data. The first script is the only script that interfaces the device, and relays all data to the other script. This seems like a more complex approach unless you plan on being able to have several programs requesting data simultaneously.
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