SB-Bus Errors

On this page you'll find the possible error messages and their causes. Any of these error messages can be reported by the *ERROR? command. Usually it is only interesting to send the *ERROR? command after receiving an Execution Error prompt !> in response to the last issued command.

NO ERROR
The last issued command was completed without any errors. The last command also reported this by sending an OK prompt => .

SYNTAX ERROR
The last issued command could not be understood. Maybe there was a typing error in the command name, or the command was intended for a completely different SB-Bus device. The last attempt to execute a command resulted in a Syntax Error prompt ?> .

NOTHING TO REPEAT ERROR
You've tried to repeat the last command while the interface hasn't executed a command yet after it was switched on, so there's nothing to repeat.

ABORTED ERROR
The last command was aborted by the user. Usually only the commands that produce longer lists can be aborted because all the others are finished very fast and therefore can not be interrupted. You can interrupt longer lists by sending an ESC character to the SB-Bus.

NO PARAMETERS ALLOWED
The command you gave doesn't require any parameters. You did specify one or more parameters though, but they can't be accepted.

MISSING PARAMETER ERROR
The command you gave did require one or more parameters, but you failed to supply any or enough parameters.

TOO MANY PARAMETERS ERROR
You've supplied more parameters than the command could handle. Please read the command description to find out what parameters are to be expected.

ILLEGAL PARAMETER ERROR
At least one of the parameters you specified after the previous command could not be recognized. This is usually caused by a typing error, or you probably used spaces in the parameter field.

TOO MANY ERRORS
This error can only be generated if the Acknowledge flow control is selected. You must send an acknowledge character (usually = ) to the instrument in response to every line it sends to the SB-Bus. Sending an error prompt ( ! or ? ) 10 times in a row will abort the previous command and will cause this error.

HOLD MODE DEACTIVATED
This error is caused by sending the *HOLD command while the *HOLD mode was already active (with or without a command on hold). The *HOLD mode will be deactivated this way and a command that was placed on hold will be canceled.
Please note the difference between the system *HOLD command and the normal HOLD command!

HOLD NOT ACTIVE ERROR
The *TRIG command will cause this error when the *HOLD mode was not activated, so there is no command to be executed.

NOTHING IN HOLD ERROR
This error is caused by the *TRIG command when there was no command placed on *HOLD previously. The *HOLD mode will be deactivated when this error occurs.

RANGE ERROR
A value in one of the parameters was out of its legal range. Please refer to the command's description to find out what the legal range of the specific parameter is.

NVM WRITE ERROR
The instrument tried to write to NVM memory but somehow did not succeed in it. This is probably caused by a malfunctioning NVM memory.

NO REFERENCE SWITCH ERROR
You tried to select a reference source using the REFERENCE command, while there is no reference switch installed in the instrument.
If you are absolutely certain that there is a reference switch installed the instrument was mis-informed about it. Please correct this using the OPTION command.

MENU IS ACTIVE ERROR
The user has activated the Menu on the instrument. The instrument can not perform any measurements while the menu is active, so some of the commands will generate this error message when given while the Menu is active.
The DISPLAY? and FREQ? are the first instructions to fail while the Menu is active for obvious reasons. Values that are previously stored by the HOLD command can still be read without triggering this error message. This is because these values don't rely on new measurements of course.
The HOLD command is the next command to fail while the Menu is active because it wants to store the currently measured values. It can't do that because there are no current measurements.
Finally the SYNC command will generate this error message while the Menu is active because it also relies on new measurements.
Remember that the *REMS command disables the Menu function, avoiding all of these problems while remotely controlling the instrument.

VALUE NOT FOUND ERROR
You tried to delete a value from the Offset or Scale list using the command OFFSET D,offset or SCALE D,scale. But the value you used could not be found in the table and therefore could not be deleted.

DUPLICATE VALUE ERROR
You tried to store a new value in the Offset or Scale list using the command OFFSET S,offset or SCALE S,scale. But the value you used was already present in the list so there is no need to store that value again.

MEMORY FULL ERROR
You tried to store a new value in the Offset or Scale list using the command OFFSET S,offset or SCALE S,scale. But the memory that holds all these values is full. You can store a maximum of 50 different values in the memory that is shared between the Offset and Scale lists.