Keysight New instruments

[bd139]

Did I see cloud connected test gear there?

That makes bits of me hurt.

[wizard69]

Nobody has posted the teaser video?

Interesting video but not enough info!

That's the definition of a "teaser".

Yeah I'm a little short on patients.   Work has sucked of late and tonight I came home to a furnace not working and I don't have the energy to even try to fix it.    On the flip side my EEVBlog BM786 meter came in today.   Maybe I can put the meter to work this weekend fixing the furnace.

[SilverSolder]

At least the weather is getting better?

[Anthocyanina]

with all the talk about the crowbar circuits in this topic, something i've never heard of before, i wonder why don't they implement a battery charging mode then? push the battery mode button = disconnect the crowbar until the battery mode button is pushed again? can just be a regular latching switch and have the power supply detect if it's closed or not so that it knows it's still in battery mode after turning it off then on again? this doesn't sound too hard to implement i think, maybe would add about 5$ in parts, but when talking about 1k$ power supplies, would that hurt too much?

[SilverSolder]

with all the talk about the crowbar circuits in this topic, something i've never heard of before, i wonder why don't they implement a battery charging mode then? push the battery mode button = disconnect the crowbar until the battery mode button is pushed again? can just be a regular latching switch and have the power supply detect if it's closed or not so that it knows it's still in battery mode after turning it off then on again? this doesn't sound too hard to implement i think, maybe would add about 5$ in parts, but when talking about 1k$ power supplies, would that hurt too much?

A crowbar can effectively be disabled by setting its threshold higher than the max output of the supply.  That's how the crowbar I have here works, anyway.

So you can leave the crowbar "off" (effectively) if you don't need the protection.

[nctnico]

with all the talk about the crowbar circuits in this topic, something i've never heard of before, i wonder why don't they implement a battery charging mode then? push the battery mode button = disconnect the crowbar until the battery mode button is pushed again? can just be a regular latching switch and have the power supply detect if it's closed or not so that it knows it's still in battery mode after turning it off then on again? this doesn't sound too hard to implement i think, maybe would add about 5$ in parts, but when talking about 1k$ power supplies, would that hurt too much?

A crowbar can effectively be disabled by setting its threshold higher than the max output of the supply.  That's how the crowbar I have here works, anyway.

So you can leave the crowbar "off" (effectively) if you don't need the protection.

Not so fast... a crowbar can also kick in in case the voltage at the output is higher than the setpoint.

[SilverSolder]

with all the talk about the crowbar circuits in this topic, something i've never heard of before, i wonder why don't they implement a battery charging mode then? push the battery mode button = disconnect the crowbar until the battery mode button is pushed again? can just be a regular latching switch and have the power supply detect if it's closed or not so that it knows it's still in battery mode after turning it off then on again? this doesn't sound too hard to implement i think, maybe would add about 5$ in parts, but when talking about 1k$ power supplies, would that hurt too much?

A crowbar can effectively be disabled by setting its threshold higher than the max output of the supply.  That's how the crowbar I have here works, anyway.

So you can leave the crowbar "off" (effectively) if you don't need the protection.

Not so fast... a crowbar can also kick in in case the voltage at the output is higher than the setpoint.

Yes, but if the battery exceeds the max voltage that the supply is capable of...  you really are trying to break it! 

I have never managed to trigger the crowbar unintentionally.  I very rarely use it...   for protection, I just set the CC just over what the DUT normally uses, that is usually good enough protection for Australia.

[Neganur]

Related to the new EDU-series instruments, I couldn't help but notice the following note in the German Batronix store:

"Attention:
According to the manufacturer Keysight products may not be sold to private customers. Please contact our sales team"


err.......ok? That was unexpected.


source

[Qw3rtzuiop]

Related to the new EDU-series instruments, I couldn't help but notice the following note in the German Batronix store:

This seems to be some batronix specific restriction. Other distributors will sell to private customers.
https://www.eevblog.com/forum/testgear/keysight-products-not-to-be-sold-to-private-customers/

[Lowkus]

The dark coloring of the housing might be a functional consideration.  Computer software has been moving toward darker themes because it can be more relaxing on the eyes, in particular it lessens the appearance of vitreous floaters.

[jusaca]

Yeah, while I do prefer dark themes in software, I can't imagine how a darker casing would be more relaxing to the eyes... I think this is solely a branding thing, to make the testgear more recognisable.
I really liked the old look, gray case with the black inlet for the screen, I think that was recognisable enough. But I also don't mind their new style. If they want to go with it, why not...

[Berni]

The dark coloring of the housing might be a functional consideration.  Computer software has been moving toward darker themes because it can be more relaxing on the eyes, in particular it lessens the appearance of vitreous floaters.

I think its more of a trend than anything.

Test equipment most likely stuck to bright beige colors because that is what computers back then looked like. And those all became that beige color because computers ware mostly meant for use in an office and standards ware being put down on what an office work environment should be like, among that was making this fancy new electronic equipment fit into the office environment. Offices are generally a bright and well lit environment so to fit in with the light colored desks and walls the computer equipment should have similar colors to fit in. Since offices bought lots of computers, the manufacturers made computers that fit into that, along with all the other peripherals like keyboards, mice, disk drives, printers etc... Then when people started buying computers for themselves they got the same beige colored boxes because that is what you could buy. And i suppose it just became the standard color for a computer to be beige, it looked weird if it was any other color. So i suppose test equipment drew from the same inspiration. Not all test equipment was light colored, but most of it was. So i suppose it also became weird for test equipment to be dark colored.

But then people started caring less about what color computers are in an office and manufacturers started experimenting with black computers for the sake of being different than everyone else. Especially once IBM started making black office workstations. They stood out and so everyone else also started making black computers to stand out until it became the new standard once everyone was making black computers. So apple wanting to stand out from all that went the other way in making completely white computers or even making brightly colorful computers to stand out even more.

Same thing happened when blue LEDs came around. They used to be expensive at first so only the fancy expensive equipment would have a blue power LED. But then everyone else also wanted to look fancy so once the price of blue LEDs came down everyone was sticking obnoxiously bright blue power LEDs on everything.

I think this fad is simply now catching on to test equipment where going black is an attempt to stand out and be hip. I personally don't like it so much, but hey everyone has there own taste. Possibly 15 years later all of it will be black and the beige ones will be considered old looking, like it is with computers.

[bd139]

Well they just started selling white PC cases and monitors again as optional and people are working out that dark mode was a bad idea in software. I suspect test gear will as you mention remain 15 years behind vogue so in around 2040 everyone will be going “ooh that scope is white” again. Probably while dressing in some 90s throwback outfit.

Edit: got to say that I hate blue LEDs. They are the least pleasant colour. In some applications they are damn offensive. I’ve had to snip out standby LEDs on a couple of things because they are bright blue. And whoever came up with those horrible blue backlights on LCD displays should be shot.

[Berni]

Yep it all eventually comes around.

We just reached that point with Windows UI design:

[bd139]

Ah yes, indeed. This is reminding us that the last time it was useable and had enough contrast was 1998  . I look forward to that 1998 again.

[Anthocyanina]

Yeah, while I do prefer dark themes in software, I can't imagine how a darker casing would be more relaxing to the eyes... I think this is solely a branding thing, to make the testgear more recognisable.
I really liked the old look, gray case with the black inlet for the screen, I think that was recognisable enough. But I also don't mind their new style. If they want to go with it, why not...

Yeah! it's definitely not more relaxing, in software i think dark themes are a lot better since they don't blast as much light into your eyes, but, they are emissive devices, you can use them with no environmental light, but when it comes to reflective and not emissive surfaces, black/dark letters/numbers/symbols are more easily perceived against a white/light background than the other way around. Our eyes don't work exactly like a camera, but we don't have infinite dynamic range, and can't adjust to brightness changes instantly, so to switch from looking at a white/light surface or an emissive light source like a display then turn to the oscilloscope (which also has an emissive display!) it isn't a smooth transition to easily and clearly see the white writing on black buttons, on a black panel since the eyes now have to adjust to less light going in. It's not super slow or very annoying, but it is noticeable. I feel like going with a dark-ish grey like the color of the ti 89 titanium (maybe also on other ti calculators, i don't know) would have been a better choice if they wanted to dark mode test equipement

[EEVblog]

Edit: got to say that I hate blue LEDs.

I can remember when blue LEDs came out, designers just went nuts with them.

[jusaca]

I can remember when blue LEDs came out, designers just went nuts with them.

Well, I do think they can look cool.
I don't see the problem with the color, but I feel like 90% of products just completly overdo it with brightness! Maybe efficiency got so much better while many engineers still use LED currents that were adequate 20 years ago?

[Berni]

I don't think black front panel impacts the usability all that much.

It is true that black text on white paper is more readable than white text on black paper. But that is mostly with thin lined fonts, once a more bold looking font is used it doesn't matter so much anymore. Perhaps if anything the colored markings such as yellow green blue pink channel markings stand out even more on a black background. Also there is the benefit that mat black plastic tends to be more forgiving to bumps, scrapes, dirt, aging etc... So in my opinion doesn't really degrade the usability of the instrument. I just prefer the old colors. I especially liked the older HP tan gray fake leather texture case with beige front(but that understandably looks kinda dated these days). For example Tektronix is still sticking to its unmistakable Tek blue color for the scopes. Fluke is sticking to its unmistakable bright yellow on handheld DMMs

Dark mode for software is different. It does genuinely help when working late at night in a dark room. Makes for less contrast between the room and the screen and has less of a tendency to upset your biological clock compared to looking at a bright cool white background of a typical text editor. The human body associates bright cool white light as being mid day. So that makes the dark color theme of all these oscilloscopes perfectly suited for those long late nights of debugging your circuits, since as we all know this is when the best work happens.

EDIT: Regarging blue LEDs. Yes they are usually simply too bright, but would look okay at a normal brightness. I think this is because even the early blue LEDs (They only became widely commercially available around the years of 2000s) had really good efficiency. We do also have really high efficiency green and red LEDs too, but for some reason companies seam to still be producing the old 1990s LED designs that need 10mA to get anything useful out of it and selling it so cheep that people keep using them. While the typical blue LED only needs like 1 or 2 mA to be as bright as you would ever need for a indicator led.

[SilverSolder]

I can remember when blue LEDs came out, designers just went nuts with them.

Well, I do think they can look cool.
I don't see the problem with the color, but I feel like 90% of products just completly overdo it with brightness! Maybe efficiency got so much better while many engineers still use LED currents that were adequate 20 years ago?

Agree, "too much of a good thing" is a real problem with many blue LED implementations.

[Lowkus]

So I just had an idea, what if someone were to manufacture new cases for oscilloscopes, kind of like designer-style housings.  Would engineers buy that sort of thing, where they'd pull the guts out of one and put it into the new case?  Or would it risk the stability of the oscilloscope to put it in a new housing?

[Neganur]

I don't think engineers buy oscilloscopes because they look nice....
I mean, nothing wrong with them actually looking nice, just - you gonna pimp your 300EUR Rigol with a 500 EUR burl wood finish?

[SilverSolder]

So I just had an idea, what if someone were to manufacture new cases for oscilloscopes, kind of like designer-style housings.  Would engineers buy that sort of thing, where they'd pull the guts out of one and put it into the new case?  Or would it risk the stability of the oscilloscope to put it in a new housing?

People do it with computer cases, but the market for that is huuuuge compared with o'scope cases....

[nowlan]

I am sure dbrand or someone could make carbon fiber skins for your scopes.

[SilverSolder]

I am sure dbrand or someone could make carbon fiber skins for your scopes.

Photos!!!