A method of data acquisition for health management of systems is provided. The method includes receiving, at a remote node, analog data from one or more sensors configured to monitor a health characteristic of a system, converting, at the remote node, the analog data into digital data, time stamping the digital data with the remote node, recording the digital data in a memory of the remote node, wherein the memory is a ring buffer, transmitting, from the remote node to a central device, requested digital data upon receiving a request related to a triggering event, and synchronizing the transmitted data at the central device based on the time stamp of the requested digital data to generate synchronized data.