Section 4: Sourcing and measuring
2470 High Voltage SourceMeter Instrument Reference Manual
4-54
2470-901-01 Rev. A /
May
2019
Sweep operation
Sweeps allow you to set up the instrument to source specific voltage or current values to a device
under test (DUT). A measurement is made for each value.
The 2470 can generate linear staircase, logarithmic staircase, linear dual staircase, and logarithmic
dual staircase sweeps from the front panel or from a remote interface. In addition to these sweeps,
you can generate custom sweeps if you use remote commands.
When you generate the sweep, the 2470 creates a source configuration list and a trigger model that
contain the settings you selected for the sweep. To run the sweep, press the TRIGGER key. You can
also use an initiate command over the remote interface.
Linear staircase sweep
When you use a linear staircase sweep, the voltage or current source increases or decreases in fixed
steps. Each source-measure point is equally spaced between the start and stop.
The 2470 sends a buffer clear command at the start of a sweep; if you do not want this action, you
can change the sweep trigger model to eliminate the clear block.
The sweep begins with a start voltage or current and ends with a stop voltage or current. A
measurement is made at each point after the delay. The figure below shows an increasing linear
staircase sweep.
When a linear staircase sweep is triggered to start, the output goes from the bias level to the start
source level. The output then changes in equal steps until the stop source level is reached. A
measurement is performed at each source step (including the start and stop levels). With trigger delay
set to zero, the time duration at each step is determined by the source delay and the time it takes to
perform the measurement (the NPLC setting). Note that the delay is the same for all steps in the
sweep.
