Not that I am aware of.
If you want to spend under $25 and do some soldering, get a DSO138. Be aware that this is a far cry from what you would get for your $500 budget.

 

Never had the bucks to build one.

 

There are embedded projects for low end stuff. Kits on Banggood.com,
again very low end stuff.

But serious stuff, stuff with significant BW, say 5 Mhz or greater, significant
triggering capabilities, measurement breadth, frame rates......not aware of
anything serious.

That being said there are some Tek and Agilent groups on Yahoo that have
retired Tek and Agilent engineers supporting the respective sites. Some
discussions of the way things have been done, how things are evolving.

Also on manufacturer sites some video on technology. Same for some FPGA
sites, where a lot of core scope engines are coming from.

I was lucky to have built an old analog Eico and later on a dual channel Heathkit.
I would say my skill set really improved as I started to repair old scopes and ones
up to 1990's.

Todays scopes are distinguished by their SW suite, Tons of code that really
make scopes shine. HW of course is much more RF, more art these days
as most starting DSO's are sampling at 1 Ghz or better.



Regards, Dana.

 

Not that I am aware of.
If you want to spend under $25 and do some soldering, get a DSO138. Be aware that this is a far cry from what you would get for your $500 budget.

That looks like fun but certainly not a valid tool for much. I think I am going to do the unthinkable and wait. I need a new project like a hole in the head and I have no immediate need for a scope I am guessing it will be a few months before I am playing with electronics on a components level again. I am however going to do a buy at some point and learning to design a circuit it is on my short list. I am going to keep an eye out and see if there are any sales during that period. of course thanks you everyone for the advice. Certainly don't stop if you have something else to jump in with as i am learning from every post.

 

Another possibility you can explore is a PC scope. You use the LINE input of your PC and the software is free.

 

LoL its fun to see a little shop banter and I am probably stepping in it here. But, are there any build your own oscilloscopes that would be worth the cost for the education?

Since your stated budget is enough to buy a nice 4-channel DSO, building your own would be for reasons other than the scope itself. It might be good experience, but if you want a scope as an instrument, in this case, you are better off with the Siglent than anything you build yourself.

Really, as an instrument, the Siglent (or Rigol) options are amazing values. You are lucky to be buying a scope now when these choices are available. My first scope awa a 1MHz Leader analogue scope, which I was so happy to have, and was as expensive as the current low-end DSOs with almost no relationship to them save that it was an oscilloscope and so are they.

Enjoy your new scope, and maybe build one too, with some help from it.

 

That looks like fun but certainly not a valid tool for much. I think I am going to do the unthinkable and wait. I need a new project like a hole in the head and I have no immediate need for a scope I am guessing it will be a few months before I am playing with electronics on a components level again. I am however going to do a buy at some point and learning to design a circuit it is on my short list. I am going to keep an eye out and see if there are any sales during that period. of course thanks you everyone for the advice. Certainly don't stop if you have something else to jump in with as i am learning from every post.

Waiting is fine, things should only get better. Buy when you are ready and gain the benefit of newer models or better prices on older ones.

 

I would have a real look at what is available from china for your budget.
BIG pluses for me are 4 channels... BUT make sure they each have separate scale knobs, its a real pain in the ass having to scroll through a menu to select which channel is now activated by the one Y scale control.

The best scope I have at the moment is a Rigol DS1074B its only 70MHz, but is actually good enough for me to work with some fast pulse work - about 5ns. Rigol is a very good brand but unfortunately the realized in the last few years how much we in the west would pay for one, so they are now as expensive as other brands and are actually more expensive if you buy from china! Hantek are also a good brand, but even though I upgraded to a 250MHz hantek, the rigol still seems to have better performance (it does have twice the sampling rate 2GSa/s.)

You might also look at PC scopes, these are very affordable, and its a real plus to be able to save a trace image to your computer which is quicker using a direct PC scope.

 

Wuerst, by that logic why have grids at all? Why actually show the waveform if you are only interested in the parameters?

Seeing the waveform allow for a quick visual check of a known or even unknown signal, and the grid is there to give a 2D reference to the waveform that is displayed.

In my experience with new hires, dexterity with the menus and options is something much easier learned than actually having the critical thinking about a measurement gained by counting graticule subdivisions or using cursors.

I'm sorry but there's no demonstrable connection between using a graticule and critical thinking. After all, pretty much any 5 year old can count his fingers, and greading from a graticule is hardly more difficult.

The same is true for the (unfortunately still very widespread) belief that only by using the most archaic method possible a person can really gain appreciation for using a scope.

In fact, if a contender starts using graticule or cursors from getting the base parameters of a modestly complex signal then there's a very high chance this person is also oblivious to the sampling theorem and the inter-relation of BW, sample rate and sample memory.

As the old saying goes: there are lies, damn lies, statistics and what is displayed in the screen of your oscilloscope.

True, but that is equally valid for any test instrument. For example, many people would be surprised if they knew how much an analog scope lies to and hides stuff from its user.

The reality is that any test instrument lies, due to imperfections and non-linearities inherent in its design. In addition, any probing will have an impact on your actual signal, the questions just are by how much and does it affect what I want to measure.

Despite I agree with your assessment that we need to critically think about how we learn and teach more modern techniques and tools, I wouldn't go as far as saying this skill or its tools are useless as a lobotomy. It is a complementary skill that will still save your bacon in many situations. Obviously that, with such analog background, there is also a ramp to be learned to teach the discrete numeric approach of modern data acquisition systems.

I have to disagree. The only reason where learning how to operate an analog scope "saves your bacon" is if you start working at some dire place that can't afford even a modern <$400 DSO or if you start working in a test instrument museum. For pretty much everything else, it's obsolete knowledge.

Because the simple fact is that analog scopes are dead, and they won't be coming back. I know that there are quite a number of people (not saying you are one of them, nor any of the other members here, I'm thinking about a particular group of people from real life here) which have a hard time accepting this, simply because the analog scope has been their bread and butter scope for decades, but it's still a fact. Like the lobotomy or the steam engine train it will not come back.

Which means the remaining stock of analog scopes is all used, not new, and for most part more than 25 years old - often a lot more! It also means that, over the decades, pretty much all of them will have used up most of their service life, which means the risk of failure with any analog scope is pretty much going through the roof. And everytime a scope fails and needs parts from another, this pool shrinks further. In addition, not all old analog scopes are handed over to someone else, often enough they are just being scrapped, i.e. more reduction to the pool. A pool btw that no-one really cares for except collectors and hobbyists.

So I'm sorry but the idea that knowing how to operate an analog scope will "save the bacon" is pretty farfetched. What for an beginning EE will "save the bacon" every day however is knowing how to operate a digital scope properly. Simply because that is the predominant standard oscilloscope out there, and has been for many years.

+1
Agreed. I see readings off the digital scope that are totally wacko. I choose to verify readings by looking at the trace against the grid markings.

Frankly, if you see readings that are completely off then either your scope is crap or you are doing something seriously wrong.

But yes, a view at the signal compared against the graticule should easily tell you if anything is way off.

An analog scope is better than no scope at all.

That is true, however the OP gave a reasonable budget, and with that I don't think there's the need to go antiques.

My choice, depending on your budget and scope availability would be (not in any order of preference):

1) A used scope for under $50, e.g. TEK 2213, 2225.

If it has to be analog then I'd also consider Philips/Fluke ("The T&M alliance"; easy to use, most made of standard components, and many models have better trigger performance than most Tek scopes) and Hameg (simple analog scopes, maintenance friendly, use standard components so again easy to repair).

2) A used digital scope for under $150, e.g. TDS210, TDS220

I'd rather recommend to get a HP 54645A/D, or even one of the later Agilent labelled 54622A/D Series. While they have a CRT, these scopes are much more reliable than the old TDS200 Series, offer more memory and much better update rates. Also, the trigger performance is better than with the TDS200.

The Agilent labeled 54600 Series scopes can even trigger on CAN, LIN and USB.

If it is digital then I'd avoid anything with the Tek label on it.

 

Rigol is a very good brand but unfortunately the realized in the last few years how much we in the west would pay for one, so they are now as expensive as other brands and are actually more expensive if you buy from china!

Be careful with China pricing, things can often be much more expensive there than in the West.

Rigol pricing hasn't changed over the years. The <$400 DS1054z is by far the cheapest new 4ch scope that is not a toy, and even their new entry-level scope MSO5000 starts at just over $900, and both are easily hackable.

The larger Rigol scopes (DSO/MSO7000) are indeed very expensive, even compared to the established manufacturers, while lacking in features, performance and maturity. But that has been true before (DS6000).

Hantek are also a good brand, but even though I upgraded to a 250MHz hantek, the rigol still seems to have better performance (it does have twice the sampling rate 2GSa/s.)

Be careful with Hantek, most of their products are low-quality and buggy, and updates come a lot slower than for products from Rigol and Siglent. Support is pretty much non-existent as well.

Hantek really is a bottom-of-the-barrel brand I wouldn't really recommend.

You might also look at PC scopes, these are very affordable, and its a real plus to be able to save a trace image to your computer which is quicker using a direct PC scope.

You can do the same with a Siglent SDS1000X-E or a Rigol DS1054z. Either via USB, or even faster and over longer distances via Ethernet.

And while USB scopes have their applications in many specialist areas, they are hardly a replacement for a bench scope, and most people quickly find the filling with a mouse on a screen annoying and miss the knobs and buttons of a real scope.

If it has to be an USB scope, I'd have a look at PicoScope, which makes some of the best USB scopes on the market. If money is tight, look at OWON, they have a pretty decent USB scopes (VDS Series).

Hantek has USB scopes, too, but I'd not recommend them because of their low and often unreliable performance and buggy software.

 

It is very obvious that you have very strong opinions about all kinds of oscilloscopes.
My go-to scope for over 20 years has been a Tektronix TDS 220 100MHz scope. If I had no scope at all and wanted a personal scope (ignoring the latest offerings) this would be my first choice.

 

It is very obvious that you have very strong opinions about all kinds of oscilloscopes.

Well, it's a bit more than just opinion. I spend a good part of my professional time to make sure a number of labs in Europe and the US have the test gear they need, so I not only buy literally truckloads of gear (new and used) each year, but in addition I also deal with test equipment evaluations where new gear is put through its paces. Which not only gives me an opportunity to work with a large number of instruments, I can also see how other professionals get on with them.

Obviously this only includes the big brands, not Siglent or Rigol, both I only know from personal experience (and occasionally supporting the hobbyists in my circle of friends).

We haven't bought any Tektronix scopes for many years (and before that only on insistence of a certain group that insisted on them, and even they no longer do), simply because they really are so poor. It's not like in the analog scope days where the best you could buy was a Tek, its digital socpes are almost all somewhere between mediocre and lackluster, all based on slow platforms that need some tricks to get decent waveform rates out of, with unintuitive to truly horrible UIs, and often questionable design decisions (like pairing high update rates with miniscule memories). The worst thing however is that they pretty much all are slow like wading through molasses, and tend to lock up or crash if they have to do anything demanding.


Then there are the bugs. We had the new MDO5 and MDO6 scopes for evaluation, and both were full of bugs that would even embarrass a Chinese B-brand. Sometimes I feel sorry for the Tek representatives that they have to try to sell this stuff. WHich they don't do often, as we're not the only ones who shun them. Tek isn't exactly at the height of its success, and hasn't been since the demise of analog scopes. They still find customers through government contracts and in education, but businesses looking for great DSOs rather buy Keysight or LeCroy (which invented the digital scope, and offers some scopes you can't get anywhere else).

Seriously, if you think Tek makes great DSOs then you haven't really seen what else is out there. And that was true 20 yearss ago as it is today.

Not everything is bad, though. Tek's highend AWGs are top-notch, as is the new AFG31000. The RTSAs are very good, too. Just the scopes are beyond hope.

My go-to scope for over 20 years has been a Tektronix TDS 220 100MHz scope. If I had no scope at all and wanted a personal scope (ignoring the latest offerings) this would be my first choice.

Fair enough, and why not if it fits your needs and that's what you like. And after all, the TDS200 is probably the last time when Tek was actually innovative (they came up with the lunchbox format).

I personally wouldn't want to give up on all the advancements and functionality that's available today (like serial decode, proper FFT, or just a color screen for easier identification as to which trace shows what) just for the sake of loyality to a brand which had its heydays until the early '90s.

If it had to be my only scope then I'd rather use a <$400 Rigol DS1054z than a TDS220 any day.

 

Instruments don't make the engineer. Engineering talent does. Much of what we do with scopes is a form of art filtered with our experience and imagination.

I would chose Michelangelo with a chisel over a programmer with the best 3D laser sculpting machine possible.

 

Instruments don't make the engineer. Engineering talent does.

That is absolutely true.

Much of what we do with scopes is a form of art filtered with our experience and imagination.

I'm sorry but this is nonsense. Engineering isn't art, it's actually the complete opposite.

In art, you express your views, emotions, concerns through means that you believe make sense. If tomorrow your mood is completely different, your artwork may change to the complete opposite. Art has very few hard rules (many would even say there are none), and while not every piece of art is valuable in monetary terms, your artwork is not becoming less of an piece of art for you because others hate it or aren't willing to pay a lot for it. Art is what you make of it.

On the other hand, EE, like most engineering disciples, are the exact opposite of art. First of all, engineering is based on strict physical laws and mathematical rules, which don't care much for your emotions, views and opinions and which, if ignored, will bite you in the backside sooner than later. As engineer, you have to work within a framework that not only consists of the limitations imposed by physics and math, you also have to deal with requirements and specifications which limit your freedom even more. In many areas of engineering you also get additional restrictions through certifications and qualification your design has to pass. So at the end of the day your freedom to act is severely restricted.

After all, it should be remembered that the wiggly line on the screen of your scope is not just the reflection of some voltage changes, it's a graphical expression of a mathmatical term. And a solid knowledge of math, and especially trigonometrics, helps to understand the various interactions for example of of amplitude and energy (and without understanding the physics and maths behind it you'll have a hard time really understanding EE). So when reading a scope, there is literally no room for imagination. Just hard, cold data.

I would chose Michelangelo with a chisel over a programmer with the best 3D laser sculpting machine possible.

I would chose the 3D laser, because as good as Michelangelo was as a sculpter, he was pretty crap at adherence to specs

 

Engineering isn't art, it's actually the complete opposite.

Sorry, but I beg to differ. Any activity involving human creativity is an art. The only case I'd argue against that definition would be science, but then again, although closely related, engineering isn't science either.

 

That is absolutely true.
..
I'm sorry but this is nonsense. Engineering isn't art, it's actually the complete opposite.
..

The Engineer is just another tool without creativity and artistry. Why does TEK make bad scopes in your opinion? Is it because of strict physical laws and mathematical rules that somehow limit them and not others in making good designs?

 

Sorry, but I beg to differ. Any activity involving human creativity is an art.

Really? I know it's moving into phylosophy territory, but that definition is overly broad.
The Oxford Dictionaries [1] define art as:
1. the expression or application of human creative skill and imagination, typically in a visual form such as painting or sculpture, producing works to be appreciated primarily for their beauty or emotional power.
2. the various branches of creative activity, such as painting, music, literature, and dance.

And the Cambridge Dictionaries' definition of art [2] is this:
- the making of objects, images, music, etc. that are beautiful or that express feelings
- the activity of painting, drawing, and making sculpture
- an activity through which people express particular ideas
- the making or showing or performance of painting, acting, dancing, and music
I cited both because they reflect what's widely accepted to be "art".
So clearly, art has to do with the expression of ideas and feelings through visual means.
How do you believe Engineering fits into this?

The only case I'd argue against that definition would be science, but then again, although closely related, engineering isn't science either.

Interesting albeit strange view, since engineering is actually very close to science. Science is the study of the physical world, and Engineering is the application of that knowledge.


[1] https://en.oxforddictionaries.com/definition/art
[2] https://dictionary.cambridge.org/dictionary/english/art

 

Obviously this only includes the big brands, not Siglent or Rigol, both I only know from personal experience (and occasionally supporting the hobbyists in my circle of friends).

1. Why these labs don't work with Siglent or Rigol?
2. Why the big know companies, medical industries, automotive industries around the world have not Siglent or Rigol as first choice?
3. Why are now selling the Rohde & Schwarz, Keysight and other top brands and are still in the market and not go on the sidelines from Siglent or Rigol?

Since the Siglent and Rigol are the winner in absolute specifications and half priced, what is the cause that somebody buy a top brand measuring device? Maybe from blindness or stupidity? Why the Rigol and Siglent with these very strong competitive edge don't have the whole of global market. From the other side why these "stupid" manager from the top brands selling so expensive their sub-specs products in one competitive market?

 

How do you believe Engineering fits into this?

You gave me the answer yourself:

- an activity through which people express particular ideas

 

The Engineer is just another tool without creativity and artistry. Why does TEK make bad scopes in your opinion? Is it because of strict physical laws and mathematical rules that somehow limit them and not others in making good designs.

No, Tek made poor DSOs because, back then when the analog scope era ended, Tek was pretty much dragged into the digital world by their customers. I'm sure if itw as for them tehy'd gladly continued to make analog scopes, but with dwindling sales that wasn't an option. So Tek tried to replicate the analog scope in digital form, while HP quickly realized the advantage digitization does bring to the table. LeCroy, who invented the digital scope, was already producing very sophisticated analysis scopes which they initially sold to the high energy particle folks and other areas of the science market (and quickly after also into the EE market).

Later came the Danaher period, where after being acquired Tek had to implement DBS, the Danaher Business System, a strict management system of cost cutting exercises, with little investment into R&D, and massive cuts also with the once great Tek support. It was during the Danaher time when Tek lost most of its skilled engineers.

If you look at Tek's DSO portfolio from say 1995 to today, and compare it with what competitors offered at the same time, then it should be easy to see why Tek is far from being the top dog it was during the analog era. While Tek's bench scopes were slow and with limited functionality, HP actually managed to make a digital scope that replicated an analog scope as good as possible (54645A/D), and continued to make bench scopes that are very fast and which engineers really like to use, LeCroy put on pressure from the top end, offering scopes like the 9300 Series which had waveform analysis capabilities way beyond anything else on the market, combined with large memory. And like HP (which then became Agilent and subsequently Keysight), LeCroy has continued to bring very sophisticated high-end scopes to market where Tek resorted to sell just another re-hash of their outdated architecture. And while HPAK and especially LeCroy have been pushing the technology in scopes further and further, there was very little innovation over the years from Tek.

And that hasn't changed today. Tek scopes are still slow, they still lock up when doing ressource-intensive stuff, and are full of bugs. The only mature scopes are the really old ones like the TDS3000 they still offer for an inflated amount of money, even though the scope has not been competitive for some 15 years. It's no surprise Keysight is growing and growing, and while they, too, want a lot of money for most of their kit, their scopes are better, faster, more mature, offer better functionality and are supported by what is a first-class support.

It's a bit sad, really, especially since the market could need another strong vendor which would certainly help to lower the prices a bit, but unfortunately that's how it is.