An all-in-one digital cantilever controller applicable to all SFM systems is disclosed that can perform many relevant experiments for cantilever control in scanned force microscopy. A compact optimized digital implementation replaces analog components associated with cantilever signal processing and control. It has minimal thermal drift, at least an order of magnitude less than analog components. It has a number of meaningful tuning parameters available, as well as a user-friendly graphical interface (GUI) for adjusting those tuning parameters and performing different types of experiments.