EEVblog #1057 - Digilent Open Scope MZ Review

[EEVblog]

Dave looks at the Digilent Open Scope MZ Review, an $89 open source oscilloscope, logic analyser, and function generator.

https://store.digilentinc.com/openscope-mz-open-source-all-in-one-instrumentation/

[firewalker]

Does it work with sigrok-pulseview yet?

Alexander.

[Avacee]

Excellent review  enjoy and trust your reviews much more compared to the marketing driven/scripted ones that only show something working perfectly.

Given it's open source I can't help but wonder how many weeks before the Chinese are pumping them out at a fraction of the price with links to Digilent's website for the software.
Then it may be worth getting one as the UK Price is £83.27 from RS-Components so given its limitations and software that's currently a pass.

[EEVblog]

Given it's open source I can't help but wonder how many weeks before the Chinese are pumping them out at a fraction of the price with links to Digilent's website for the software.

I'd be interested to know how much the cloners could sell an Analog Discovery for?

[Bud]

Why do they call it "professional" ?  I can hardly see any professional wasting their  time fiddling with it.

[BillyO]

Dave, there is nothing wrong with a well implemented R2R DAC.  It'll get it done.

[EEVblog]

Why do they call it "professional" ?  I can hardly see any professional wasting their  time fiddling with it.

Yeah, forgot to comment on that.
The Analog Discovery is certainly a "professional" education market, but this one is aimed at hobbyists really.

[EEVblog]

Dave, there is nothing wrong with a well implemented R2R DAC.  It'll get it done.

Sure.

[nctnico]

Why do they call it "professional" ?  I can hardly see any professional wasting their  time fiddling with it.

Without a real scope frontend including BNCs it is more like a data acquisition board.

[imidis]

It seems unrealistic. 

[thmjpr]

This was linked in the youtube comments:
http://www.analog.com/en/design-center/evaluation-hardware-and-software/evaluation-boards-kits/ADALM2000.html
https://wiki.analog.com/university/tools/m2k
https://www.eevblog.com/forum/testgear/analog-devices-adalm2000/

For $99, hardware wise looks way better (10MHz, 100MS/S digital). Software mentions network analyzer and spectrum analyzer. But who knows if it will ever be released, and the software will be supported.
Analog discovery used to be available at this price point, but now even with the student discount is much more expensive.

[EEVblog]

This was linked in the youtube comments:
http://www.analog.com/en/design-center/evaluation-hardware-and-software/evaluation-boards-kits/ADALM2000.html
https://wiki.analog.com/university/tools/m2k
https://www.eevblog.com/forum/testgear/analog-devices-adalm2000/

For $99, hardware wise looks way better (10MHz, 100MS/S digital). Software mentions network analyzer and spectrum analyzer. But who knows if it will ever be released, and the software will be supported.
Analog discovery used to be available at this price point, but now even with the student discount is much more expensive.

Wow, that looks like a killer at $99
Release date anyone?

[ArdWar]

I guess using free I/O for DAC with a bunch of resistors is better(?) than spending additional ~60 cents for integrated DAC.

Strange design decision indeed. Cost? Performance? 

[abraxa]

Does it work with sigrok-pulseview yet?

This thing is a toy, so I don't know any of the core devs willing to waste their time writing a driver for it. Digilent did get in touch with us regarding support for their devices in sigrok but as of now we have no idea how much support from their side this would entail. If it's a mere "here, have the hardware and the comm protocol" kind of deal then I'd expect the Open Scope MZ to be passed on. Simply because it's just not worth our time. However, drivers contributed by the community would of course be welcome.

[abraxa]

This was linked in the youtube comments:
http://www.analog.com/en/design-center/evaluation-hardware-and-software/evaluation-boards-kits/ADALM2000.html
https://wiki.analog.com/university/tools/m2k
https://www.eevblog.com/forum/testgear/analog-devices-adalm2000/

For $99, hardware wise looks way better (10MHz, 100MS/S digital). Software mentions network analyzer and spectrum analyzer. But who knows if it will ever be released, and the software will be supported.
Analog discovery used to be available at this price point, but now even with the student discount is much more expensive.

The software used is scopy (https://github.com/analogdevicesinc/scopy) and is in part based on PulseView, so it's open source. I'm pretty sure AD is serious about releasing the ADALM2000

[prof]

 

I was seriously laughing my ass off watching this video.

I'm one of the Kickstarter backers and the whole thing is just a huge mess and a major letdown.

The whole project is just all over the place. The project people are obviously overwhelmed. The engineers haven't even close to delivered the promised features and progress seems to be pretty much dead: you can count the software releases on one hand and they seem to be only slight bugfix releases (from looking at the source because no release notes -- who reads release notes anyway...). The current software is so buggy to the point of being totally useless. There's no offline support out-of-the-box (requires to manually install the Waveforms Live on the device which is a rather involved process). Capturing via WiFi only seems to work every full moon or so and even over USB is so quirky that you'll never know whether the DUT or the "scope" is at fault. In other words: Totally useless, a toy at best; but then again there're much better toys out there.

Heck, even their shipping department messed up the shipping declaration and doesn't respond to inquiries I've been asked by other Digilent people to make.

The only takeaway from this project is: Sometimes it takes a completely botched project like this to see the reality of a shitty company behind a brand with a supposedly good reputation. I'll make sure to stay the hell away from Digilent in the future.

[EEVblog]

The whole project is just all over the place. The project people are obviously overwhelmed. The engineers haven't even close to delivered the promised features and progress seems to be pretty much dead: you can count the software releases on one hand and they seem to be only slight bugfix releases (from looking at the source because no release notes -- who reads release notes anyway...). The current software is so buggy to the point of being totally useless. There's no offline support out-of-the-box (requires to manually install the Waveforms Live on the device which is a rather involved process). Capturing via WiFi only seems to work every full moon or so and even over USB is so quirky that you'll never know whether the DUT or the "scope" is at fault. In other words: Totally useless, a toy at best; but then again there're much better toys out there.

Interesting. I didn't think to check the Kickstarter updates and comments.

The only takeaway from this project is: Sometimes it takes a completely botched project like this to see the reality of a shitty company behind a brand with a supposedly good reputation. I'll make sure to stay the hell away from Digilent in the future.

How is the Analog Discovery so well received then?
Entirely different team?

[Fungus]

Given it's open source I can't help but wonder how many weeks before the Chinese are pumping them out at a fraction of the price with links to Digilent's website for the software.

I'd be interested to know how much the cloners could sell an Analog Discovery for?

I thought you said the AD's main chip cost about $100.


What could "BTNP" and "BTNR" possibly stand for, I wonder?


 

[madires]

Seems to be neither fish nor fowl. And using JS doesn't give me any confidence in the product either. I'm a hobbyist and I think the 90 bucks for the Open Scope MZ could be spent on something more useful.

[mrpackethead]

Seems to be neither fish nor fowl. And using JS doesn't give me any confidence in the product either. I'm a hobbyist and I think the 90 bucks for the Open Scope MZ could be spent on something more useful.

$90 woudl almost buy a nice dinner.

[bitwelder]

What's up with the wiggly J2 connector?

[Rolo]

What's up with the wiggly J2 connector?

That a trick to get a good fit for a programmer header without soldering it. The header makes good contact because the slight offset of the holes. Seen it on more digilent products.

[thm_w]

What could "BTNP" and "BTNR" possibly stand for, I wonder?

https://www.eevblog.com/forum/blog/eevblog-1057-digilent-open-scope-mz-review/?action=dlattach;attach=393677;image
 

Sure, but why not make Prog and Reset text larger? Then the end user would read the important one first, and not the designator. They missed a lot of opportunity to put information on the silkscreen.
Of course if whoever made the board expected it to be in a decent case, silkscreen info wouldn't be needed.

[EEVblog]

What could "BTNP" and "BTNR" possibly stand for, I wonder?

https://www.eevblog.com/forum/blog/eevblog-1057-digilent-open-scope-mz-review/?action=dlattach;attach=393677;image
 

Sure, but why not make Prog and Reset text larger? Then the end user would read the important one first, and not the designator. They missed a lot of opportunity to put information on the silkscreen.
Of course if whoever made the board expected it to be in a decent case, silkscreen info wouldn't be needed.

Yep, silly stuff.
When shootign stuff on my camcorder screen screen it's easy to miss stuff like that, your eyes are drawn toward to big bold horizontal text, not the smaller side text.

[G0MJW]

Given it's open source I can't help but wonder how many weeks before the Chinese are pumping them out at a fraction of the price with links to Digilent's website for the software.

This is presumably why it is open source in the first place. To allow anyone to copy, improve on and develop the project.