Building a lab from the ground up. Need some suggestions.

[AndyC_772]

A desoldering station is going to be important because i will be tearing apart old shit for the parts.

Bad idea. Set aside some of your budget to buy new components as and when you need them.

With new parts from reputable suppliers, you know exactly what you're getting, you know they work, and you know they've not been abused or damaged. There's nothing at all good about wasting time chasing a problem that's down to faulty components.

Buy your other equipment as and when you need it, don't rush to spend all you can on day one. If your first project doesn't require a function generator, then don't buy a function generator. Maybe your second, third and fourth projects won't need one either, but one of them really does need an FPGA board, or a CAN bus interface, a differential probe, or an active load. Don't assume that your lab will be all common, popular equipment and nothing specialised.

[cvriv]

Next semester they have us building our own power supplies. Good advice. I will remember this.

I didn't think I would have to ask for suggestions when it comes to equipment, but i think it's a good idea to see what others think. Firstly, i am an EE student. Fairly new to it; Im learning the basics now. Im doing very well in my classes. Now, I have $4000 - $5000 to spend. I have nothing to start with. I did just get done purchasing a PC for this lab so that is taken care of already. I need a power supply,  a bench DMM, an digital oscilloscope, soldering and desoldering gear, etc. A function generator. Now, 4 - 5000 is a lot, but it's not and I know all of you know this. Even though I would like to get everything i need with this 4 - 5000 i would like even more to get the best most important stuff first and then get the other smaller stuff in time. You know what i mean? The power suppy, oscilloscope, and bench DMM are the most important. I havent used a function generator in school yet so i dont know how important it is. Anyways, im will to spend a good amount of money on the power supply, DMM, and oscilloscope. I need these to be good for now and for anything that i could possibly want to do down the road. Knowing me, I out grow stuff pretty quick. For the oscilloscope i was thinking a either a Rigol DS2072A or a used DS2202 or maybe even a DS2202A if i can break a deal with a seller. Any objections to these? What do you think? For a bench DM. I was thinking an Agilent 34401A? An objection to this? A power supply, Im not sure. I was thinking the Rigol DP832, but Dave Jones ran into problems with it. Any suggestions for a similar power supply that is reliable? I havent even looked into a function generator yet or a soldering and desoldering station. A desoldering station is going to be important because i will be tearing apart old shit for the parts. Whatelse? What suggestions do you have for any gear. I already spoke to my professor about this and he thinks its a great idea. He said it'll be usefull for next semester as i will be building circuits in that class. I didnt get advice when it comes to what equipment because i dont think he is keeping up with the times, lol. Thanks for you help.

I would build your own power supply. You can recycled an old laptop power adapter into a triple output adjustable constant current constant voltage power supply for like $10 using a couple buck converter circuits and an arduino.

The best solder will make even the cheapest iron usable. With my $10 Zhongdi ZD-98 and Kester 44 #66 Sn63Pb37 .020" I can solder like a boss. Absolutely follow Daves advise and use .020" (0.5mm) diameter or smaller. Also absolutely essential is a Hakko 599B-02 wire sponge.

Here is the order I placed on All-Spec a couple weeks ago:

KW4400     SOLDER WIRE RA 44, .020        EA   $25.26
CW7000     PEN DISPENSER EMPTY FOR FLUX   PKG  $14.48
835100ML   FLUX ROSIN NON-CONDUCT 4.2 OZ  EA   $8.72
80-1-5     SODER-WICK ROSIN SD .030" ESD  EA   $2.79
80-2-5     SODER-WICK ROSIN SD .060" ESD  EA   $2.79
80-3-5     SODER-WICK ROSIN SD .080" ESD  EA   $3.02
80-4-5     SODER-WICK ROSIN SD .110" ESD  EA   $3.26
80-5-5     SODER-WICK ROSIN SD .145" ESD  EA   $3.61
80-6-5     SODER-WICK ROSIN SD .210" ESD  EA   $3.78
599B-02    SPONGE WIRE WITH HOLDER        EA   $8.81
611-1      SOLDER STAND SINGLE REEL       EA   $12.53

[George_Race]

Take a look at the picture of my test bench.  Here is the link.
http://www.mrrace.com/product_pages/other_items/MyTestBench/index.htm

I do have several VOM/LCR/etc...meters and a nice solder station as well.  Not shown in the picture.

You are looking at equipment purchased on eBay and put back into great working conditions where necessary and all for less then $5000 over a period of 2 or so years, a piece at a time.

And although not "Officially NIST Certified" the equipment meets the NIST standards for lab measurements for frequency.
Keeping everything working together is the GPSDO that provides the 10 MHz Primary Standard frequency for the Sig Gen, Counter, & Spectrum Analyzer.  A very good signal amplitude measurements standard, is provided by the HP 8466 Generator and Boonton 92EA RF Millivoltmeter.

Good luck with your project, you an do it a piece at a time.

[cvriv]

I ant to thank you for saying what I was thinking the whole time. It's not the first time I encounter something like this. From forum to forum and area of interest to area of interest,... you'll find the same behavior. I am trying so hard to not open my mouth, because I have a big mouth. I'm still not going to say anything, because I really do want to be a part of this community, so I will just keep my mouth shut.

From what you have wrote and what others have wrote, I know what I have to do. I want to to thank you and the others for all the help. I'm going to start comprising a list of stuff, but im not going to purchase anything until about a week or two before my semester is over. This way I'll have everything right when classes are over. I wont be able to test anything out now because I have to much studying to do.

Im going to buy things I know I need and I know what quality i need for each item based on it's importance. I'm probably going to spend the most on an oscilloscope because I know how important it is. Probably going to spend right around $1000 for one. Im eyeballing a Rigol DS2102A. A power supply, not sure yet. I'll have to read through your post carefully and see. I was considering getting a RIGOL DP1308A power supply. I dont need anything more than 25v, right now at least. The signal path reviewed it and he liked it. So that was good. I have to watch his other video on it though. It is a programmable supply. I know you said not to worry about getting one of these. We'll see what happens.

 I was thinking about getting a Siglent SDM3055 bench multimeter and maybe a Fluke 87v handheld to back up the Siglent. I cant believe how expensive the hand helds are! Holy hell! I remember the guy from the signal path saying that the lowest measurement of resistance is 200ohms for the Siglent which he said could make it harder to measure very small amounts of resistance. I checked the specs for the fluke and it's 50ohms which is better than the Siglent. This totally changes the way I look at hand helds. Anyways,... so yea. Thanks again for your help. 

I went through this exact process last year when I decided to go back into electronics and to get a second degree, in EE.  I'm surprised at the amount of nerd-rage generated when someone dares to ask for advice when they want to spend more than a few hundred dollars, without "earning it."  I ignored this nonsense and evaluated each purchase.  I'm now using my gear for freelance projects and just ordered a Keithley 8820-S this morning to work on a customer project.

View Dave's video.  Look at suggestions, then upgrade where you see fit.  That's exactly what I did-- I built up a list and would research the test gear to death and purchase each, one at a time. 

My advice to you or any beginners in general:
- If you don't know you need something don't buy it, or buy the cheapest one you can get your hands on.  When you NEED it, get the best you possibly can afford, for your specific and future needs.
- Don't pay retail for new equipment.  Don't be afraid to get a quote or ask for a discount.  The more you buy, expect the discount to be bigger.  That being said, TEquipment usually had the best deal when I was shopping for new gear and soliciting quotes.
- Sometimes eBay has worse prices than you can get from an factory authorized seller; Sometimes prices on Amazon are worse, as there are sellers on Amazon who will take your order and use eBay as a drop shipper.  Always shop around.

Power supply:
- Forget programmable, focus on cheap and reliable.  Chances are you won't ever use the programmable features anyway.  By the time you really want a programmable power supply, they will all have 6.5 digit meters built in with LXI standard.  Also, I've never had to run my power supply above 24V, so don't go crazy.  Minimum should be a linear power supply with current limiting.  Check out factory certified/used power supplies and you might find a bargain.  I purchased a new Tektronix 0-72V power supply on clearance for ~$323. 
- The Rigols have had some major issues, am I'm not convinced they've all been fixed; same with Siglent.  Mayuono has a cheap power supply with a built in 6.5 digit meter, but is known to generate a destructive 15 V spike when turned on or off.  Or just go to tequipment.net->power supplies and sort from lowest the highest and keep scrolling until you find one that you are comfortable with.
- You can build your own power supply, but after spending hours and hours looking at kits, designs, parts lists, pricing out components, figuring out how to make the case, and trying to find a design with CV/CC and limiting was consuming too much time.  You can purchase a power supply and it will arrive in a few days ready to go.  Yes, it's a great learning experience, but keep in mind most shops don't design power supplies for their products, they buy them off the shelf or tweak reference designs from places like TI.
- Choose wisely and the power supply will outlive you, so long as you don't abuse it.  You'll notice Dave still has his first power supply.

Logic Analyzer:
- You don't need one unless you are working with digital designs serial busses.  When you want one, buy just a Salea logic analyzer.  The logic analyzers on scopes aren't great. 

Oscilloscope:
- Avoid USB oscilloscopes, or multipurpose USB test stations like the NI MyDAQ, or Analog Discovery.  I was forced to purchase a NI MyDAQ for one of my EE courses and it's an expensive toy that was forced to use with terrible, bloated software that only runs under Windows.  The people recommending them never touched one.
- Don't buy an antique/analog oscilloscope unless you just want to collect and repair old stuff as a hobby.  Be nice to people who do this, because a) they know magical stuff about analog design, and b) you might inherit their stuff when they go into the old folks home, and I guarantee they have some cool stuff hiding in cardboard boxes that they've forgotten about.
- Rigol is the #1 recommendation for <$500.  Beyond $1k, they aren't as good a value.  I purchased the cheapest Rigol.  It got the job done, but it was noisy, flickered constantly, and had issues.  Now that I have more experience, I honestly think I would have been happier with an entry level scope from Tektronix, Agilent, etc., for just a little more money.  But every time I thought about buying an entry level scope from the top tier vendor, I'd see people complaining about the limited memory.  I can count the number of times on my right hand the times that would have mattered, provided I set the triggers correctly.  But the bright side is that it was terrible enough to push me to upgrade.  As soon as I had the smallest justification, I upgraded to an Tektronix MDO3014.  I am very, very happy with the new scope.
- Above the $800 price point start looking at other manufacturers.  Hammeg/R&S has some low end scopes that looked pretty good against the Rigols if you get them on a sale.  Keysight too.   
- When looking purchasing your first oscilloscope don't get caught up on extra features, look at primarily at bandwidth and what you intend to do, and the rest will follow.  In the beginning most of your measurements are going to be qualitative (is it 12V or 0V, what does the waveform look like, etc.) and not quantitative (how many nano seconds is the rise time compared to that other signal, how many mv is that signal before the clock arrived, etc.).
- For very basic electronics or basic repair, an oscilloscope is unnecessary but nice to have.
- For basic electronics when you start throwing in digital logic, op-amps, I'd say <=50MHz is fine.
- For basic microcontrollers, look at the signals you intend look at.  Still, I think 50MHz is fine, unless you start getting faster clock speeds.
- More bandwidth is better; lower capacitance probes is better; 10x passive probes are better than 1x/10x probes.

DMM:
- Get two DMMs; two cheap DMMs are better than one expensive one; eventually you will want to measure current and voltage at the same time or check to see if the meter is broken.
- I think a 5.5 digit meter, like the Fluke 8808A is awesome; it's fast and crazy responsive.  I purchased a factory certified one from Fluke for ~$800.  I also have a 6.5 digit meter, and an 87V, but I use the 5.5 digit fluke most often.

LCR meter:
- This is a luxury.  Since I was buying parts assortments I wanted to be able to measure capacitors and unmarked inductors.  Don't buy the $20 LCR/ESR meters on eBay, they are worthless.  Buy the BK LCR meter or similar.
- Also, don't buy jumbo mystery component grab bags, or you will end up with a drawer filled with hundreds of parts you don't use.  If you want to buy an assortment of parts, buy an assortment of labeled known values.  Trust me.  I have a box of unknown chips with part numbers that don't reference to anything.

Function Generator/Arbitrary Waveform Generator
- Resist the urge to purchase the newest Siglent or Rigol waveform generator.  I'm still using the cheap Instek function generator and just now getting to the point where I want to use arbitrary waveforms and noise injection.  When it becomes obvious you need one, buy a good one.

Soldering
- Buy a reasonably good soldering station with replaceable tips.  I'd suggest Weller, Hakko, Metcal, etc.  You want variable temperature control; leaded and lead free solder melt at different temperatures, and the thermal mass changes depending what you are soldering.  Get a thinner pencil tip so you can do through hole and SMD with drag soldering.
- small diameter solder.
- good desoldering braid with a fine mesh.
- liquid flux is your friend (kester flux pen or in bottle)
- For Hot air, I'd recommend Hakko.  They seemed to have the best price when I bought mine.

Etching/PCB fabrication
- While many will tell you just to send the board out and have it manufactured, I etch my own boards and am now playing with applying my own solder mask and using the toner transfer method for silk screen.  You can wait five days to get a pretty board from a PCB manufacturer or spend two hours making a board.  Its up to you.  You can also etch your own solder stencils as well.

Prototyping
- If you are using breadboards, buy the flexible jumper wires.  Don't buy the precut wires, but the flexible ones.  Buy mostly male to male, but purchase some male to female and female to female.  These are handy when you have exposed headers but need to connect to a female logic analyzer or female header.  If you have a cat, buy twice as many as my cat likes to chew them to pieces if I leave them out.
- Cables are handy.  Buy BNC-aligator, BNC-BNC, BNC to mini-grabbers, mini-grabbers to mini-grabbers, post to aligator... you get the idea. 

Spectrum Analyzer:
- You don't need one.

VNA
- Seriously, you don't need one.  If you want to know what one is, find one of the analog scope guys (see above) and offer to clean the cat urine and dead mice out of their garage of analog oscilloscopes and they will teach you what they are.  If they give you one of their scopes, graciously accept it and rent a box truck to help you get it home, or they may get offended.

If you want to get into RF, disregard most of what I say.

[NilByMouth]

This makes me think of someone buying a BMW 7 Series as their first car. Seriously, limit your total budget to $1000 and get cheaper stuff so you get to know what you need as you use it, then get the expensive stuff afterwards.

[cvriv]

This is a BMW 7 Series: agilent-keysight dsax92504a. The stuff I want to buy, more like a... I dont know. Whatever car that's not bottom of the line and nor top of the line.

This makes me think of someone buying a BMW 7 Series as their first car. Seriously, limit your total budget to $1000 and get cheaper stuff so you get to know what you need as you use it, then get the expensive stuff afterwards.

[nbritton]

get cheaper stuff so you get to know what you need as you use it, then get the expensive stuff afterwards.

I don't agree with this, this kind of thinking is how people end up with 20 scopes. If you're committed to EE then get the best scope that you can reasonably afford. Quality gear can always be resold on eBay to recoup your money when you want to upgrade to an even better scope. A student needs something that is calibrated, reliable, and trustworthy.

[joesixpack]

Im going to buy things I know I need and I know what quality i need for each item based on it's importance. I'm probably going to spend the most on an oscilloscope because I know how important it is. Probably going to spend right around $1000 for one. Im eyeballing a Rigol DS2102A. A power supply, not sure yet. I'll have to read through your post carefully and see. I was considering getting a RIGOL DP1308A power supply. I dont need anything more than 25v, right now at least. The signal path reviewed it and he liked it. So that was good. I have to watch his other video on it though. It is a programmable supply. I know you said not to worry about getting one of these. We'll see what happens.

There is nothing wrong with spending money or buying good tools.  It's a personal decision.  The DP1803A has a retail price of $908 and is an 80 triple output power supply.  I haven't heard any bad things about that supply, which is rare for Rigol products.

To give you an idea of what is out there, I just purchased a Keithley 2280s power supply (factory refurbished).  It was ~$1300.  It has a built in 6.5 digit meter and can measure current down to 10 nanoAmps. But it's only a single channel 20V/6A supply. I'm going to use it on some battery powered embedded projects. 

I'm not recommending this meter to you, but if you go slow and have a list of things you want you can buy a lot better with not much more money.  Keep an eye out for sales.  Rigols do go on sale occasionally 25%-35% off.

Quite frankly, I think you'll be happy no matter what supply you get or if you build your own.

The best advice I could give is to take the time to research what makes one power supply better than another, and make your decision.  Same for the other equipment.

http://www.bkprecision.com/support/downloads/power-supply-guide.html
http://www.delftek.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/04/HP-power-supply-handbook.pdf

I can't find the other ones, but there are some guides and appnotes from the other manufacturers.  When you become an EE, you are going to be doing this a lot- look at requirements, evaluating, shopping, rinse and repeat.

[nbritton]

A power supply, not sure yet. I'll have to read through your post carefully and see. I was considering getting a RIGOL DP1308A power supply. I dont need anything more than 25v, right now at least. The signal path reviewed it and he liked it. So that was good. I have to watch his other video on it though. It is a programmable supply. I know you said not to worry about getting one of these. We'll see what happens.

Spending $1k on a DP1308A would be a foolish allocation of limited resources. Power supplies are one area you can skimp on when getting started, honestly anything that moves electrons will get the job done. Take that money and put it towards a better scope.

P.S. Stay away from Siglent, they have buggy firmware and unethical business practices.

[tggzzz]

The best advice I could give is to take the time to research what makes one power supply better than another, and make your decision.  Same for the other equipment.

Good advice, but I'd add "... better than another for X but not for Y".

I also think that at thei stage the OP ought to spend time concentrating on fundamentals that will last a career, and not spend time on things that will be inimportant in a few years. Examples could include newer equipment, career path, or equipment becoming irrelevant, e.g ballistic galvanometers or (cough) analogue vs digital scopes.

Learning how to use, say, a spectrum analyser effectively takes a lot of time; there will always be time for that later - provided the OP knows when to use a SA and when to use a NA or MDA or....

I can't find the other ones, but there are some guides and appnotes from the other manufacturers.  When you become an EE, you are going to be doing this a lot- look at requirements, evaluating, shopping, rinse and repeat.

And learning how to do research and to distinguish between "musts", "wants" and "wouldn't it be nice ifs" will always be useful in any job - technical or otherwise.

[cvriv]

Thank you. I am very much committed to EE. I'll research everything thanks.

get cheaper stuff so you get to know what you need as you use it, then get the expensive stuff afterwards.

I don't agree with this, this kind of thinking is how people end up with 20 scopes. If you're committed to EE then get the best scope that you can reasonably afford. Quality gear can always be resold on eBay to recoup your money when you want to upgrade to an even better scope. A student needs something that is calibrated, reliable, and trustworthy.

[tggzzz]

Thank you. I am very much committed to EE and the equipment I have lined up will last me a very long time. I won't be coming upon a limitations anytime soon

In that case there is an argument that you aren't pushing hard enough   More seriously, it is difficult to predict what you will need in 5 years time, so don't bet too much on your prediction! IMNSHO it is sensible to only buy (or beg or borrow) stuff when you have a need for it.

[Weistek]

Scope : rigal ds1054z (4ch 100mhz)

Bench meter : HP 3478a (awsome meter, may need internal battery changed)

Solder station : hakko fx951 (best solder station I have ever used)

Psu analog : HP 6230 (something in that line)

Digital psu : hp E3620a.

Function generator : anything wavetek is good, you can get 5~50MHz gens fairly cheap.

This was my setup when I started my lab doing EE in collage. It's have grown a lot since. But this should get you started.

Sent from my SM-G920T using Tapatalk

[Weistek]

Also old fluke bench meters are good.

Handheld meter, Brymens are good.

Sent from my SM-G920T using Tapatalk

[cvriv]

Thanks guys:)

@ tggzzz - I totally get what you mean! EE is a new thing for me, and I'm afraid I don't know enough to make the claim that I'll need better gear right away. LOL. BUT! Given all of the other times in the past where I wish I had better gear to do greater work... I wouldn't be surprised if if happened again with EE.

The thing is that I have always had to improvise with equipment to get certain things done. Some of the stuff I have done was really dangerous too. I'm kind of tired of wishing I had better stuff. I dont have a huge problem with improvising; I think it's a skill in itself, but now I have the opportunity to buy buy all the "better" gear. So I want to do that. If I max out my gear right away then I max my gear out right away. Maybe I wont. But at least I got to buy the gear I really wanted to get. It's kind of a personal thing.     

[tggzzz]

The thing is that I have always had to improvise with equipment to get certain things done.

Good. That is a valuable skill you will use repeatedly in your professional life.

That is especially true if you are pushing the boundaries of the possible or known, because you can't buy the equipment and have to make it yourself.

Conversely, if you are doing a standard repetitive task then it makes commercial sense to get precise niche equipment you need for your task. Niche = expensive, of course.

Some of the stuff I have done was really dangerous too.

Safety is one are where you must spend the money. It presupposes you know enough to recognise the danger and know how to avoid it. Too many don't

[Awesome14]

Growing up I purchased what I needed as I needed it. The Fluke 8842A is probably better than Fluke's current 5.5 digit bench meter. I had two of them. But, then 6.5 digit meters took over, and I switched. Experience and technique make any equipment work much better. I can use whatever is available and get the job done. That's the mark of a good EE. Anyone can do good work if there is no limit to budget. With a few tricks you can really get some mileage out of you equipment.

And I liked the response about learning how the equipment works and what makes a really nice piece of equipment really nice. 

[cvriv]

Hey everyone. Didnt want to create a new thread about the same thing so im going to continue posting here about purchasing equipment. Just want to know about a few pieces of equpiment. Power supply. I found one that is not programmable. Its the BK Precision 1760a. Anyone have experience  with it? It's 0-30v, 0-5A, and it has fine adjustment knobs, tiple output.

Also for a DMM, a benchtop, a Rigol DM3058E. Anyone ever use it? Also i was thinking about getting a Fluke 87-5, but damn its expensive. I wouldnt mind saving some money on a handheld DMM with true RMS. Any suggest a cheaper model, thats just about as good with temp sensing?

For an oscilloscope, not even going to mention what im getting because its stupid expensive and dont want to hear the you dont need that remarks. Pretty sure im getting this model, just trying to figureout how much to not spend on it.

Can anyone recommend a really decent waveform generator?

[cvriv]

Also, are there usually some good black friday/ cyber monday sales on equipment? Im thinking yes bit considering its specialized equipment, i dont know.

[nidlaX]

Also, are there usually some good black friday/ cyber monday sales on equipment? Im thinking yes bit considering its specialized equipment, i dont know.

I plan to get some equipment such as the Quick 957D rework station from Adafruit which will likely have a discount code for BF/CM. If you're looking for a good deal on the Brymen meters, watch for a sale from Sear's and search for the equivalent Greenlee / Extech models. I purchased the Greenlee DM-510A for less than the net price of the BM257S from Franky, AND it came with a free HDTV!

For more specialized stuff, Zoro just had a 25% sale on pricier items such as bench multimeters.

For multimeters, the new 5.5 digit Siglent meter might be a good fit for you if you want an interface more polished than the Rigol's. Consider the Brymen BM257S / Greenlee DM-510A for your handheld meter, you can't go wrong.

[CustomEngineerer]

I am assuming that since you mentioned you were looking at getting either the Rigol DS2072A, DS2202 or DS2202A that you either don't know that the DS2072A can be hacked into the DS2202A (or even the DS2302A) or you have a moral objection to doing the hack. If its a moral objection then I understand and please ignore this post. If not then you should know that the DS2072A and DS2202A contain the same hardware, just software crippled and its trivial to unlock the extra bandwidth and options. There are multiple threads on the forum explaining how to do it and for a student on a budget it definitely makes sense to save the extra $900 (or extra $1600 vs the DS2302A). I would also recommend against getting the builtin signal generator (DS2072A-S) and getting a standalone generator.

[cvriv]

I am assuming that since you mentioned you were looking at getting either the Rigol DS2072A, DS2202 or DS2202A that you either don't know that the DS2072A can be hacked into the DS2202A (or even the DS2302A) or you have a moral objection to doing the hack. If its a moral objection then I understand and please ignore this post. If not then you should know that the DS2072A and DS2202A contain the same hardware, just software crippled and its trivial to unlock the extra bandwidth and options. There are multiple threads on the forum explaining how to do it and for a student on a budget it definitely makes sense to save the extra $900 (or extra $1600 vs the DS2302A). I would also recommend against getting the builtin signal generator (DS2072A-S) and getting a standalone generator.

I actually want to get the DS4024. 200mhz, 4 channels, and 4GSa/s sample rate. Beautiful. It's pretty badass. I sent tequipment.net an email about making a purchase and if they have any deals for customers that spend over a certain amount. I know im not going to spend as much as some people or even as much as what some single pieces of equipment go for, but i thought it couldnt hurt to ask. 

[cvriv]

Ill keep this in mind:) Thanks:)

[CustomEngineerer]

With the strong support of the Rigol DS1000Zs and DS2000As I can understand the thinking that the DS4000 must really be killer but I'd strongly urge you to search the forum for threads on the DS4000. What makes the DS1000Z and DS2000As so attractive is their relatively low cost for the feature set. But once you start getting up to the price of the DS4000s the value for the money really starts to go down and the firmware issues are a bigger disappointment when you are spending that much money. Its your money so get what you think will make you happy, but you had mentioned wanting to get the best you can get for your money, and something that you won't outgrow, and the DS4000 just doesn't seem to fit that description.

Edit: I don't have a DS4000 and I haven't used one so my opinion is just based on what I've heard from other people that went that route. I've had the DS2072A-S for about a year.

[cvriv]

Ok, ill search around this forum for what others had mentioned about this oscilloscope. Thanks. I'm not looking to hack any equipment at the moment so yea.