Tools of the Trade.

[BillO]

Just a warning about UNI-T. I know they have some pretty nice stuff, especially some of the DMMs and that nifty new little AWG they have for about $100. However, they will provide absolutely zero support. I bought a scope off them 12 years ago and while it was a nifty scope for the money back then it did have some bugs. I have tried to report these as I have found them and I've tried to see it they ever published a firmware update by sending in an email request every couple of years, but I never get nay response back from them. Nothing. The scope's bugs are no anything that would ender it useless and I have gotten 11~ sorta useful years out it, and I do have a bench DMM that has given me no real trouble either but for me it's time to move to a more market savvy company. One that has a concept of customer care.

I bought a Siglent scope recently and from what I hear they are responsive to customer issues. Maybe they are no Tektronix, Keysight or R&S, but I simply cannot afford the stuff those companies throw in the garbage.

What are other's experiences?

[GARTHWILSON]

I should get another oscilloscope, although I have not been in any hurry. My analog ones' switches have gotten problematic and they're not accessible to spray adequately with contact cleaner; and my boss gave me an Agilent digital scope which is not user-friendly at all. It's user-hostile! I wrote that on another forum, and someone replied that that's how Agilent 'scopes are. I read the entire manual twice, and yet certain basic settings I want are elusive, and as I remember from the last time I tried to use it, it thinks it knows better, and says in essence, "Oh, what you want is [...] so let me set that up for you automatically and save you the trouble," and it won't leave it the way I asked. I contacted a company that rents and sells used test equipment, asking about trading it in on something else, and the amount they offered me for it was an insult, only about one-twentieth of the new price, even though it was virtually new. I was expecting more like one-quarter, and then they could sell it for one-half. An article I read also basically insulted anyone who might be thinking of an analog 'scope, saying digital is where it's at now. Well, really good analog ones are still far less expensive than good digital ones. I can almost always make something in the digital world repeat in a loop so as to see it on an analog 'scope, and sometimes I also want the X/Y mode which many (most?) DSOs lack. I like the form factor of the scope-meters, but last I looked into them (which was not recent), they had severe deficiencies. I look forward to more discussion on this, and whatever you find out.

[BillO]

I kind of miss my Tek 465. I was thinking of trying to get a Tek 2465B. They are an awesome analog scope. 4ch @ 400MHz. Ones in good working condition run about $1000 once you source a set of decent probes. The Tek scopes of those years long ago were just intuitive to use.

The new Siglent 1204X-E I got is not bad for a cheap DSO. It even has serial protocol decoding built in. There are some mysteries in it still but I'm getting used to it. One thing you did not have to deal with in the past was 4-layers of endless menus to get to the thing you need to change. That gets tiresome real quick. A couple of the really nice features it has though are a http server whereby you can view and control the scope from any networked computer. The other is the good set of trigger options. Not bad for an under $800 DSO.

Bothe the Siglent and my old Uni-T have an X-Y mode. I even have a cheap Hantek 4ch USB scope and an even cheaper Instrustar USB scope (which I bought as a gag) that will do it too. I think that is pretty standard these days.

[GARTHWILSON]

BillO wrote:

One thing you did not have to deal with in the past was 4-layers of endless menus to get to the thing you need to change. That gets tiresome real quick.

At my last place of work, around 1990, I used a Philips scope that had both digital and analog modes. The analog mode was much faster than the digital. It has softkeys, but could also be controlled by all the buttons, or even through IEEE-488. It was pretty intuitive compared to some (most?). Instead of rotary and other switches that were common at the time, it used reed relays which of course seal out the pollutants in the air that gradually foul up other scopes' switches.

Quote:

Both the Siglent and my old Uni-T have an X-Y mode. I even have a cheap Hantek 4ch USB scope and an even cheaper Instrustar USB scope (which I bought as a gag) that will do it too. I think that is pretty standard these days.

I'm talking about where one in the front-panel inputs is for the X position, replacing the timebase, so you can do things like Lissajous patterns and raster graphics (the latter requiring also a Z input for brightness). Is that what you're talking about too, or do you just mean X minus Y, ie, differential? I know the latter are on virtually every 'scope.

Dave Jones has a EEVblog review of a UNI-T 'scope at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=99_WFvP_T9E . He says he definitely cannot recommend it.

Another tool of the trade, which I'm also in the market for: Printers! My old Epson dot-matrix impact printers are having problems, so I just talked with someone at Epson about a repair. I also found out however that you can buy a new Epson LX-350 for no more than I expected to have to pay for a repair. When I called them up, I had to go through several layers of technical "help," re-telling my story every time, explaining that I use this on two different computers and neither one is Windows or Mac, that one is DOS (most of the technical "help" people are too young to know what that is) and the other one (my workbench computer) doesn't even use an operating system (something they don't understand), and that yes, I do know that my LX-800 and T-1000 printers have actual mechanical problems, and that there's a reason I need:

• fanfold paper (for proofreading code, where otherwise page breaks always seem to come at the worst possible places!)
• it has to have one of the older interfaces (serial or preferably parallel, not just USB)
• a character printer that doesn't need everything fed to it as graphics
• I need to be able to print one line and see it, without ejecting the whole page, then a few minutes later, print another line and see it

I went through this exercise a couple of years ago too when I was trying to get the information on what data to send it to do graphics on their 9-pin dot-matrix impact printers. Finally, several levels up, I was able to get to someone who understood and emailed me the right documents, rather than just asking what OS I was using and trying to direct me to their downloadable drivers.

I've emailed asking for a little more information on this LX-350 that's not in the manual, specifically whether the escape codes are the same as they used decades ago in their dot-matrix impact printers; but it does look like it will be a good replacement. And BTW, it has a Centronics parallel interface, RS-232, and USB!

[GARTHWILSON]

BillO wrote:

nifty new little AWG they have for about $100

I had to look up what "AWG" was. Arbitrary waveform generator. I've used my workbench computer for that, but now I also have an HP 3314A with AWG capability and which I can control from my workbench computer and my hand-help HP computers (HP-41cx and HP-71).

[BillO]

GARTHWILSON wrote:

BillO wrote:

I'm talking about where one in the front-panel inputs is for the X position, replacing the timebase, so you can do things like Lissajous patterns and raster graphics (the latter requiring also a Z input for brightness).

Yup, that's what I'm talking about. However, I've just confirmed the UNI-T won't do it. The other 3 will, including the $50 Instrustar. I could have sworn I was able to do it on the UNI-T, but I guess it was the Hantek I used. Anyway, I can't find it on the UNI-T.

The UNI-T I have dates from quite a while ago. They were the first to put a big screen on their low end scopes. For the price ~$500 it was the only scope I found that provided 1mV/div input, true 1GS/sec and that big screen all in one package. All that is par for the course these days and can be had for less money.

I too have a lovely piece of HP tech porn. a HP1660A logic analyzer. I'll have to do a few weeks of weight lifting before I can retrieve it for photos though. LOL.

[BillO]

GARTHWILSON wrote:

BillO wrote:

nifty new little AWG they have for about $100

I had to look up what "AWG" was. Arbitrary waveform generator. I've used my workbench computer for that, but now I also have an HP 3314A with AWG capability and which I can control from my workbench computer and my hand-help HP computers (HP-41cx and HP-71).

Just found one of these down the road from me. They want $250CDN for it (less than $200 US). I'm tempted...

[speculatrix]

BillO wrote:

Just found one of these down the road from me. They want $250CDN for it (less than $200 US). I'm tempted...

I completely understand people who collect (and use) these classic HP devices – they just look the way lab equipment should. There's a saying in the aviation world - "if it looks right it'll fly right". Same goes.

[willie68]

Nice,
i love my hameg. This one is round about 35 years old. The function generatr abouve just 1/2 year.
I had several UNI-T's, i think they're ok, but i didn't try to get support or repair something.
Don't be angry with me, but 12 years for a digital device from China is a decent amount of time.

A little true story on the side:
A well-known company here in Germany once developed a small digital radio that you could build yourself. It was such a kit with instructions with the background to convey some electronics and at the same time to have a nice project. The edition was only a few thousand pieces. This radio was manufactured and assembled in China. Also the software of the little chip. The part became a box office hit. Only 1 year later they wanted to relaunch the radio again. However, they only wanted to make a few small changes to the software. Like I said, a year later. But no chance. The software had to be developed from scratch, because none of the Chinese partners could remember that software. No version control system, no backup, even the employees couldn't help. Of course, the software could have been read out of the chip and disassembled. But the effort was equal to a new development.

[BigDumbDinosaur]

speculatrix wrote:

There's a saying in the aviation world - "if it looks right it'll fly right".

That’s what they said about the de Havilland Comet and the DC-10...

Honorable Mention goes to the Convair 240.

[BillO]

BigDumbDinosaur wrote:

speculatrix wrote:

There's a saying in the aviation world - "if it looks right it'll fly right".

That’s what they said about the de Havilland Comet..

Those square windows on teh original Comet never looked right.

[plasmo]

I have a HP 54645D mixed signal scope for about 25 years. It has two 100MHz analog channels + 16 digital channels sampling at 200MHz. It was several thousands dollars 25 years ago but now you can buy used one on eBay for $300-$400. I like it so much I bought a used 54645D as backup.
Bill

[BigDumbDinosaur]

BillO wrote:

BigDumbDinosaur wrote:

speculatrix wrote:

There's a saying in the aviation world - "if it looks right it'll fly right".

That’s what they said about the de Havilland Comet..

Those square windows on teh original Comet never looked right.

Picture windows. Gave the passengers a better view. In fact, when BOAC put the first Comets into service, that “better view” was a sales point.

There were several points of origin for skin cracking. The window corners were one, as was a cutout in the top of the fuselage on which an RDF antenna was mounted. Riveting was not as good as it should have been. Not helping matters was the fact that metal fatigue was a poorly-understood phenomenon at the time. It took destructive hydrostatic testing of an entire fuselage to identify the problem. The redesigned Comet proved to be a good plane, but it never recovered from the bad rep of the original.

[GARTHWILSON]

I wonder how this Hameg [Edit: Rigol] is: https://www.jameco.com/z/DS1202Z-E-Rigo ... 39231.html . This one is $330 at Jameco, which is far less than DSOs usually cost, and even less than analog 'scopes have traditionally cost. Does anyone here have a Hameg [Edit: Rigol] scope, and can you comment on their user-friendliness and other important traits, whether good or bad?

About the Epson LX-350 printer I mentioned above: I never got an answer about the question I emailed through their site about the Esc codes (information that's no longer in the manuals, as they expect you to just blindly use their printer drivers running under standard modern OSs, which I don't), so I called today and miraculously got through to someone who seemed to know something about this stuff, and he confirmed that they are the same as their dot-matrix impact printers of decades ago; so I ordered one. I should be here in a week.

[pjdennis]

GARTHWILSON wrote:

I wonder how this Hameg is: https://www.jameco.com/z/DS1202Z-E-Rigo ... 39231.html. This one is $330 at Jameco, which is far less than DSOs usually cost, and even less than analog 'scopes have traditionally cost. Does anyone here have a Hameg scope, and can you comment on their user-friendliness and other important traits, whether good or bad?

That link goes to a Rigol scope. I've no experience with them but have seen them compared alongside Siglent scopes, for example this comparable one which is around $50 more at $380: https://www.jameco.com/z/SDS1202X-E-Sig ... 83191.html. I have the 4-channel version of this Siglent scope which otherwise has basically the same features and have found it user friendly and capable.