Final Questions Before I Get My First Oscilloscope

[Muxr]

How about the utterly useless FFT on the Rigol (4kpts)

where did you get that? 6 months ago? with the latest FW, my calculation indicated that ds1000z is using 16Ksample signal points translated into usable half side of FFT data ie 8K FFT points... my question though... do "other-than-rigol" scope provide SDK (PC connectivity and programmability) documentation? namely..
1) gwInstek?
2) Siglent?
3) the R&S 1200 etc
that talked much about in here?
if yes can someone provide the link so i can have a peek?
if no answer, i guess the answer is no...

Every time I tried using FFT on my DS2072A I was disappointed, no matter what I did I was not able to make any sense of the readings other than just the signal itself. The harmonics were often buried in the noise. Rigol does have a lot of community support for 3rd party utils for that stuff, that's true. However when it comes to the FFT feature in the scope itself it's really an afterthought. Same is true for serial decoding.

[Fungus]

The OP wants a modern scope in the $1200 range, which he will be happy with for the next 5 years and have some soft unlock room to grow. I think HMO1202 fills that requirement perfectly.

Sure... so long as he's happy with only two channels and some very expensive upgrades.

Oh, wait, he wanted a SigGen as well. The R&S signal generator isn't very good so that might put it out of his budget range.

[Fungus]

Every time I tried using FFT on my DS2072A I was disappointed, no matter what I did I was not able to make any sense of the readings other than just the signal itself. The harmonics were often buried in the noise. Rigol does have a lot of community support for 3rd party utils for that stuff, that's true. However when it comes to the FFT feature in the scope itself it's really an afterthought.

Let's find out if he wants FFT before basing the entire discussion on it, eh?

[Muxr]

The OP wants a modern scope in the $1200 range, which he will be happy with for the next 5 years and have some soft unlock room to grow. I think HMO1202 fills that requirement perfectly.

Sure... so long as he's happy with only two channels and some very expensive upgrades.

Oh, wait, he wanted a SigGen as well. The R&S signal generator isn't very good so that might put it out of his budget range.

He did not specifically say he wanted a sig gen, he asked if the option was worth it, I think you're reading too much into it. In either case I am not making a decision for him, I am giving him options. A good quality scope is within his budget, which seemed to be his main concern. So I offered the best quality scope in that range. Nothing more or less.

[Mechatrommer]

There is a programming manual for the GDS2204E I have; it can talk SCPI over LAN or USB. There is also a Labview driver:
http://www.gwinstek.com/en-global/products/Oscilloscopes/Digital_Storage_Oscilloscopes/GDS-2000E

yup i'm browsing now. i'm looking at how to dump all 10MSamples data of GDS2000E into a pc. i browsed all i seem not to find any, maybe its under another term... having said this... with Rigol DS1000Z series albeit its slow built in FFT. there is possibility to do off-processing of a 24MSamples FFT for really serious work, with other DSO this is impossible unless one manually patch several disparate datasets from different trigger events... ymmv..

[Muxr]

Every time I tried using FFT on my DS2072A I was disappointed, no matter what I did I was not able to make any sense of the readings other than just the signal itself. The harmonics were often buried in the noise. Rigol does have a lot of community support for 3rd party utils for that stuff, that's true. However when it comes to the FFT feature in the scope itself it's really an afterthought.

Let's find out if he wants FFT before basing the entire discussion on it, eh?

I am merely presenting options. I never said don't get the Rigol, if you read my first post I wrote that I own a DS2072A myself and I praised it for the bargain that it is. I am giving him information so that he can decide. Like for instance Rigol's FFT is useless.

[teamSMITHusa]

As far as i understood 1200USD is the whole budget to acquire scope (maybe with decoding functions) and and signal generator, so the amount for the DSO should be lower.

All my previous statements were based on that.

@ teamSMITHusa :

- could you more specific about what are you doing with your setup ?
- are the signal generator and the decoding functions a "must to have" staying within 1200USD ?

First off...
Each and every reply has been awesome. You are all great and the replies are hugely appreciated. I value each and every one. The debate back and forth helps more than you know.
What I want to do with my new setup? (I am actually upgrading most of my old equipment, this will be my first Digital Scope, but not my first scope (i had an old analog years ago)).
I do the basics, troubleshoot and engineer switching and basic power supplies, troubleshoot and engineer logic circuits and timing circuit, OPamps, custom ICs, design simple circuits (some micro-controller, legacy CPU, and ROM based) and PCBs, troubleshoot basic computer peripherals and computers (mostly legacy computers), etc. BUT, I also want to LEARN more! and advance my skills over the next 5 years, hence the 'not gonna buy another DSO in the next 5 years' in the OP (so that i'm better than Dave by then  lol!).
The $1200 USD budget is primarily for the scope (see original post). But after lots of research, I found that perhaps getting the Rigol DS2072A at $839 USD would allow me to get a few other items that I need to upgrade. I didn't see a HUGE advantage of spending it all on a scope and by doing so gaining a huge amount of features or quality. Sure some of the scopes debated here have some better quality if i spend the full $1200, but I can live with some quirks. I just refuse to buy junk, at any price. I'm good with an entry level scope, but I would say an 'enhanced' entry level scope (thus the DS2072A over the DS1000 series). Whoever said the MHz upgrade hack was a big selling point for intermediate users is right. My heart was set on a 100MHz flavor scope minimum, but a native 100MHz eeked above $1200 (and I refuse to go a penny over $1200 since my first budget for a new scope was $600). LOL! funny how I do that to myself. 
At this point im thinking of getting the Rigol DS2072A ($839) and the Rigol DM3058E Bench DMM ($469). That's about $1300 for both. My current Bench DMM is a $150 MasTech MS8040 (ProTek B4004), which was good to learn on and use in my early days and a beginner, but is basically poo poo for my now intermediate level of skill (and its aging).
So i will have to set another budget ( ) for a new function generator and frequency counter in a few months (my current old heaps of poo will get me by until then).
So yeah! upgrading my old stuff to new stuff for the next 5 year period.
Hope that helps answer that. More comments would be awesome!!! and thoughts on that Rigol DM3058E DMM? Hmmm???
Thanks again! You are all fantastic!

[Fungus]

I am giving him information so that he can decide. Like for instance Rigol's FFT is useless.

PS: Have you got the latest firmware? There's plenty of pics of Rigols doing reasonable FFTs in the discussion of the FFT video.

(Not as good as the R&S, but way better than in Dave's video...)

[Muxr]

I am giving him information so that he can decide. Like for instance Rigol's FFT is useless.

PS: Have you got the latest firmware? There's plenty of pics of Rigols doing reasonable FFTs in the discussion of the FFT video.

(Not as good as the R&S, but way better than in Dave's video...)

No because it introduced a new debilitating bug: https://www.eevblog.com/forum/testgear/new-firmware-(00-03-04-02-01)-bug-of-rigol-ds2000a-oscilloscope/msg830091/#msg830091

Skipping this version.

[Mechatrommer]

No because it introduced a new debilitating bug:

if built in FFT is so much important to you, how about installing the latest fw, and dont ever come close to steps that produce the bug? bug fixed

[Muxr]

No because it introduced a new debilitating bug:

if built in FFT is so much important to you, how about installing the latest fw, and dont ever come close to steps that produce the bug? bug fixed

It's not that important, besides I moved on to a scope with a decent FFT and good time domain. 

[markone]

At this point im thinking of getting the Rigol DS2072A ($839) and the Rigol DM3058E Bench DMM ($469). That's about $1300 for both.

I would have bet on that, on the other hand $839 for a 2 channels-2 GSa/s-300Mhz 8" screen scope it's a damn good price.

I your place i will start to study the hacking procedure right now 

[markone]

I am giving him information so that he can decide. Like for instance Rigol's FFT is useless.

PS: Have you got the latest firmware? There's plenty of pics of Rigols doing reasonable FFTs in the discussion of the FFT video.

(Not as good as the R&S, but way better than in Dave's video...)

Dunno if you tried to use this version in a serious way, i did and sadly i have to say that is buggy as hell.

If you play with time base, center freq. and Hz/div after a while the scope get mad, parameters range become utterly wrong and you have to recall the default from storage menu.

I tried to analyze an FM modulated 10 Mhz sine signal within +/- 200Khz, after lots of function crash i lost the patience.

If you want to work with low freq. span, in absence of knob speed management, you have to go back and forth between center freq and Hz/div controls to center your signal and then expand the scale, and then the sh*t happens.

Really, i had some expectations with the last FW version but after a while i dropped the ball, the code is unstable and the UI navigation is a nightmare.

If you watch the R&S HMO showed in Dave's video, it operates exactly like a real spectrum analyzer, with all the controls that behave as they should.

Regardless the number of FFT points, the Rigol's development team should take a look to that video and start to implement a working FFT function controlled in the very same way.

[nctnico]

If you watch the R&S HMO showed in Dave's video, it operates exactly like a real spectrum analyzer, with all the controls that behave as they should.

Just watched the FFT video again but if you want to change the timebase on the HMO you have to go out of FFT mode first, change it and then go back. How obfustigated is that? Since the timebase is likely to affect the samplerate (and thus FFT resolutions) that can become very cumbersome. Better have seperate controls for span and timebase so you can adjust everything independantly without needing to switch between modes!

[Muxr]

It is intuitive, to change the time domain settings you go to time domain mode. Once you are in frequency domain you get freq. domain controls, I don't see anything convoluted about that. It's one button away. And all the settings are remembered.

[nctnico]

It is intuitive, to change the time domain settings you go to time domain mode. Once you are in frequency domain you get freq. domain controls, I don't see anything convoluted about that.

Try to use FFT for a measurement. Since FFT, memory depth and samplerate (the latter controlled by the timebase setting) are closely intertwined you'll find you'll need to change the timebase as well to get a good FFT resolution/measurement.

[Muxr]

It is intuitive, to change the time domain settings you go to time domain mode. Once you are in frequency domain you get freq. domain controls, I don't see anything convoluted about that.

Try to use FFT for a measurement. Since FFT, memory depth and samplerate (the latter controlled by the timebase setting) are closely intertwined you'll find you'll need to change the timebase as well to get a good FFT resolution/measurement.

I have used it, it's really simple. You set the timebase and you go to FFT. If you didn't select enough of a sample, you just hit FFT again which takes you back to time domain and you fix your sample. It's one button. But most importantly your navigation controls are the same no matter which mode you are in, which is the important advantage.

[Fungus]

Listen up everybody:

The R&S has a better FFT than the Rigol!

All clear on that???

OK, can we move along now...?

[nctnico]

I disagree. Everything but Rigol and Siglent scopes seem to have usefull FFT. Or do we need to add Owon and Hantek to the useless FFT list?

[Muxr]

Listen up everybody:

The R&S has a better FFT than the Rigol!

All clear on that???

OK, can we move along now...?

You don't have to be so defensive about it, we're discussing differences between different scopes. And specifically not about Rigol in the last few posts.

[markone]

Here i am,

after some power recycle i finally owned the f*****g  beast managing to take some low (relatively to the context) span FFT shots on my beloved DS1074Z.

Here below in attachment the spectrum analysis of the very same signal used by Dave in its video about FFT on DSO's, 1Mhz carrier FM modulated (FM freq 5Khz, FM dev 500 Hz) apart from amplitude level that here is much lower, 10mVrms on 50ohm load, due to the fact that i use to verify waht i see on Rigol FFT screen with my cold war Atten 5005.

Not so bad, the problem is how to achieve the right settings operating the awful FFT scope UI without crashing the function.

[markone]

Not so bad, the problem is how to achieve the right settings operating the awful FFT scope UI without crashing the function.

Start a thread about this bug, and draw their attention by emailing them. Hopefully they can upload FW update very quickly.

I will do.

There is the potential to put a decent FFT function in this hardware, maybe better in higher models, but it requires to change a lot the UI control approach and to fix the stability bugs, i think with a reasonable effort and a likely return in term of customer satisfaction.

[nowlan]

I think the hmo-max is better value than the new model (both 100mhz), which has more memory and faster sampling i believe.
It has the software decoders, but not the logic pod.

There used to be an educational bundle which includes the pod+decoders. Worth a shot if your a student.
http://www.tequipment.net/Hameg/HMO-ED01/Options/

Once upon a time the hameg compacts came with the decoders include (but no pod).

Support is generally responsive too.

[Muxr]

This is the updated link (the current one) it works with any HMO scope: http://www.tequipment.net/Rohde-&-Schwarz/HMO-ED01/Options/

[zapta]

I don't really see the HMO1202 UI advantages;

One ergonomic advantage is that the Rigols, or at least the DS1054Z's,  are noisy, as in fan.  I returned mine and ordered an R&S. According to Dave you can barely hear them. Still waiting for mine so can't confirm it yet.

OP, Tequipment has a chat button on their website and they are very responsive, in case you have questions.