Test Equipment Anonymous (TEA) group therapy thread

[med6753]

Yep indeed. It's ass end of solar cycle now as well. Also if you go to the hamfests I'm the youngest dude there these days which is scary as I'm not that young. Perhaps I should pillage all the valves out of their shit for test gear 

Hell, the last hamfest I went to I felt like the youngster. 

[bd139]

  that old eh? 

Just put an offer on the printed SM for my 2445 and bought AoE X chapters. This is what sold it for me 

[BU508A]

Just stumbled over this: a tunnel diode for the Tek 454/454A (NOS)

https://www.ebay.com/itm/324020552875

[Cerebus]

I've joined the dark side:



Freshly delivered Rigol MSO5104 complete with a free pack of decoder licenses. It's not a Tek or an HP, but it's a damn sight cheaper than anything that the big boys put out with a 8Gs/s sample rate. It may be about to magically morph into a MSO5354...

UI is painfully laggy compared to a proper scope but, much to my surprise, the touch screen functionality doesn't suck.

[bd139]

Conflatulations. They are rather nice (apart from that UI lag!). I spent about two weeks convincing myself to try and buy one then used one at Kempton last year and it wasn't going to be any more useful than the DS1054Z to myself so I passed.

Plus as a former FD Trinitron owner I still can't bring myself to touch a device or computer screen. It took me nearly 5 years to accept that you had to do that to use a smartphone 

[tggzzz]

Conflatulations. They are rather nice (apart from that UI lag!). I spent about two weeks convincing myself to try and buy one then used one at Kempton last year and it wasn't going to be any more useful than the DS1054Z to myself so I passed.

Plus as a former FD Trinitron owner I still can't bring myself to touch a device or computer screen. It took me nearly 5 years to accept that you had to do that to use a smartphone 

I must look and see if I still have my light pen somewhere.

[bd139]

That's fine. Doesn't involve greasy fingers touching the screen.

I actually made a light pen for my BBC micro back in the day. One of my first electronic projects. Used a transistor, a photodiode and plugged in the joystick hole. I managed to squeeze it all in a Berol pen. Used it, err, once. That was a bus to maplin job. Back when they were actually worth going to. And not shut

[AVGresponding]

I'm sure someone here needs another one of these...   

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/TEKTRONIX-465B-100MHz-Two-Channel-Oscilloscope/184167876142

EDIT: Thanks BU508A  >.>

[GreyWoolfe]

I am hoping that the bills go down a bit too, the new system will be an inverter type - said to save a bit. Fingers crossed.

Winter months the bills are reasonable, not much savings- $10-20 a  month.  We save $50-75 a month during the summer months.  Hopefully, it will last as long as the original.  Then it will have paid itself off.

Mnem, not good enuf to simply lick the fork, you must lick the plate also.  Mrs GreyWoolfe hates when I do that so I surreptitiously lick it on the way to the sink but only on the really good meals.  She is a great cook, it's when she outdoes herself that I am prone to licking.

Worsthorse, my heart goes out to you.  I have lost a few over the years.  I shudder at the thought of my precious girl crossing the rainbow bridge, it would be like losing my wife or son, she is that precious to me.  Hopefully, even though she is 9, we have many more good years together.  She is in good health, as active as she was when she was 2 and she watches her weight.  They never really leave us though.  They live on in our memories.

[BU508A]

I'm sure someone here needs another one of these...   

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/184167876142

EDIT: Apologies for the ludicrously long URL[/s]

Fixed that for you. 

[Cerebus]

... I still can't bring myself to touch a device or computer screen. It took me nearly 5 years to accept that you had to do that to use a smartphone 

I know what you mean. Some part of me thinks that adding a touch screen interface to a scope is just wrong. I much prefer test gear that has buttons and knobs, preferably ones that are direct analogues of the controls you would have if you were building the instrument out of purely analogue technologies. I bought the MSO5104 despite it having a touch screen rather than because it has a touch screen.

[jake111]

I've joined the dark side:


Freshly delivered Rigol MSO5104 complete with a free pack of decoder licenses. It's not a Tek or an HP, but it's a damn sight cheaper than anything that the big boys put out with a 8Gs/s sample rate. It may be about to magically morph into a MSO5354...

UI is painfully laggy compared to a proper scope but, much to my surprise, the touch screen functionality doesn't suck.

Nice!  I just unlocked one of those for a friend, surprisingly easy.  He got the 70MHz version and now it's 500MHz with all the options...  Pretty funny...  Generally I don't like these software ripoffs but I didn't feel bad at all doing this to a product from a company based in the heart of commieland 

[SilverSolder]

[...]
I just unlocked one of those for a friend, surprisingly easy.  He got the 70MHz version and now it's 500MHz with all the options...  Pretty funny...  Generally I don't like these software ripoffs but I didn't feel bad at all doing this to a product from a company based in the heart of commieland 

Are we any better than any Chinese copycat, from an ethics point of view?   Answer on a postcard...

[bd139]

So the only probes I have lying around are cheap P6100 ones at the moment and they are quite frankly shit. Even putting your hands near them causes problems and adequate compensation is pretty difficult. They overshoot like mad and generally suck balls. Now I have a scope worth investing in it looks like I need to buy some decent probes.

So first stop was to find some suitable Tek probes. Turns out a broken piece of shit still goes for £50 or so which is not something I'm paying for a risky dodgy probe purchase.

Next stop was China to see what they had on the market and you can get a 300MHz probe which has a dubious rise time on it. Reviews I have seen suggest the specifications are exaggerated.

Then to Probemaster who do ones with the correct indicator pins. Good job. So a kit of 3 probes including carriage and duty and VAT is going to set me back £200. Nope.

Now to TME who sell Testec 300MHz probes with apparently a good reputation and decent 1.2ns rise time. That's £105 for two, which is better and probably worth it if they perform ok.

Does anyone have any other options?

Edit: found some Testec ones at 250MHz 1.4ns rise time but they are switchable ones (spit yuck) but two for £50: https://uk.farnell.com/testec/tt-mf312-2-6-11020-2-6/probe-oscilloscope-double-mid/dp/4308104

[mansaxel]

Are we any better than any Chinese copycat, from an ethics point of view?   Answer on a postcard...

Maybe not. But if I own it, I should be able to do whatever I want with it.  That's the law where I live.

I can sort of understand the desire to sell a spread of products. That way you'll get more customers. But selling the same product, just artificially dumbed-down, feels unethical to me. I am getting a device that has limitations meaning I can't utilize its potential. But that amount of utilization potential can't be of use to anybody else either, it is just wasted. They did not spend LESS on building it, they did not consume less of our finite resources building it, they just made it suck.  That is immoral.

The practice of selling selected components is another thing. Sometimes you need that extra. Sometimes the design is so forgiving you can make do with pretty much any component within the same order of magnitude. Giving the designer / customer the option of better performance, while selling those that did not meet the utmost demands at a lower price, makes sense. Less waste, more options.

Of course the movement of functions and capabilities into software complicates this. When the difference between "basic" and "cool" is just code, what to do?

Side note on HW functions becoming software:

Every day at work I have to endure HW vendors staggering into becoming software companies with various amounts of luck. A special corporate case of "Beware of the EE with a compiler!" (and the corollary "Beware of the programmer with a screwdriver!") that usually is a clusterfuck of epical proportions. Case in point: Security in industrial and domestic automation and control systems. QED.

[bd139]

Technically I'm an EE with a compiler here 

[tautech]

So the only probes I have lying around are cheap P6100 ones at the moment and they are quite frankly shit. Even putting your hands near them causes problems and adequate compensation is pretty difficult. They overshoot like mad and generally suck balls. Now I have a scope worth investing in it looks like I need to buy some decent probes.

So first stop was to find some suitable Tek probes. Turns out a broken piece of shit still goes for £50 or so which is not something I'm paying for a risky dodgy probe purchase.

Next stop was China to see what they had on the market and you can get a 300MHz probe which has a dubious rise time on it. Reviews I have seen suggest the specifications are exaggerated.

Then to Probemaster who do ones with the correct indicator pins. Good job. So a kit of 3 probes including carriage and duty and VAT is going to set me back £200. Nope.

Now to TME who sell Testec 300MHz probes with apparently a good reputation and decent 1.2ns rise time. That's £105 for two, which is better and probably worth it if they perform ok.

Does anyone have any other options?

Edit: found some Testec ones at 250MHz 1.4ns rise time but they are switchable ones (spit yuck) but two for £50: https://uk.farnell.com/testec/tt-mf312-2-6-11020-2-6/probe-oscilloscope-double-mid/dp/4308104

So whatta you want ?
10x fixed ?
Autosense ?
Compensation range ?

[bd139]

2 off 10X probes not switchable. 10-50pf. autosense would be nice but not important. Main thing is something that actually adheres to the specification.

Currently looking at these: https://www.reichelt.com/gb/en/modular-probe-250-mhz-x10-testec-mf-212-p32418.html

[tggzzz]

2 off 10X probes not switchable. 10-50pf. autosense would be nice but not important. Main thing is something that actually adheres to the specification.

Currently looking at these: https://www.reichelt.com/gb/en/modular-probe-250-mhz-x10-testec-mf-212-p32418.html

Resistive divider Z0 probes, if you want low capacitance and high input impedance relative to conventional *10 probes.

Make them yourself

[med6753]

Technically I'm an EE with a compiler here 

Are you bragging or complaining? 

[tautech]

2 off 10X probes not switchable. 10-50pf. autosense would be nice but not important. Main thing is something that actually adheres to the specification.

Currently looking at these: https://www.reichelt.com/gb/en/modular-probe-250-mhz-x10-testec-mf-212-p32418.html

They don't look too bad but their C is a bit high.
We do these 300 MHz reasonably priced ones and there's a 350 MHz one very similar I can't yet find a link for:
https://siglentna.com/product/sp2030a-auto-sense-300-mhz-oscilloscope-probes/

Otherwise look for some Pintek ones in your part of the world from their selection here:
http://www.pintek.com.tw/files/pintek/Oscilloscope_e.pdf

[bd139]

2 off 10X probes not switchable. 10-50pf. autosense would be nice but not important. Main thing is something that actually adheres to the specification.

Currently looking at these: https://www.reichelt.com/gb/en/modular-probe-250-mhz-x10-testec-mf-212-p32418.html

Resistive divider Z0 probes, if you want low capacitance and high input impedance relative to conventional *10 probes.

Make them yourself

Ah yes I'd forgotten about those. That might actually do the job. Will order some reistors and do some experiments as I've got a whole roll of RG316 and SMA parts here to leverage. Thanks for the reminder.

2 off 10X probes not switchable. 10-50pf. autosense would be nice but not important. Main thing is something that actually adheres to the specification.

Currently looking at these: https://www.reichelt.com/gb/en/modular-probe-250-mhz-x10-testec-mf-212-p32418.html

They don't look too bad but their C is a bit high.
We do these 300 MHz reasonably priced ones and there's a 350 MHz one very similar I can't yet find a link for:
https://siglentna.com/product/sp2030a-auto-sense-300-mhz-oscilloscope-probes/

Otherwise look for some Pintek ones in your part of the world from their selection here:
http://www.pintek.com.tw/files/pintek/Oscilloscope_e.pdf

Yeah agreed. tggzzz is right on the mark actually with his suggestion. The P6100's can be relegated to near DC stuff then and then the rest of the problem domain is moot.

Technically I'm an EE with a compiler here 

Are you bragging or complaining? 

Both 

[worsthorse]

Blimey. Just got Radcom through the door this morning. ML&S litter for the first few pages with shiny things that don't work very well. There's a half arsed review of a Ksger T12 that doesn't even open the thing up and whine about the mains safety issues but has a whole paragraph on being a cheap arse. This is followed by someone restoring the bird shat covered remains of a rusty beam antenna. Then an advert for MFJ's new "arrived broken" stuff. Then some unrealistically priced second hand crap and some valve vultures offering collection. This is followed by the letters section in which some miserable hostile elitist twat complains that they should revoke amateur licenses for people who don't progress past foundation quickly (perhaps they just wanted some legit 2m action?!?!). At the end "shitty propagation this month".  . In the bin. Really not selling it are they. I'm surprised I didn't see a letter rant that "membership is dwindling". Of course it is - no one wants to spend 50 smackers a year on that crap.

Sounds like your average issue of QST.

[bd139]

At least that's printed on paper you can wipe your ass on without getting brown fingers 

[tautech]

2 off 10X probes not switchable. 10-50pf. autosense would be nice but not important. Main thing is something that actually adheres to the specification.

Currently looking at these: https://www.reichelt.com/gb/en/modular-probe-250-mhz-x10-testec-mf-212-p32418.html

Resistive divider Z0 probes, if you want low capacitance and high input impedance relative to conventional *10 probes.

Make them yourself

Ah yes I'd forgotten about those. That might actually do the job. Will order some reistors and do some experiments as I've got a whole roll of RG316 and SMA parts here to leverage. Thanks for the reminder.

2 off 10X probes not switchable. 10-50pf. autosense would be nice but not important. Main thing is something that actually adheres to the specification.

Currently looking at these: https://www.reichelt.com/gb/en/modular-probe-250-mhz-x10-testec-mf-212-p32418.html

They don't look too bad but their C is a bit high.
We do these 300 MHz reasonably priced ones and there's a 350 MHz one very similar I can't yet find a link for:
https://siglentna.com/product/sp2030a-auto-sense-300-mhz-oscilloscope-probes/

Otherwise look for some Pintek ones in your part of the world from their selection here:
http://www.pintek.com.tw/files/pintek/Oscilloscope_e.pdf

Yeah agreed. tggzzz is right on the mark actually with his suggestion. The P6100's can be relegated to near DC stuff then and then the rest of the problem domain is moot.

Fine if you only play with LV stuff otherwise I like some CAT rated probe to hang onto.