How to detect vaping in home can measure a single number for a voltage, but an oscilloscope is much more useful when building circuits that have changing voltages. An oscilloscope lets you see how a voltage changes over time and gives you a visual reference to find problems with your circuit.

Start by connecting the oscilloscope to your signal source (like an Arduino, 555 timer or other wave generator). Adjust the vertical and horizontal knobs until you can fit your signal in the screen. This should be fairly easy.

Next, play around with the trigger controls. This is where you can tell the scope to display repeating waveforms or capture a single event on the screen. You can also set the trigger level to stabilize a repeating waveform or make it easier to analyze a sudden spike on the display.

Interpreting Waveforms: Understanding What Your Oscilloscope Displays

Finally, you can use the cursor buttons to mark specific areas on the display for manual measurements. These are like the fine-tipped pens of the oscilloscope world and they let you measure the heights and widths of certain parts of the signal.

The other controls that are important to experiment with are volts/div and the time/div setting. These set the resolution and how fast your scope can measure voltages on the vertical, voltage scale. It is also important to adjust the vertical position knob, which moves the wave up and down on the display. This affects how close you can get to the peaks and troughs of the signal.