Simple Question for those in the electronic field.

[rhaugen]

If you needed a new oscilloscope which one would it be ?

I am hoping that those that actually work in the electronic field would be willing to wade in. All the other threads seem to be about specific scopes etc. I am curious what those in the know would like to have for themselves.

 

[Arouse1973]

Well I think if you asked any of us we would want the best for our money. It does depend on what you want it to do. I used a 50 MHz CRT scope for many years, it served me well. Somtimes people think they need the best scope on the market. Well it all depends on what your doing with it. I think for the average electronic bod 50MHz scope will be fine. That's just my opinion.
Adam

 

[Harald Kapp]

What I would like to have, what I need and what I can afford are 3 seperate items.

• I would like to have: a 100MHz (analog bandwidth) digital oscilloscope with at least 4 channels and a logic analyzer option.
• What I need (for my personal purposes): my old 20 MHz analog 2 channel scope
• What I can afford: today more than what what I bought many many years ago, but no need to discard a good scope as long as it does its (occasional) job.

Professionally we use at least 100 MHz digital scopes. But I don't think that should be reason enough for you decide upon. You need to find your personal requirements (bandwidth, number of channels, accuracy etc.) and select a sope according to those needs.

 

[KrisBlueNZ]

I agree with Adam. It really depends on what you need to do.

In my last job, for 20 years, I used an analogue 2-channel Hitachi scope, and I liked it a lot. The most technologically advanced feature it had was delayed trigger, and I very seldom even used that!

Of course you have to understand its limitations; as with any other piece of test equipment, there are things that could be there in the signal you're measuring, that it simply will not show you. You have to be aware that it's not necessarily telling you everything you might want to know.

Technology moves quickly though, and for the last 30-plus years, digital storage scopes have been steadily improving in functionality and performance.

I follow Dave Jones of eevblog (http://www.eevblog.com and http://www.youtube.com/user/eevblog) who has a huge experience and knowledge of test equipment, among many subjects. He seems to recommend a brand called Rigol (among others) and a model called something like CZ1000 (it has a 1000 in the name, anyway).

It's available with various options, including a logic analyser feature and an arbitrary waveform generator, both of which can be really useful, whether they're integrated into the scope or not. I think personally I would probably want the logic analyser to be separate, and to use a PC as the user interface, because they are quite UI-intensive, and a mouse and keyboard are always going to be an order of magnitude better than knobs and buttons, no matter how nicely designed they are.

Dave has also reviewed a number of PC-based scopes (USB devices that use a PC for the user interface) and generally he doesn't recommend them. I've used a very old version of the same thing, and it definitely does have its uses - mainly, being able to capture events leading up to a trigger for later analysis.

If I had the money, I would go for a 4-channel digital scope with at
least 100 MHz bandwidth, with a nice large sample buffer. I would probably
buy it on eBay (unless I won a lottery prize), from a medium or large
company that upgrades their equipment regularly, so I would know it had
been maintained and calibrated, and wasn't being disposed of because it had
a problem.

 

[(*steve*)]

I think my gut feeling would be:

1. If you're buying second hand, get an analogue scope
2. If you're buying new, get a digital scope

I wouldn't buy a second hand digital scope merely because they're advancing so fast that an old one probably isn't worth the money (unless it's really cheap). It's a bit like buying a 10 year old mobile (cell) phone (digital scope) or a 10 year old car (analogue). Even if they've both been looked after, one will probably perform more like a new one than the other...

 

[KrisBlueNZ]

I wouldn't buy a second hand digital scope merely because they're advancing so fast that an old one probably isn't worth the money (unless it's really cheap).

Wouldn't there be some companies that would be upgrading their test equipment every few years, that would be selling off reasonably recent scopes?

 

[(*steve*)]

Wouldn't there be some companies that would be upgrading their test equipment every few years, that would be selling off reasonably recent scopes?

Yeah, but just look at the price/specs of digital scopes now as compared with a few years ago. The prices are no longer falling so rapidly at the bottom end, but the specs are rapidly increasing. It would have to be really cheap.

This is really just from my own observations as I've been thinking about my next scope and looking at ebay as well. It probably doesn't help me that there's not too many places selling used test equipment within 1000 miles of me.

 

[KrisBlueNZ]

Yeah, but just look at the price/specs of digital scopes now as compared with a few years ago. The prices are no longer falling so rapidly at the bottom end, but the specs are rapidly increasing. It would have to be really cheap.

Where would you say the sweet spot is? The best value for money, with the important features that you or I would want? How important are number of channels, buffer size, logic analyser functions, advanced triggering, etc?

This is really just from my own observations as I've been thinking about my next scope and looking at ebay as well. It probably doesn't help me that there's not too many places selling used test equipment within 1000 miles of me.

Yes, likewise. I would be very lucky to find any decent digital scopes second hand in New Zealand at good prices. But I'm going to get a lump sum payment for porting some code, and I'm considering replacing my old analogue scope. Can you suggest some good manufacturers and model numbers that I could look at?

 

[(*steve*)]

If you look at the DS1052 that was pretty much a breakthrough when it came out, then look at what's available now to see what a few $$ does.

Dave Jones has a DS2000A model (not sure of the exact one). It's around $1200 for the base model. It's more than a few $$ but it gives you a huge leap in performance.

What would I like in a scope? function generator, spectrum analysis (especially low frequencies), digital signal analysis, analogue-like intensity.

The interesting thing to note is that Rigol are notoriously easy to upgrade with a few software hacks (if you're into that sort of thing).

Other than that... give me an Agilent scope