EEVblog #1038 - Uni T UPO2104CS Oscilloscope Teardown

[cpuerror]

What a hot mess of a scope. The front panel looks like a cheap imitation of the DS1054. Also, whats up with using Arial in the UI? The last time I have seen something that ugly it was a Visual Basic app running in Windows 3.1.

This scope is a loser, it's too expensive, it's underdeveloped and poorly imitates its competitors. At $299 it might have a shot at the low end market, at $599 its just setting good money on fire.

[Mr. Scram]

It's interesting to note that both Uni-T and Siglent are taking design cues from Rigol. I guess that means they're becoming a real contender.

[Fungus]

For proper price comparison you have to look at the Rigol 1104Z. It has a price of $619 for the Rigol 1104Z so the UNI-T is only $20 less. The Rigol 1054Z wins on price if a user hacks the scope to enable its full capabilities.

Does any hobbyist NOT hack their Rigol? 

This scope is a loser, it's too expensive, it's underdeveloped and poorly imitates its competitors. At $299 it might have a shot at the low end market, at $599 its just setting good money on fire.

Yep. At that price and with no hacks it's dead in the water. If I were Uni-T I'd be thinking about "leaking" some hacks.

If the bandwidth hacks are hardware mods (move resistors) then it's still dead in the water once the Siglent arrives. You'd have to be a total Uni-T fanboy to buy one over the Siglent.

So much R&D money down the drain...

[NivagSwerdna]

We know that Bob's your uncle but who is this Flynn person? 

Dave used to run a dating web site so it should really be "In like Dave" but the reference is to Errol.

According to IMDB "Errol Flynn was born to parents Theodore Flynn, a respected biologist, and Marrelle Young, an adventurous young woman."  Marrelle was born Mary but changed it to Marrelle and was born of 'seafaring folk'.. I wonder if she was a pirate?

[Hydrawerk]

Is this an old-style 50Hz iron-core transformer? You hardly see a switched PSU and a 50Hz transformer in a scope. 

[kx5]

Is this an old-style 50Hz iron-core transformer? You hardly see a switched PSU and a 50Hz transformer in a scope. 

That has to be the standby power supply. What a mess of a design 

[Hydrawerk]

I think that there is no back-up battery for real time clock in this scope.

[thm_w]

I saw that UNI-T is using thermal reliefs on the vias. Is there a good reason to do so? I usually connect them directly to the plane, unless I plan to solder bodge wires to them :-)

Zero reason to do this. When you add thermal relief rule to Altium, the default is to apply to all pad types. So you have to specifically add another rule to exclude vias from reliefs, which people either don't realize or don't know how to do (its a commonly asked question).

[Ardutronic]

What's the difference between DC bias and the vertical offset? When I want to see a signal outside the range of the ADC I just use the vertical offset and it works .

[nctnico]

If the bandwidth hacks are hardware mods (move resistors) then it's still dead in the water once the Siglent arrives. You'd have to be a total Uni-T fanboy to buy one over the Siglent.

Everybody seems to be totally excited about the new Siglent 4 channel scope and forget that every piece of Siglent gear is riddled with bugs when released and chances are some bugs are never fixed. If the Uni-T has firmware which works then it might be a better buy. Especially if you want to use your new scope for measuring instead of help filling a thread about bugs in a scope on this forum.

[Fungus]

Everybody seems to be totally excited about the new Siglent 4 channel scope and forget that every piece of Siglent gear is riddled with bugs when released and chances are some bugs are never fixed.

True. I hope Dave is thorough.

If the Uni-T has firmware which works then it might be a better buy. Especially if you want to use your new scope for measuring instead of help filling a thread about bugs in a scope on this forum.

Or get a Rigol DS1054Z for $200 less.

[tautech]

If the bandwidth hacks are hardware mods (move resistors) then it's still dead in the water once the Siglent arrives. You'd have to be a total Uni-T fanboy to buy one over the Siglent.

Everybody seems to be totally excited about the new Siglent 4 channel scope and forget that every piece of Siglent gear is riddled with bugs when released and chances are some bugs are never fixed. If the Uni-T has firmware which works then it might be a better buy. Especially if you want to use your new scope for measuring instead of help filling a thread about bugs in a scope on this forum.

The usual anti Siglent BS from you.
You should know better, this from a thread you've participated in:
https://www.eevblog.com/forum/testgear/testing-dso-auto-measurements-accuracy-across-timebases/msg1204964/#msg1204964

And need we remind you of the bug reports you made of other brands you own. 
https://www.eevblog.com/forum/testgear/siglent-sds1204x-e-released-for-domestic-markets-in-china/msg1291644/#msg1291644

[nctnico]

And need we remind you of the bug reports you made of other brands you own. 

Bending the truth again through your pink glasses!? Here is my text you are referring to from that thread to put things into the right context:

The GW Instek GDS-2204E had two or three minor bugs which where solved within weeks. The dissaster with the Siglent SDS2000 made me want to verify all functions before committing to buying it. Since then a handfull of minor bugs got fixed (exotic stuff like things going wrong if there is a space in a free math expression send to the scope using an SCPI command). I got the MicSig TO1104 specifically for a review where they installed a beta version of the decoding, so yes that deserved some remarks. Both these scopes don't have a bug list as long as a typical Siglent unit after it has been released and no trivial bugs which should discovered by the factory's testers.

You can write all you want but that doesn't change the cold hard fact that it takes Siglent months to years to fix all bugs in a scope if they even care to do so. It is up to the buyers if that is acceptable for them or not so leave it at that. After all you get what you pay for.

Reading through the threads about the bugs in the low end scopes (in general) makes me a little sad. I see a lot of relatively inexperienced people struggling with whether the effect they see on their scope is a problem in their circuit, user error or whether it is a bug in their scope. You can't do much about the first two but the last one can be mitigated by spending a bit more (or settle for something with lesser specs and/or second hand) especially if your time is worth something. Good tools make working on a project way more pleasant.

[Mr. Scram]

Can you please take your lovers' quarrels elsewhere?

[DutchGert]

I niticed the pcb designer used thermal relieves on the via's, bit wierd

[Bashstreet]

I think David was rather complimentary of the Uni-T maybe he is hoping for some UNI-T swag 

Cannot say i was impressed... for the price... you would hope something bit more... refined
Uni-T keeps trying to offer lot of functionality in nice case hiding the absolute rubbish workmanship horrible components and cost cutting done to extreme.

Now i do not mind cost cutting when it is done sensibly.. but when one cuts fraction of cents to build a product with absolutely inferior rubbish components risking despair and disappointment of their customers is not good logic.

Uni-T must evolve or it will die slowly.

I have made the mistake purchasing Uni-T product in the past .. never again once company ruins their reputation with me that's it.
Only if they can grow in future good reputation and change their ways no thx for me.

[Hydrawerk]

absolute rubbish workmanship horrible components and cost cutting done to extreme.

What exactly? Is it worse than Siglent and Rigol??

[Mr. Scram]

I think David was rather complimentary of the Uni-T maybe he is hoping for some UNI-T swag 

Cannot say i was impressed... for the price... you would hope something bit more... refined
Uni-T keeps trying to offer lot of functionality in nice case hiding the absolute rubbish workmanship horrible components and cost cutting done to extreme.

Now i do not mind cost cutting when it is done sensibly.. but when one cuts fraction of cents to build a product with absolutely inferior rubbish components risking despair and disappointment of their customers is not good logic.

Uni-T must evolve or it will die slowly.

I have made the mistake purchasing Uni-T product in the past .. never again once company ruins their reputation with me that's it.
Only if they can grow in future good reputation and change their ways no thx for me.

Can you point out how they cut costs to the extreme. Dave doesn't quite seem to share your opinion.

[kkamel]

Anyone help, I have this stupid oscilloscope for one and half years now, it’s my only scope. Today when I powered it up it says system loading and then I hear the relays the it hangs up forever on uni-t logo. Any help hard reset or force firmware update?
I did open it and I found the capacitor that Dave was talking about, it’s not normal capacitor it super capacitor 2.7V 4.7F, I discharged it completely through a resistor hoping it would act as hard reset, but nothing happened the same problem. I hope someone one could have a solution?
Thanks