TV Based Oscilloscope

This single project turns your TV into a digital storage oscilloscope with a sampling rate 160 Ksps. As a bonus, five voltages on the five analog inputs can be monitored.

No additional video-controller and video-RAM are required. Main goal of this project is an implementation of a high-resolution (512x240 pixels) video generator inside the ARM microcontroller, LPC2138. This video generator operates in the background mode, with a low CPU loading that allows the other high-intensive tasks (such as the data collection and visualization) be run. 

Both of standards, American NTSC and Europe PAL are supported.

There are many solutions, as a sound card, as USB standalone devices based that turns you PC into digital oscilloscope. All of them have a significant disadvantage – when you use PC simultaneously for measurement and for other needs, you are compelled to click a mouse again and again to switch between applications. Of course, you may put a dedicated notebook, but the other disadvantages such as a continuous operating system loading and control by the mouse are remain.

Those devices require the PC with all peripherals, my device just the TV. It’s ready to be used immediately after the powering on. Note that the implementation of scope was not my main task, it was just a good way to demonstrate the operation of video-controller that has been implemented using the capabilities of the Philips’ chip LPC2138.

Step 1: Circuit Diagram and Connections

Step 2: Download Required Files

Download Code

Download Working Details