From: anthonypaulo@gmail.com   
      
   > I looked briefly at the 1x. You have a lot of ringing. First, some ringing    
   > is fine, if that's the way the circuit is designed. Old NMOS/CMOS stuff    
   > is not trying to balance driver and receiver impedence, so I would expect    
   > things to not look "perfect". If there is real ringing, it's only a problem    
   > if the amplitude is so much that it causes the receiver to misread the    
   > signal (so, a clock ringing so much that it could be intereted as a new    
   > edge is a problem). As I explain to many people--some ringing is usually    
   > fine, it needs to be severe to be a problem.    
   >    
   > But: you showed the image of your probe--that's very useful. And you're    
   > probing incorrectly. You need the tip of the probe to be within say 1cm    
   > of the signal to be probed. You can not attach a long wire, and then    
   > attach the probe to that wire. If you want to see a signal on the    
   > motherboard, the probe tip must go right down there. You can solder on    
   > a VERY SHORT stub of less than 1cm (I often solder on a resistor, and    
   > then clip the lead down to <1cm since I can easily hold a resistor with    
   > pliers, it's thinner than usual solid wire, and it makes the soldering    
   > easy. You clip off the resistance blob itself). Then attach the probe    
   > to that SMALL stub.    
   >    
   > It looks like in slot 2 you have a prototyping card with a breakout    
   > connector, and you've stuck some wires in the connector for the signal    
   > and ground. These wires look to be about 6 inches long, and you've    
   > attached the probe to these wires. If you put a resistor in that    
   > connector instead, clip it to be short (and get rid of the resistance    
   > part), and probe that. No soldering needed. Not as good, since you're    
   > using an effective 3cm stub (the connector counts against you, sorry).    
   >    
   > The best is to take a real card, like the card in slot 5, and find the    
   > back side of a through hole chip with the signal you want. Solder on a    
   > resistor lead, then snip it to be very short (5mm is very easy to do,    
   > 3mm is great). Note: I don't use new solder usually, just melt the    
   > solder already there and it's enough to hold the stub. I find the probe    
   > won't really clip on to the through-hole leads as they are since there's    
   > not enough to grab onto beyond the solder ball. Then put the probe    
   > directly on that stub, and it should grab on easily. This is about the    
   > best I can do.    
   >    
   > One trick is to test out ringing by manually holding the probe tip on the    
   > signal as well, and see if the ringing gets better. If the 1cm stub shows    
   > ringing, try manually holding the probe and see if it gets better. If it    
   > still does, then there's just ringing on the signal. It happens.    
   >    
   > It's ok to probe "badly" if it's easy, or that it's not worth the    
   > trouble to probe properly. Try to look at the signals as "digital", and    
   > ignore kinks, ringing, etc.    
   >    
   > Kent   
      
   Hi Kent! Thank you so much for responding, this is a great explanation of what   
   I've been doing wrong. I'll do what you suggested and see what it looks like.   
   I figured the problem was likely to be me, and thanks to you I'll be able to   
   make a more informed    
   test from now on.   
      
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