Data acquisition system for test and measurement signals

A system for acquiring and reading out test and measurement signals comprising:

• a computer system;
• an acquisition device having a Field Programmable Gate Array (FPGA) for sampling signals and storing data representative of said sample signals, in which said FPGA operates in accordance with configuration and settings at the FPGA defining FPGA operation;
• and
• said computer system has memory storing a plurality of FPGA configurations in which each of said plurality of FPGA configurations when applied to said FPGA reconfigures said FPGA to enable a plurality of different modes of operation of said acquisition device in accordance with one or more user selectable characteristics of the acquisition device operation, and said computer system in response to user selection of said one or more characteristics of the acquisition device operation automatically determines which one of said stored plurality of FPGA configurations provides said selected one or more characteristics of acquisition device operation and automatically transfers the determined one of said FPGA configurations to the acquisition device which when applied to the FPGA reconfigures the FPGA to enable one of said plurality of different modes of the acquisition device operation for said selected one or more characteristics without affecting user operation of the acquisition device so that said transfer and reconfiguration of the FPGA occurs seamlessly and unobtrusively to the user.