Choosing between entry-level 12-bit DSOs

[ebastler]

talking about wasting screen area, here is $16K scope... you cant win!

Hint: They have a much larger screen to start with. 

[Caliaxy]

talking about wasting screen area, here is $16K scope... you cant win!

Hint: They have a much larger screen to start with. 

And they still couldn't find a tiny spot on that large screen to put their name/logo on... 

[mawyatt]

Believe these modern DSOs have become the most complex instruments on our benches, displacing the SA and VNA of old times, and seem to be growing in complexity, performance and features. If someone knows of a more complex lab bench instrument, please enlighten us!!

Now folks have these instruments available at the price of a Lawn Mower instead of a Mercedes, they are complaining about Nit Picking features, like pixel size/shape, text size/shape, screen clutter, boot time, and so on

Come on folks, can't the collective great minds here put more effort into Utilizing these Brilliant Instruments rather than Nit Picking them to death, and enlighten those with less experience rather than the continuous pissing stream of mine's better than yours

Performa01, pdenisowski, rf-loop, gf and a few select others have provided a means for other less knowledgable folks to learn and understand these wonderful instruments and explore their enlightened feature sets.

Rigol and Siglent seem to be leading the charge with the Introductory "Lawn Mower" 12 Bit DSOs, but with features that were only available in the "Mercedes" class.

So let's quit pissing in the yard, start up that DSO, and mow some grass

Then we can Nit Pick about who's lawn is better

Best,

[KungFuJosh]

Then we can Nit Pick about who's lawn is better

Get off my lawn! Damn kids. [grumble grumble] 😉😉

[shapirus]

Come on folks, can't the collective great minds here put more effort into Utilizing these Brilliant Instruments rather than Nit Picking them to death

Why not do both?
Highlighting things that are done well and suggesting possible uses, and criticizing things done poorly (especially where it would have been easy or trivial to do them well!) is equally important.

[tggzzz]

As for your screenshots,the first one looks pretty acceptable.

In the second one, why are there useless hieroglyphs "turn left", "dustbin", "target in a circle", "broken comb", "pencil", "cog", "downvoted hamburger" and similar hieroglyphs on the RHS?
They add nothing, except visual noise.
They subtract from the information area.
They should be deleted.

I guess you're trying to be funny with the names since the icons have labels: they are "undo" (a really useful function), "delete (a window)", "zoom," "FFT", etc.  Users actually really like these.

Words are easy to interpret and unambiguous. The words were there , and I understood them.
The pictograms were ambiguous[1]; why were they there? What did they add to the words? 

My parents had a microwave oven and an electric oven and nobody could understand what the pictograms/hieroglyphs meant - even after getting out the instruction book and reading that. "Nobody" means half a dozen adults of three generations.

[1]
The "turn left" pictogram is a bastardisation of the some undo/redo symbols.
The delete pictogram is conventional.
The magnifying glass with a cross pictogram is almost the same as the search pictogram. The significance of the small religious symbol is unclear
The FFT pictogram is guessable.
There are two cog pictograms. What's the difference?
 

[tggzzz]

talking about wasting screen area, here is $16K scope... you cant win!

Hint: They have a much larger screen to start with. 

Yup; that makes a significant difference

[tggzzz]

Believe these modern DSOs have become the most complex instruments on our benches, displacing the SA and VNA of old times, and seem to be growing in complexity, performance and features. If someone knows of a more complex lab bench instrument, please enlighten us!!

Now folks have these instruments available at the price of a Lawn Mower instead of a Mercedes, they are complaining about Nit Picking features, like pixel size/shape, text size/shape, screen clutter, boot time, and so on

Come on folks, can't the collective great minds here put more effort into Utilizing these Brilliant Instruments rather than Nit Picking them to death, and enlighten those with less experience rather than the continuous pissing stream of mine's better than yours

Performa01, pdenisowski, rf-loop, gf and a few select others have provided a means for other less knowledgable folks to learn and understand these wonderful instruments and explore their enlightened feature sets.

Rigol and Siglent seem to be leading the charge with the Introductory "Lawn Mower" 12 Bit DSOs, but with features that were only available in the "Mercedes" class.

So let's quit pissing in the yard, start up that DSO, and mow some grass

Then we can Nit Pick about who's lawn is better

Best,

Choosing between different entry-level 12-bit DSOs requires nit-pickling.

Overall it is much more important to choose which class of instrument to use - but that's not the subject

When the screen is so cluttered that it starts to crowd out the measurement information, it becomes relevant. Doubly so when that is demonstrably unnecessary!

[tggzzz]

Come on folks, can't the collective great minds here put more effort into Utilizing these Brilliant Instruments rather than Nit Picking them to death

Why not do both?
Highlighting things that are done well and suggesting possible uses, and criticizing things done poorly (especially where it would have been easy or trivial to do them well!) is equally important.

Precisely

[ebastler]

Come on folks, can't the collective great minds here put more effort into Utilizing these Brilliant Instruments rather than Nit Picking them to death

Why not do both?
Highlighting things that are done well and suggesting possible uses, and criticizing things done poorly (especially where it would have been easy or trivial to do them well!) is equally important.

My thoughts exactly. I can easily do both, use the scope productively and report on some aspects I consider done well or less-than-ideal. 

The criticism is not meant to take away from the fact that these scopes are amazing value for money. I still have my first CRT scope (1980s, 20 MHz dual channel, more than 3 times the price of a DHO800 or SDS800 today); and even compared to my 9-year-old first DSO the progress is massive. But other potential buyers will benefit from user feedback on the differences and nuances between modern entry-level scopes, so they can make an informed decision based on their preferences. And manufacturers should benefit from knowing what users appreciate or dislike, so they can optimize their products further.

[KungFuJosh]

My parents had a microwave oven and an electric oven and nobody could understand what the pictograms/hieroglyphs meant - even after getting out the instruction book and reading that. "Nobody" means half a dozen adults of three generations.

I'm not sure if you're intentionally confusing icons for some reason, but it's pretty weird. Everything on Paul's screenshot makes sense to me, and I sure as hell can't afford one of those scopes (though I would love to).

If you want to get to know the nuances of different scopes, there's no better way than to buy one.

[Mechatrommer]

Then we can Nit Pick about who's lawn is better

in the end, who can produce better circuit/product/design.. sometime to get that, we need to use combination of tools, not dso alone, or probably with no dso at all involved. and some nasty and dirty old age tin can tricks, cheers.

[shapirus]

My parents had a microwave oven and an electric oven and nobody could understand what the pictograms/hieroglyphs meant - even after getting out the instruction book and reading that. "Nobody" means half a dozen adults of three generations.

I'm not sure if you're intentionally confusing icons for some reason, but it's pretty weird. Everything on Paul's screenshot makes sense to me, and I sure as hell can't afford one of those scopes (though I would love to).

If you want to get to know the nuances of different scopes, there's no better way than to buy one.

You missed the main point. It wasn't about the meaning of the icons. It was about that fact that the icons occupy screen space while creating little or no added value. Text, if written with a well selected font and size, creates most of the control's marking value.

That's, however, not always absolutely true. I'm sure there are people who have difficulties with reading and understanding text at a glance and locating a control they need on the screen if there are only text markings. For them icons (alone or with text) are better. This is why good GUIs designed by people who know what they are doing have a special configuration setting: "show: a) text; b) icons; c) text&icons".

[tggzzz]

My parents had a microwave oven and an electric oven and nobody could understand what the pictograms/hieroglyphs meant - even after getting out the instruction book and reading that. "Nobody" means half a dozen adults of three generations.

I'm not sure if you're intentionally confusing icons for some reason, but it's pretty weird.

Que? Those hieroglyphs confused everybody, without exception.

Since those items have long been consigned to the tip, those hieroglyphs can't be shown, so you can't see how incomprehensible they were.

Everything on Paul's screenshot makes sense to me, and I sure as hell can't afford one of those scopes (though I would love to).

If you want to get to know the nuances of different scopes, there's no better way than to buy one.

How does buying one scope doesn't help you understand the nuances of different scopes?

There are two fundamental problems with hieroglyphs:
- they occupy scarce real estate which would be better used to display the traces and numerical settings
- they duplicate other information on the display, to no advantage
And on top of that they are unclear/ambiguous.

[KungFuJosh]

Que? Those hieroglyphs confused everybody, without exception.

Are you talking about your anecdote, or the actual screenshots? I found the screenshots perfectly clear.

If you want to get to know the nuances of different scopes, there's no better way than to buy one.

How does buying one scope doesn't help you understand the nuances of different scopes?

That's exactly my point; buy more scopes, learn more nuances.

There are two fundamental problems with hieroglyphs:
- they occupy scarce real estate which would be better used to display the traces and numerical settings
- they duplicate other information on the display, to no advantage
And on top of that they are unclear/ambiguous.

The vertical space isn't wasted; the height of that top bar is already defined by the trigger block etc. on the right side of the screen. It would be wasted space if there was empty space instead of the icons. 🤷

I see an obvious advantage. I wear glasses because I'm nearsighted. I can see the "undo" icon faster than I can squint to read the letters if I don't feel like wearing my glasses (which is often).

None of the icons in Paul's screenshot are unclear or ambiguous to me. They're literally standard icons, seen across millions of products around the world. Icon artwork may subtly change, but what they actually are is clear. And the beauty of it is, you can still read the words if you want to ignore the icons. 😉

[awakephd]

Many Siglent products are also rebadged and as such show a different brand name until they might be later flashed with Siglent firmware.....

That's interesting. What are some specific examples? Does this happen more at the high end, or down here in the low end of things where I am attempting to swim?

[KungFuJosh]

Many Siglent products are also rebadged and as such show a different brand name until they might be later flashed with Siglent firmware.....

That's interesting. What are some specific examples? Does this happen more at the high end, or down here in the low end of things where I am attempting to swim?

Some models from Lecroy are an example. Scopes, DMMs... For example, decide whether you'd prefer the LeCroy T3DMM6-5, or the Siglent SDM3065X.

[tggzzz]

Que? Those hieroglyphs confused everybody, without exception.

Are you talking about your anecdote, or the actual screenshots? I found the screenshots perfectly clear.

I'm talking about the part you responded to in your post.

Why did you choose to remove that context in your question? (There's an obvious disreputable reason you might have done that, but I'll give you a chance to state a reputable reason).

[pdenisowski]

I'll start with a disclaimer:  I'm not the person who decides what our icons look like or are named.  But I'd be happy to share my personal thoughts

Words are easy to interpret and unambiguous. The words were there , and I understood them.
The pictograms were ambiguous[1]; why were they there? What did they add to the words? 

A few points:
1) For better or for worse, we live in a society that is often symbol-driven, not word-driven.  Apple products are an excellent example of this, but it extends well outside of electronics: automobile controls, road signs, etc.  For example, the attached lawn mower warning sign: I imagine it's in everyone's best interest to convey this meaning in both words and symbols.

2) The words are there to resolve any ambiguity as to what the icon means.  I think the "gear = configuration/settings" convention is pretty universal, but as you say, many icons are not.  To continue the lawn mower analogy: I once had a lawn mower with lever that had pictures of a rabbit and a turtle next to it.  I used to make the (unfunny) joke that this lever was used adjust for what kinds of animals might be lurking in tall grass.  And, of course, there is the classic hand dryer / bacon dispenser meme (attached)

My parents had a microwave oven and an electric oven and nobody could understand what the pictograms/hieroglyphs meant - even after getting out the instruction book and reading that. "Nobody" means half a dozen adults of three generations.

The instruction book for the first microwave oven I ever saw was also the assembly manual (a Heathkit GD-29 microwave) - it didn't have any icons, as far as I remember  

The magnifying glass with a cross pictogram is almost the same as the search pictogram. The significance of the small religious symbol is unclear

I think it's supposed to be a "+" sign for "zoom in / increase" vs. a plain magnifying glass for search. I think these are very common, conventional symbols as well.

There are two cog pictograms. What's the difference?

One is for configuring the instrument, the other is for configuring the icons - I agree that's kind of confusing

One of my favorite Latin sayings is "de gustibus (non est disputandum)" which basically means "tastes are not to be debated"   There is no "correct" answer as to whether red flowers are "better" than white flowers. 

On the other hand, I think it is possible to make value judgements about whether or not a symbol is a "good" symbol or not, that is, whether it effectively and efficiently conveys the desired meaning (for example, most people in Western society would say that red roses are more appropriate as a symbol of romantic love). 

Sorry for the long post: in my experience, decisions about what T&M instrument to buy often do come down to which instrument's user-interface is perceived as "better" by the buyer, and like everything else, tastes and preferences in user interfaces change over time as well.

[tggzzz]

I wear glasses because I'm nearsighted. I can see the "undo" icon faster than I can squint to read the letters if I don't feel like wearing my glasses (which is often).

I presume that means the trace is also difficult for you to see, and therefore to interpret and to understand.

When I look at a scope trace, I always want to see all the detail in it. Hence I wear my glasses without fail.

I can't understand someone choosing not to do that.

[KungFuJosh]

Que? Those hieroglyphs confused everybody, without exception.

Are you talking about your anecdote, or the actual screenshots? I found the screenshots perfectly clear.

I'm talking about the part you responded to in your post.

Why did you choose to remove that context in your question? (There's an obvious disreputable reason you might have done that, but I'll give you a chance to state a reputable reason).

🤣🤣🤣 Guy, so you are still harping on your anecdote then? I thought the context of the story was as to how it applied to the context of this part of the off-topic conversation in the thread.

Since it wasn't clear enough to you, I absolutely do not care in the slightest bit that 3 generations of your family couldn't understand a microwave. I'm still talking about oscilloscope screen utilization. 🙄

[awakephd]

not useless, but we need to think rationally, esp if you are the programmer of dso. today screen is 16:9, not like the old day like what? 3:2?

Not that it matters for the point being made, but since we're picking nits ...

I'm thinking that the old Tektronix displays are closer to 4:3, same as the old standard for TVs and other CRTs (e.g., computer monitors).

[DaneLaw]

not useless, but we need to think rationally, esp if you are the programmer of dso. today screen is 16:9, not like the old day like what? 3:2?

Not that it matters for the point being made, but since we're picking nits ...

I'm thinking that the old Tektronix displays are closer to 4:3, same as the old standard for TVs and other CRTs (e.g., computer monitors).

wasn't the older CROs mostly 5:4 ratio
Personally I prefer either 4:3 or 16:10 for oscilloscopes.. same on laptop screen, as I prefer the vertical depth.. if I wanna see a movie and consume media.. then 16:9 makes sense

On laptops, the jump from 16:9 (3200x1800) like on the Porsches Books here to Surface Book2 (3000x2000) the vertical gain are massive, but that is also a 3:2 ratio https://tinyurl.com/yspt9d3v
But its sadly often quite low tier TFT LCD screens that are fitted in modern digital oscilloscopes, even on relatively expensive scopes.

[KungFuJosh]

I wear glasses because I'm nearsighted. I can see the "undo" icon faster than I can squint to read the letters if I don't feel like wearing my glasses (which is often).

I presume that means the trace is also difficult for you to see, and therefore to interpret and to understand.

When I look at a scope trace, I always want to see all the detail in it. Hence I wear my glasses without fail.

I can't understand someone choosing not to do that.

I can see the traces fine, but I'll just have to buy an MXO5 series scope when it becomes difficult. 🤣

[Mechatrommer]

Indeed, there is no need for any 'scope to have their name on the viewing area----they all have a big logo on the instrument itself.

I don't find it terribly objectionable as long as it either (a) can be turned off or (b) is not occupying space that could / should be used for other information. 

Those are the key points, of course.

As for your screenshots,the first one looks pretty acceptable.

In the second one, why are there useless hieroglyphs "turn left", "dustbin", "target in a circle", "broken comb", "pencil", "cog", "downvoted hamburger" and similar hieroglyphs on the RHS?
They add nothing, except visual noise.
They subtract from the information area.
They should be deleted.

maybe you live too much by reading books (novels?) what you called hieroglyphs are graphical representation of what is intended, surely it can be confusing since different culture will translates them as different meaning, thats why a short text is added there, but once you get to know it, you dont have to read the text anymore, just by looking at the graphics, we can quickly recall what it is... for example your "target in a circle", is a common symbol for zoom in or zoom out in many software disciplines, art such as Photoshop, engineering tools and CADs, OS utilities magnifier etc... without reading the text i can already suspect what it is... "target in a circle"? i never thought of that here its all about reducing cognitive load https://www.interaction-design.org/literature/article/user-interface-design-guidelines-10-rules-of-thumb maybe for you bookworm habit, it should be very quickly you can learn the concept and meaning if you RTFM... trust me it will make your life much easier trust me i'm not so young kid myself...