Cheap scopes, Siglent vs Rigol

[Rmadd]

So I'm currently an EE student and I'm looking to start a small electronics lab to learn more about everything and maybe do a few projects.  On the subject of O scopes, I want a relatively cheap one that doesn't completely suck so following Daves advice I was going to pull the trigger on a Rigol DS1054Z ($400 US).  Then I noticed Siglent makes the 1052DL for $240... I did a few searches and nobody on here really talks about it, even though the amazon reviews are very positive.  Baisically what I'm asking is has anyone had experience witht the Siglent and would you recommend it for a first time scope buyer, over the Rigol.

[JPortici]

1052DL for $240

yeah, there are reasons for that.

32k memory points for instance
No serial decode is another

1072CML+ is newer, with more memory, with more bandwidth for a sligtly higher price, but still no decode. if i had to buy a siglent i wouldn't get anything less than sds1000x series

anyway, siglent makes better hardware than rigol, as much better as it can be when you are racing to the lowest cost

[Rmadd]

1052DL for $240

yeah, there are reasons for that.

32k memory points for instance
No serial decode is another

1072CML+ is newer, with more memory, with more bandwidth for a sligtly higher price, but still no decode. if i had to buy a siglent i wouldn't get anything less than sds1000x series

anyway, siglent makes better hardware than rigol, as much better as it can be when you are racing to the lowest cost

Would I grow out of the 1052 too quickly for it to be worth it?

[JPortici]

in my opinion buying a new digital scope without serial decode options is a waste of money, especially if you don't have other tools

[alsetalokin4017]

1052DL for $240

yeah, there are reasons for that.

32k memory points for instance
No serial decode is another

1072CML+ is newer, with more memory, with more bandwidth for a sligtly higher price, but still no decode. if i had to buy a siglent i wouldn't get anything less than sds1000x series

anyway, siglent makes better hardware than rigol, as much better as it can be when you are racing to the lowest cost

Would I grow out of the 1052 too quickly for it to be worth it?

Yes... the first time you need 3 or 4 channels.   

[Rmadd]

in my opinion buying a new digital scope without serial decode options is a waste of money, especially if you don't have other tools

Would that be listed under the logic analyzer on the scopes description?

[nctnico]

in my opinion buying a new digital scope without serial decode options is a waste of money, especially if you don't have other tools

Would that be listed under the logic analyzer on the scopes description?

No, it is listed as protocol decoding which usually works for the analog channels. Decoding on digital channels isn't always supported. When it comes to the Rigol 1054Z: it is only worth buying if you are going to hack it. If not then there are much better deals out there.

[Rmadd]

in my opinion buying a new digital scope without serial decode options is a waste of money, especially if you don't have other tools

Would that be listed under the logic analyzer on the scopes description?

No, it is listed as protocol decoding which usually works for the analog channels. Decoding on digital channels isn't always supported. When it comes to the Rigol 1054Z: it is only worth buying if you are going to hack it. If not then there are much better deals out there.

If I'm using an o scope for mainly educational purposes with some small projects on the side, is decoding something that I should look for? I'm very new to Oscilloscopes so I'm not entirely sure what I should be looking for and what is actually a good deal.

[JPortici]

Rigol 1054z is fine for you, a good starter package. It has a bit of everything
Being an EE student i bet you have only used tektronix TDS2000 or simiar, it will be slightly better (same slow speed but capable of more stuff)

If you weren't on a strict budget i wouldn't recommend it thought. (I'd recomment a GWi 2104 but you are in another class of instrument.. and double the price)

[Rmadd]

Rigol 1054z is fine for you, a good starter package. It has a bit of everything
Being an EE student i bet you have only used tektronix TDS2000 or simiar, it will be slightly better (same slow speed but capable of more stuff)

If you weren't on a strict budget i wouldn't recommend it thought. (I'd recomment a GWi 2104 but you are in another class of instrument.. and double the price)

Yeah Id say I'm on a tight budget, as I need to get a lot of other stuff to have a good lab, I'm mainly going off of Daves video on how to set up a lab, although with a few exceptions. 

[nctnico]

If I'm using an o scope for mainly educational purposes with some small projects on the side, is decoding something that I should look for? I'm very new to Oscilloscopes so I'm not entirely sure what I should be looking for and what is actually a good deal.

If you are going to work on projects with a microcontroller (which I assume you will) then protocol decoding is essential because sooner or later you will encouter a chip which communicates through I2C or SPI. Communication using a UART is also very common so being able to decode that is handy as well.

[JPortici]

Cheap scopes are always a compromize between functions, speed, memory and of course analog performance.

What do you need?you know. Do you want to do digital stuff, communication like spi/i2c? You can decode on paper but that slows you down a lot.
You know that at some point you'll want to mess with stuff like CAN bus? Then you have to consider that.

Or, if you never have to look at >30Vsignals you can also consider a usb based scope, but nothing less than a picoscope. You'll lose all the physical controls but because you don't have to pay for those you can get a very powerful instrument for a fraction of the cost. It also support pretty much ANY commercial serial standard with no limitations in thresholds, baud rates and such. Guess what i keep on the pc area at work, or when i have to look inside car busses and such..

a 100-200€ picoscope where the next alternative would be a keysight or lecroy which starts at 3k€ plus the needed options.

[Rmadd]

Cheap scopes are always a compromize between functions, speed, memory and of course analog performance.

What do you need?you know. Do you want to do digital stuff, communication like spi/i2c? You can decode on paper but that slows you down a lot.
You know that at some point you'll want to mess with stuff like CAN bus? Then you have to consider that.

Or, if you never have to look at >30Vsignals you can also consider a usb based scope, but nothing less than a picoscope. You'll lose all the physical controls but because you don't have to pay for those you can get a very powerful instrument for a fraction of the cost. It also support pretty much ANY commercial serial standard with no limitations in thresholds, baud rates and such. Guess what i keep on the pc area at work, or when i have to look inside car busses and such

Im definitely going to be doing digital stuff with micro controllers, and Im also going to be helping with a digital communications project soon.  The Rigol 1054z has UART and I2C,  how likely would I be to encounter a need for other types?

[JPortici]

Spi is critical. But the 1054 has it too.

The next would probably be canbus, but i never really needed it until a couple of weeks ago and you won't until you mess with cars and shit (at uni stuff like formula SAE, but the mean seniors will keep all the fun parts for themselves)

[Fungus]

The Rigol 1054z has UART and I2C,  how likely would I be to encounter a need for other types?

It also has SPI.

Between those three protocols you pretty much have it covered.

You could buy the Siglent plus a cheap logic analyzer, but... the Rigol is a much better 'scope. In the long term you won't regret spending the extra money on a DS1054Z.

You'll almost certainly regret buying the Siglent (eg. the day you need more than 2 channels).

[rstofer]

Spi is critical. But the 1054 has it too.

The next would probably be canbus, but i never really needed it until a couple of weeks ago and you won't until you mess with cars and shit (at uni stuff like formula SAE, but the mean seniors will keep all the fun parts for themselves)

I might consider a logic analyzer if I were to encounter the CAN bus.  So far, I haven't.

I bought the DS1054Z specifically for the decoding.  On SPI it is terrific.  You need 4 channels for SPI so don't even bother looking at 2 channel scopes.  Yes, you can cobble your way around the requirement with a 2 channel scope and external trigger (trigger off CS') but you only see one side of the transaction (assuming you want to see the clock edges, and you do).

If you buy the DS1054Z you will absolutely want to unlock the options (bandwidth, memory depth and decoding).  The process is well understood.  Search the forum for DSER.

If you don't have $400, consider the Digilent Analog Discovery at $279.  It's only two channels on the scope (limited to 25V) but it has a bunch of other features like a dual signal generator and 16 bits of digital IO including a logic analyzer function.  Discussion elsewhere, search the forum.

Try this with a scope:

https://www.eevblog.com/forum/beginners/playing-with-the-analog-discovery/

[tautech]

You need 4 channels for SPI so don't even bother looking at 2 channel scopes.  Yes, you can cobble your way around the requirement with a 2 channel scope and external trigger (trigger off CS') but you only see one side of the transaction (assuming you want to see the clock edges, and you do).

Not entirely correct if you're just decoding.


The SDS1102X are under promotion, 100 MHz, true 500uV/ div range and decoding suite with CAN and all at double the waveform update rate of a 1054Z.
http://www.siglentamerica.com/pdxx.aspx?id=4688&T=2&tid=1

Thread:
https://www.eevblog.com/forum/testgear/siglent-sds1000x-series-oscilloscopes/

[JPortici]

I might consider a logic analyzer if I were to encounter the CAN bus.  So far, I haven't.

hmm..
maybe if you have to look at others' working hardware? but even in that case..
if i am working on a car i haven't encountered yet and i have to have an idea of what the messages on the bus on the obd port means there are dedicated tools that group data, plot diagrams and such. but if you don't have those yes, a with a logic analyze you could record a shitton of data and do the hard work by hand (being doing that at the moment)

if however i have to develop hardware (and i haven't had to do that yet, others with more experience in this field please correct me) looking at the analog signal is more important, eye diagrams and such.

[Fungus]

The SDS1102X are under promotion, 100 MHz, true 500uV/ div range and decoding suite with CAN and all at double the waveform update rate of a 1054Z.

http://www.siglentamerica.com/pdxx.aspx?id=4688&T=2&tid=1

Hah! They've put Dave's EEVBLOG review video on their product page!

I wonder if Siglent watched it all the way to the end?

(ie. To where Dave tells you whether to choose Rigol or Siglent...  )

[nctnico]

I wonder if Siglent watched it all the way to the end?

(ie. To where Dave tells you whether to choose Rigol or Siglent...  )

I don't think they watched or understood it because Dave says clearly he recommends a hacked 1054Z over the SDS1000X series 

I might consider a logic analyzer if I were to encounter the CAN bus.  So far, I haven't.

hmm..
maybe if you have to look at others' working hardware? but even in that case..
if i am working on a car i haven't encountered yet and i have to have an idea of what the messages on the bus on the obd port means there are dedicated tools that group data, plot diagrams and such. but if you don't have those yes, a with a logic analyze you could record a shitton of data and do the hard work by hand (being doing that at the moment)

if however i have to develop hardware (and i haven't had to do that yet, others with more experience in this field please correct me) looking at the analog signal is more important, eye diagrams and such.

A logic analyser is a very poor tool for protocol decoding because in many cases problems originate from the analog domain so using analog channels to hunt for a problem is mandatory. BTW: when it comes to looking at large amounts of CAN messages you are way better off using a CAN adapter (like the Lawicell CANUSB) and software (like CAN monitor pro from WG soft).

[rstofer]

I guess if I were working on the CAN bus it would be between 2 of MY controllers as I have no interest in automotive applications.  Given that scenario, I can come up with a lot of ways to troubleshoot the bus and that CANUSB is a pretty good one.  A logic analyzer might work and I might even be able to use a scope for short packets.  Lots of ways...

Just like we dealt with serial buses long before DSOs came along.  Somehow, despite our crude instruments, we got things built.

[Rmadd]

Thanks everyone for all the help! I think the Siglent is out of the picture now, I didn't realize how poor the memory was on it and I now understand the need for decoding. 

[tautech]

Thanks everyone for all the help! I think the Siglent is out of the picture now, I didn't realize how poor the memory was on it and I now understand the need for decoding.

Yep, a SDS1052DL is the bottom of the barrel these days however 20 years ago that amount of memory was considered sufficient.
A good graphic of why memory depth is important can be seen in this post by rf-loop:
https://www.eevblog.com/forum/testgear/siglent-sds1000x-series-oscilloscopes/msg933997/#msg933997

[Fungus]

I wonder if Siglent watched it all the way to the end?

(ie. To where Dave tells you whether to choose Rigol or Siglent...  )

I don't think they watched or understood it because Dave says clearly he recommends a hacked 1054Z over the SDS1000X series 

Yep, and on their own product page! You couldn't write comedy like this if you tried...   

[tautech]

I wonder if Siglent watched it all the way to the end?

(ie. To where Dave tells you whether to choose Rigol or Siglent...  )

I don't think they watched or understood it because Dave says clearly he recommends a hacked 1054Z over the SDS1000X series 

Yep, and on their own product page! You couldn't write comedy like this if you tried...   

So you like comedy ?
This is comedy:
https://www.eevblog.com/forum/projects/project-yaigol-fixing-rigol-scope-design-problems/