You guys just have to check out this logic analyzer!

http://www.saleae.com/logic/



You can download the software to give it a trial run (without requiring the hardware)

at $150 I don't think you can go wrong

At first glance, I thought that this was going to be the unit that I have, but mine is from SAELIG.

This is what I purchased a while ago: http://www.saelig.com/LA/LA005.htm

I never got it to work properly, but then again I tried it back before I really knew what I was doing. It was certainly user error. They seem to be great little tools.

I have wanted one for a while and should be getting one in the near future.

It would certainly be better than trying to use an oscilloscope to fault find digital equipment.

The best tool in my electronic tool box

What is the difference between the Saleae Logic Analyzer and the Bus Pirate besides the price?



http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bus_Pirate
http://www.adafruit.com/products/237
http://dangerousprototypes.com/docs/Bus_Pirate

From what I know (which could be wrong) the Saleae logic gives you 8 digital pins (or 16 for the 16 pin model) and you can connect them to any digital connection and it gives you millions of samples of whats going on there. You can then configure it to say that certain pins are used for certain tasks like SPI and i2C etc...

I thought that the bus pirate was for connecting to different devices to send them commands to make them do things... I could be wrong though...

Now that we are on the topic I did buy myself a Logic 8 last year (which is a fantastic tool as you say Gav!) plus I emailed them a couple of weeks ago because they give out free Logic 8's to electronic professors, long story short - they sent me out another one for free! (just got it two days ago) I'll be keeping that one at work for everyone to use though