Fluke 196C Bonus Screens and Firmware upgrade Q's - Page 1
Forum section: electronics / testgear

author: noidea
author_rank: Unknown
timestamp: May 25, 2015, 09:51:41 am
content: Hi AllI'm not sure if I should have posted this in the test equipment scores thread or if its worthy of a post of it's own. I live in Australia so by Oz standards of second hand test gear I think it's a score at least as it has only cost me AU$1050 including postage from the other side of the country and a new battery (local supplier 4000 mAh Sanyo cells).I'm an air conditioning technician and ever since I was an apprentice years ago when I went to a training session and the instructor was showing how the bidirectional communication worked on an AC unit with an old Fluke PM95 I've wanted to get something like that myself. Roll on to 25 years later and now I'm in a similar position teaching other technicians how air conditioners work and spending my time dealing with issues that other people can't fix my wish has come true. These days the majority of things that I work on are inverter driven units or I'm troubleshooting noise interference issues on low voltage control circuits so whatever I bought had to be field portable with isolated channels and math functions which tends to narrow your choices.Apart from the dead battery from it sitting in a cupboard it doesn't look like it has ever seen much action and every time you power it up there is a nag screen about a bonus feature where you can unlock extra recording screens. Does anyone know if Fluke will still give you the code to unlock these extra screen memories?I've also seen that a firmware upgrade is available from Fluke as it is version 1.07 which can be upgraded to 1.08, the USB interface came in the case and it seems pretty straightforward but are there any things to watch out for?I've watched the oscilloscope training class video and have a rough idea of what I'm doing but haven't summoned up the courage to connect it to the mains AC part of an air conditioner yet or any of the Inverter power stages. So far I've been playing around with it by looking at the waveforms out of an IR receiver amplifier, but I need to work out on my triggering settings to capture the burst of data.Anyway thanks for listening to my ramblings

author: noidea
author_rank: Unknown
timestamp: July 08, 2015, 02:00:53 pm
content: Quote from: noidea on May 25, 2015, 09:51:41 amI managed to find out the answer to my question so if anyone is ever searching, the answer is yes it's still possible get the code to unlock the bonus screen memories on an old scopemeter.

author: Xenawise
author_rank: Contributor
timestamp: March 18, 2016, 06:20:05 am
content: Popping this back up to the top. You mentioned that you got the code to unlock the extra screen memories? Do tell how this was accomplished?Xenawise

author: noidea
author_rank: Unknown
timestamp: March 20, 2016, 12:54:02 am
content: Luckily for me I happened to be talking to the local Fluke rep at a trade function and the subject got round to scopemeters. I mentioned I had purchased a used one and was it still possible to get a code to unlock the feature. A few emails later and it was done. So I guess maybe contact your local distributor and see if they can help.

author: Simon Spiers
author_rank: Regular Contributor
timestamp: August 01, 2017, 02:00:51 pm
content: Or do what I did. Just do through all the numbers till it works.

author: casinada
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: August 02, 2017, 12:07:18 am
content: What are the added features?

author: noidea
author_rank: Unknown
timestamp: August 02, 2017, 02:05:08 pm
content: With the original firmware when I got it there was only 10 saved screen / setups, the unlock upped that to 15I also upgraded the firmware to the latest available and they are still there, but the latest version of the user manual that suits the last firmware also states 15 screen / setups are saveable so maybe if you update the firmware you will get them as well.There is one problem with this, Flukeview Sciopemeter V5.4 only seems to be able to download the first 10 screens and can't see the extra fiveI've worked around this by using the remote control mode and then taking screenshots of the extr five saved screens when I've needed to.

author: casinada
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: August 02, 2017, 03:11:56 pm
content: Mine is a 199C with the newest firmware. It shows 15 Screen+ Setup and 2 Reply+ Setup available. Haven't done much with the FLukeview software.Thank you for the info.

author: W4PJB
author_rank: Regular Contributor
timestamp: January 01, 2025, 07:54:01 pm
content: Bumping an old post, but might as well keep all of the replies in one thread to make searches easier.Does anyone know if it's still possible in 2025 to still get codes for the "bonus feature" on a Fluke 192/96/99 Scopemeter? I just picked up an extremely clean 199C and it still has the "nag" screen about unlocking a bonus feature for registering. I could honestly care less about the feature, but it would be great to get rid of this screen on startup.It looks like it's just a 3 digit code, I suppose I could just cycle through them until I find it if I have to, but getting a code from Fluke would be easier.

author: smaultre
author_rank: Regular Contributor
timestamp: January 02, 2025, 08:31:57 am
content: You can update to new firmware."bonus" already activated there.