[time-nuts] Typical HP 5370B resolution ?

[Mark Spencer]

Thanks.   With suitable 5 and 10 Mhz Sine wave input signals typically the adev plots will start out at approx 4E-11 @ 1 second (when making one measurement each second) which I believe implies a practical resolution of approx 40ps.   Noise floor tests using more or less using identical signals fed into the start and stop inputs will typically be 10 ps lower.

At this point I believe I'm going to leave well enough alone on my better HP5370B's and not attempt to re align them.  I'll likely spend some more time quantifying what suitable input signals are for my HP5370B's.

Regards
Mark Spencer



> Message: 4
> Date: Mon, 4 Mar 2013 08:41:06 +0100
> From: "Ulrich Bangert" <df6jb at ulrich-bangert.de>
> To: "'Discussion of precise time and frequency
> measurement'"
>     <time-nuts at febo.com>
> Subject: Re: [time-nuts] Typical HP 5370B resolution ?
> Message-ID: <4056222B698D4625893194A1E3AD4144 at athlon>
> Content-Type: text/plain;   
> charset="us-ascii"
> 
> Mark,
> 
> given the fact that the measurement results of a 5370 are
> integer multiples
> of 20 ps it is absolutely natural to see these steps in a
> phase plot, at
> least if the input signals are not bad conditioned. I guess
> however the
> question for the "typical" 5370 resolution was not whether
> these steps can
> be seen or not but was after what the device offers as its
> effective
> resolution. If you look at the AD plot of your Timelab
> measurements you will
> see a much higher number than 2.0E-11 @ 1 s and the number
> that you see in
> the AD plot should be considered the effective resolution
> because it
> reflects the basic resolution as well as the trigger noise.
> 
> Best regards
> Ulrich
>