Recalling Recorded Data

Recordings saved using the 89600 VSA can also be recalled. Follow these steps to recall a recording (or simply drag and drop a recording over the VSA application window).

Click File > Recall > Recall Recording.
In Recall Recording dialog, browse to and select the recording.
Choose a Padding Selection and Padding Mode if desired.
Click Open.

Recordings are saved in a temporary recording file which is overwritten when a new recording is created or a recording is recalled. To preserve the current recording, rename and save the temporary recording file before creating a new recording.

Open the recording Player (Windows > Player), the player makes recording and playing back easier to control and manipulate.

You can download and playback recordings through a source, see Source Signal Playback

Example Signal Recordings and Demo signals

The VSA includes many Sample recordings and Demos, the recording are saved to the following folder:

%PROGRAMFILES%\Keysight\89600 Software <ReleaseVersion>\89600 VSA Software

See Demos and Recorded Signals for a list and descriptions of the recordings available.

The temporary recording file is always in SDF format, so the VSA converts the file to SDF format when necessary. After the temporary recording file is written, the VSA automatically selects Input > Data From > Recording.

If the recording recalled is an E3238S snapshot file, the VSA does not copy the file into the temporary recording file because of the large file size. Instead, the VSA plays back the original file. For this reason, do not move an E3238S file while it is being used by the VSA.

The Info Tab contains information about a recording, such as its length, the center frequency, span used to create the recording, and the number of channels in the recording.

Filter Settling

If a recording is recalled from a CSV, MAT, or TXT file, the VSA uses some of the points at the beginning of the recording to settle measurement filters. This effect can be minimized by clearing the correction checkboxes in the User Correction Tab. (The corrections are already applied to the data when the recording was saved in these formats.) Even with corrections turned off, approximately 27 points at the beginning of the data are used to settle measurement filters.

Corrections and Recalling a Recording

For all file formats except SDF (Fast) format, the time-domain corrections are applied permanently to recordings as they are saved. Thus, the recalled signal contains corrected signal data and the current self-calibration and external corrections are not applied.

For recordings saved in SDF (Fast) format, the data is saved uncorrected, but correction data is saved with the time data. This correction is applied when the time data is played back.