This work presents the development of a test method for diagnosing the presence of electronic systems failures caused by physical defects in the printed circuit board (PCB) and electronic components. The effectiveness of this approach is used to identify catastrophic and parametric failures. This method is used to evaluate three different embedded systems with similar topologies but different electrical designs, using components from diverse manufacturers and features with the purpose of meeting the necessary requirements in an experimental design methodology. The measurement was performed with a non-invasive current sensor designed to manage the delivery of pulses in the power supply lines of the device under test (DUT) and simultaneously measuring the dynamic current demand of the system. The analysis of the results revealed that the active current (IDDA) tests normally used in integrated circuits (ICs), are very effective in large-scale circuits such as electronic systems.