First oscilloscope for third-year EE student

[Fungus]

Yes, but if I go to checkout it calculates about €60 in shipping and handling fees and the ToS say I am responsible for paying the VAT (21%) myself :-/ . You don't think the €480 offer for the Instek in Germany is acceptable?

I just remember them being a lot cheaper a few months ago. Now they're hard to find and it looks like the price went up.   

[nctnico]

As RedFantom is unfamiliar with this forum it's probably good to note that member nctnico is a bit of a GW-Instek fan.

That is incorrect. GW Instek is a manufacturer which is often overlooked but they have some very decent gear and especially their low end oscilloscopes have several unique features you won't find in that price range. I'm just the voice of the underdog here.

[RedFantom]

...

I will make sure to adjust my expectations for the FFT performance. As it is mostly analog circuitry I want to tinker with, I thought the FFT would be really important to see the purity of my signals.
The course that related the dynamic range to the amount of bits of an ADC was only after I had tried the DS1054Z, so I had hoped for something more accurate even though it was unrealistic.

The Keysight with the wavegen would cost me about €250 more than the one without it, and that is still the 2 analog channel only variant (the EDUX1002G). That seems quite steep for the addition... Still, you consider the Keysight a contender here? Because everyone else seems quite convinced that the Siglent and the GW-Instek are the better options, considering I don't really feel comfortable hacking it while it's still in warranty.

I own many oscilloscopes including the Rigol DS1054Z which is full upgraded.  For $330, it is VERY difficult to beat that kind of functionality. It's probably capable of doing 99% of whatever you need right now, it's 4 channels, and it works.  If you're really struggling to afford a fancy scope, save your money and deal with the shortcomings of the DS1054Z.

It is capable of doing most of what I want, but the price difference between the other scopes in the list and the Rigol is not big enough to justify going for the Rigol if I know I am not fully satisfied with it... I bid less than €250 on a DS1054Z on Marktplaats (Dutch eBay), but it was snapped up within minutes . For that kind of money, it would be a no-brainer and I'd live with the limitations. I could even get an AD2 and still have money left over. Unfortunately, that was the only real digital oscilloscope that seems worth getting I've seen on there in the months I've been watching it.

...

The marker functionality is new since the big PDF review that I somehow missed until yesterday. That review contained lots of detail on the FFT function, and it is looking much, much better than the one on the Rigol. The fact that they keep updating the software is pretty awesome.

I was very surprised to see 60dB dynamic range on the Keysight at uni because that one also has just an 8-bit ADC. I wonder what trick they pulled there.

There is no trick, just very common misunderstandings of what Fourier transforms do to the signal:
https://www.analog.com/media/en/training-seminars/tutorials/MT-001.pdf

I wish they had given us this reader during the course during which they gave us the formula. This is great!

I just remember them being a lot cheaper a few months ago. Now they're hard to find and it looks like the price went up.   :-/

That is annoying. I bought the Rigol then because it was the cheapest I could find that fit my criteria (or so I thought, anyway).


Right now I'm leaning heavily towards the Siglent, because on that one the serial decoding is included and on the GW Instek the hacking of it seems a bit involved. Considering that the Siglent is only €30 more, it seems like the more reliable choice.

A big thanks to everyone who gave their opinion already! I'm planning to order after upcoming Friday (then I have the exam I should be studying for right now), so in the meantime, if anyone has anything to add, please let me know!

[rsjsouza]

As RedFantom is unfamiliar with this forum it's probably good to note that member nctnico is a bit of a GW-Instek fan.

That is incorrect. GW Instek is a manufacturer which is often overlooked but they have some very decent gear and especially their low end oscilloscopes have several unique features you won't find in that price range. I'm just the voice of the underdog here.

Ok, anti-Siglent advocate then?

Admit it, with a sentence like that you are sounding exactly like Wuerstchenhund and his reason to advocate for LeCroy so fiercely over the years.

IMO there's nothing wrong with that, given it brings different angles to the discussion. But it gives the OP an idea on where the tip scales (the reason for Mr Scram's post).

[Fungus]

If it comes down to a choice between that and the Siglent for the same money? Most specs are about the same so it's going to be a personal choice. The Siglent has a higher sample rate but the Instek has a much nicer user interface (separate channel controls, a proper button for menu selections instead of pushing a twisty knob... etc).

You rejected the Rigol DS1054Z because of its user interface so what's your true priority? 

[tautech]

If it comes down to a choice between that and the Siglent for the same money? Most specs are about the same......

have you been drinking ! 

50 MHz BW = 100 MHz BW ? 

[Fungus]

If it comes down to a choice between that and the Siglent for the same money? Most specs are about the same......

have you been drinking ! 

50 MHz BW = 100 MHz BW ? 

300Mhz after hack = 200Mhz after hack. 

[2N3055]

AD2 is whole mini lab in a box. very useful.
Siglent has 2x1 GS/s A/D converters. Big difference. And they keep on upgrading software.
There are also Micsig tablet scopes. Portable, decent performance.

Decide what you need NOW and get that, saving as much money as you can. Or get something else you might need, like multimeter, probes etc etc

During years you will acquire more than one scope. Also, "I want to buy something really good and keep it for years " mentality is dead. Get over it.
Rigol MSO5000 scope would be deemed impossible just 2 years ago.
Buying something "good to last you 10 years" means you will pay more for something that will be outdated in 5 years..

Also predicting future is not very reliable. Newer buy anything you "might need". It's a quick road to bankruptcy and insanity..

[edigi]

All cheap Chinese/Taiwanese 100MHz/1Gsps scopes are based on HMCAD1511 ADC, which has an ideal SNR rating of 49.8dB. In a real circuit (especially with cost-saving AFE and PLL), you get ~40dB of that.

FFS, that ADC is DESIGNED for cheap scopes.

So getting 35dB spur on FFT actually makes perfect sense.

Luckily this is not true.
Doubling the FFT points decreases the noise floor by 3dB. For details check this:
http://literature.cdn.keysight.com/litweb/pdf/5988-4368EN.pdf

About the FFT: I was very surprised to see 60dB dynamic range on the Keysight at uni because that one also has just an 8-bit ADC. I wonder what trick they pulled there.

See also the above.

Thus an entry level scope with 1M point FFT can have better than 100dB dynamic range in the FFT output (naturally time domain is restricted by ADC, so this is true only for the FFT output). Roughly 60dB comes from the use of FFT.
If averaging is possible this can be even further improved.

Naturally it's better not to overrate any single capability of a scope (be it FFT or Bode plot or whatever; e.g. I've used Bode plot in school only, decades ago).
Choose what best suit for your needs. If you don't know, probably you don't need the capability that you've missed and in the worst case you have to swap. Nowadays even the entry level scopes are very capable.
Checking signals in frequency domain DSA can be a better tool (out of your current budget and scope is indeed the first most important tool).
Most scopes that have very capable FFT have terrible UI that is a pain to use (missing start/stop or center/span type control, number of FFT points controlled by time base and so on).

[RedFantom]

You rejected the Rigol DS1054Z because of its user interface so what's your true priority? 

If I pay extra for a user interface that I actually enjoy using and responsiveness, that's worth it to me. I understand that the budget scopes are not as capable as the expensive ones, but not separating your UI updating from your data fetching in the software like the Rigol seems to have? No, that's a deal-breaker.
The joined channel controls are not something I think will bother me. The Keysights also don't have the buttons on the right of the screen, so I'm already used to not having those . It feels like choosing the GW Instek and the Siglent will involve some arbitrary factors. I like the look of the Siglent better...

Even if you regret buying it, since you can buy it at academic price, you can easily recover at least 100% your cost by selling it here.

I've never seen the AD2 second-hand on the local market, so I'm not sure it would even sell. The NI myDAQ is going for about €80, but that is because one of the Universities in The Netherlands requires it.
The impedance analyzer is another very interesting feature, even if it requires another add-on board. Still: Right now, I have the money and all of it is 'allocated' for buying an oscilloscope. Everything I don't spend will move to my savings account instead (not that saving isn't smart... But I have the money).

...

That is interesting and incredibly good to know at the same time! I will certainly go over this reader as well when I have the time. The FFT UI of the Siglent, at least, is looking just fine to me. At least, when comparing it to the ones in the University lab. The one thing the Keysights indeed miss is selecting how many points are used manually, and it doesn't even show it :-/ .

There are also Micsig tablet scopes. Portable, decent performance.

The Keysight DSOX3014T at the University also has a touchscreen. I've tried it, but I preferred the physical knobs and buttons. I could adjust them more easily while keeping one hand free to hold something in the circuit or hold a screwdriver.

Nothing is future-proof: I get that. That's not what I'm looking for. I'm not looking for a scope that won't make me drool over the models that will be released next year, and the year after that. There's already plenty to drool over in the €1000+ range, let alone the actual DSOX3014T. All I am looking for is a scope that will facilitate the projects that I have in mind now and then after through my master's degree.


The real question here is: Will the AD2 be able to crunch the projects I have in mind right now and the ideas that I have for future ones? The ones that I currently want to do are definitely possible with the AD2. Some of the ideas I have, though, maybe not... I'll think on it.

[nctnico]

The Keysights also don't have the buttons on the right of the screen, so I'm already used to not having those .

That is another positive aspect of the GW Instek: it really is easier to use because of having both vertical and horizontal buttons. I used to own an older Agilent oscilloscope on that doing trivial stuff like setting up decoding was much harder because you need to go through so many menu levels.

[Fungus]

I've never seen the AD2 second-hand on the local market

Of course not, nobody wants to part with theirs.

[rsjsouza]

You rejected the Rigol DS1054Z because of its user interface so what's your true priority? 

If I pay extra for a user interface that I actually enjoy using and responsiveness, that's worth it to me. I understand that the budget scopes are not as capable as the expensive ones, but not separating your UI updating from your data fetching in the software like the Rigol seems to have? No, that's a deal-breaker.
The joined channel controls are not something I think will bother me. The Keysights also don't have the buttons on the right of the screen, so I'm already used to not having those . It feels like choosing the GW Instek and the Siglent will involve some arbitrary factors. I like the look of the Siglent better...

I suspect you may be disappointed by any budget offer. Despite the more modern variants are more responsive than the previous Rigol generations, they are not comparable with the Keysight DSOX3k, especially if your screen is busy with measurements, multiple channels, decoding, etc.

In this case, I would perhaps try to find a local rep or a demo unit to play before you buy. I suspect this will be hard to do, but at least you may get a feel before investing money on the product. If you can't do that, carefully watch the many reviews on the web and try to make a judgment call.

[Gandalf_Sr]

Mr. Scram - I did read the whole thread (at the time is was < 1 page).  I know RedFantom had a DS1054Z and rejected it but then a lot of the discussion addressed his feeling that the FFT was poor.

2N3055 - I'm with you, buying gear that has some feature you think you may need in the future is usually a waste of money.

RedFantom - I paid $285 US for my DS1054Z from Tequipment.net (after eevblog discount) with free shipping - it was an open-box item that they have from time to time, they said it was a "DS1054Z-B"

[EEVblog]

Just buy the cheapest scope you can get. Anything will show you a waveform and open your world into electronics.
Spend the rest on other stuff you need.

[EEVblog]

You won't touch the 1054Z, but you'll consider the 2000 series Rigol? 

For a student the Analog Discovery is a decent option. It's not a "real" scope in that it doesn't have a decent vertical front end, standalone operation, higher bandwidth, or fast updating or segmented memory etc, but it does a lot of stuff useful for education.
You seem to be pretty demanding here for your first scope, to the point where you don't really have an option that suits all your stated needs?

[EEVblog]

You rejected the Rigol DS1054Z because of its user interface so what's your true priority? 

If I pay extra for a user interface that I actually enjoy using and responsiveness, that's worth it to me. I understand that the budget scopes are not as capable as the expensive ones, but not separating your UI updating from your data fetching in the software like the Rigol seems to have? No, that's a deal-breaker.

In your first budget scope there should be no real "deal breaker" in the regards to UI and usability. You will get used to any scope and it'll do the job.

The real question here is: Will the AD2 be able to crunch the projects I have in mind right now and the ideas that I have for future ones? The ones that I currently want to do are definitely possible with the AD2. Some of the ideas I have, though, maybe not... I'll think on it.

The AD2 is basically an educational tool, it has some nice DSA features no scope can match, and it's 14 bit converter can be very useful. But apart from that it makes a horrible everyday use scope.
If you are annoyed by the 1054Z and various UI quirks, then the limitations of the AD2 will annoy you more.

[RedFantom]

I suspect you may be disappointed by any budget offer. Despite the more modern variants are more responsive than the previous Rigol generations, they are not comparable with the Keysight DSOX3k, especially if your screen is busy with measurements, multiple channels, decoding, etc.

In this case, I would perhaps try to find a local rep or a demo unit to play before you buy. I suspect this will be hard to do, but at least you may get a feel before investing money on the product. If you can't do that, carefully watch the many reviews on the web and try to make a judgment call.

If there are any such stores in The Netherlands, I haven't found them on Google. Because if that were an option, I'd definitely try that. As for the budget offers: Both the GW Instek and the Siglent look a lot snappier when compared to the Rigol side-by-side. That also makes sense considering the hardware inside. Even if the Siglent is not as fast as the scopes at University, all it has to do is for the basic things to not be annoying.

Mr. Scram - I did read the whole thread (at the time is was < 1 page).  I know RedFantom had a DS1054Z and rejected it but then a lot of the discussion addressed his feeling that the FFT was poor.

2N3055 - I'm with you, buying gear that has some feature you think you may need in the future is usually a waste of money.

RedFantom - I paid $285 US for my DS1054Z from Tequipment.net (after eevblog discount) with free shipping - it was an open-box item that they have from time to time, they said it was a "DS1054Z-B"

For €285, I'd definitely consider it. Unfortunately, after shipping, handling fees and VAT for getting it into The Netherlands, I'd still be looking at €377 (Eleshop has it for €379 delivered) .

Just buy the cheapest scope you can get. Anything will show you a waveform and open your world into electronics.
Spend the rest on other stuff you need.

Mr. EEVblog, thank you for replying. I had not expected that. Consider me humbled.

There are no real proper videos of the Rigol 2000 series, so I have no idea how responsive it is. From your comment, I am deducing that I should avoid it like the plague. I will.
When I got the DS1054Z, I considered whether I could get used to its slowness (not so much its quirks, those I could live with), but I don't think I can. If it cost €250, then maybe. But a device costing €379 should at least not annoy me, no matter how cheap it is when compared to more expensive oscilloscopes. It's too much money for that, at least to me. If it is just fast enough not to be annoying, that is enough.

The AD2 is basically an educational tool, it has some nice DSA features no scope can match, and it's 14 bit converter can be very useful. But apart from that it makes a horrible everyday use scope.
If you are annoyed by the 1054Z and various UI quirks, then the limitations of the AD2 will annoy you more.

Yes, that is what I am afraid of. For the money, it looks like really a very useful device. However, I'm concerned that already for one of the projects I have in mind (building a PRUDAQ board and then building a simple front-end for it with switches as the controls) it will already be at its limits. Then either the GW Instek or the Siglent looks like the better investment than the AD2.

[OwO]

Thus an entry level scope with 1M point FFT can have better than 100dB dynamic range in the FFT output (naturally time domain is restricted by ADC, so this is true only for the FFT output). Roughly 60dB comes from the use of FFT.
If averaging is possible this can be even further improved.

Which scope are you looking at that has 1M point FFT? I did some searching around and even the keysight DSOX3000T series only has up to 64k points...

It definitely is possible, as I have just successfully demonstrated a 1M 32bit hardware FFT on a Zynq 7010. The bottleneck is DRAM bandwidth and in my case I can get up to 70 FFTs per second. I think up to 16M points should be easily doable on a Zynq 7010 which most of these scopes use.

[rsjsouza]

Which scope are you looking at that has 1M point FFT? I did some searching around and even the keysight DSOX3000T series only has up to 64k points...

Both the Siglent and the Instek discussed here claim 1Mpoint FFT.

[nctnico]

Just buy the cheapest scope you can get. Anything will show you a waveform and open your world into electronics.
Spend the rest on other stuff you need.

Mr. EEVblog, thank you for replying. I had not expected that. Consider me humbled.

There are no real proper videos of the Rigol 2000 series, so I have no idea how responsive it is. From your comment, I am deducing that I should avoid it like the plague. I will.
When I got the DS1054Z, I considered whether I could get used to its slowness (not so much its quirks, those I could live with), but I don't think I can. If it cost €250, then maybe. But a device costing €379 should at least not annoy me, no matter how cheap it is when compared to more expensive oscilloscopes. It's too much money for that, at least to me. If it is just fast enough not to be annoying, that is enough.

I very much disagree with Dave here. It is better to buy the best tool you can afford because it will offer a much better experience and ease of use. Sure you can 'make do' with lesser tools too but at some point that just holds you back from getting actual work done. In the end you want to complete a project and enjoy the path to completion as much as you can.

[exe]

The AD2 is basically an educational tool, it has some nice DSA features no scope can match, and it's 14 bit converter can be very useful. But apart from that it makes a horrible everyday use scope.
If you are annoyed by the 1054Z and various UI quirks, then the limitations of the AD2 will annoy you more.

I'd say it depends. I have a small bench (actually, just a workplace). I most of the time use AD2 and only when it's not enough I use better gear.

I'd say it's worth at least loan it and give it a try. To me it's not a substitute for bigger gear, but a useful daily driver .

One may say "I don't have money, my budget is limited, etc". I say forget about price, and just buy what will make you more productive. It may seem that +-1000euros is big money, but I say it's not. Time is more expensive. Also better tools improve experience and keep motivation doing stuff. It's also usually a one-time investment. But even if you need to upgrade your lab in the future it only means you are getting to the next level and it's just fine to buy some new equipment to achieve bigger goals.

[OwO]

I very much disagree with Dave here. It is better to buy the best tool you can afford because it will offer a much better experience and ease of use. Sure you can 'make do' with lesser tools too but at some point that just holds you back from getting actual work done. In the end you want to complete a project and enjoy the path to completion.

That may be true in a workplace but not necessarily correct when your objective is learning.

I develop test equipment for a living but have no test equipment in my lab other than a multimeter and some SDR receivers. I have no problems troubleshooting any boards, even very complex designs with FPGAs. I still see people with $10k worth of equipment that fail to do anything better. Troubleshooting is an art, and when you are spoiled by high end test equipment you will simply not know what to do when faced with a problem that no existing equipment is designed to test for. How do you differentially probe a 3GHz signal? A 5GHz oscilloscope with ex🅱ensive differential probes is not the answer

[nctnico]

I very much disagree with Dave here. It is better to buy the best tool you can afford because it will offer a much better experience and ease of use. Sure you can 'make do' with lesser tools too but at some point that just holds you back from getting actual work done. In the end you want to complete a project and enjoy the path to completion.

That may be true in a workplace but not necessarily correct when your objective is learning.

I develop test equipment for a living but have no test equipment in my lab other than a multimeter and some SDR receivers. I have no problems troubleshooting any boards, even very complex designs with FPGAs. I still see people with $10k worth of equipment that fail to do anything better. Troubleshooting is an art,

I never said good tools are a replacement for a brain.

Also when the objective is learning there is a real benefit of having good & trustworthy tools. Ofcourse there are always people who want to learn how to ty their shoe laces with one hand behind their back but IMHO that shouldn't be the standard.

[Gandalf_Sr]

I run a 1-man electronic design business and I'm close to retiring.  I own the following scopes:

Rigol MSO2072A, has all options
Keysight MSO7104B
Keysight MSOX4054A, I bought it calibrated with full DSOX4APPBNDL bundle installed
Rigol DS1054Z, came with all options except 300 MHz which I applied

The 2 Keysights are big and beautiful and cost me around $7,000 US each, used from Keysight eBay; they are both great scopes but it's once every blue moon that I actually need a scope that can do more than the DS1054Z.

I actually bought a Siglent SDS1202X-E when it first came out but mine had the compensation issue and, after a fight with Siglent who claimed it wasn't a bug, I (eventually) returned it for a full refund. That was the point at which I decided to buy the DS1054Z and, perhaps like you, I had this feeling that I was buying a junk low-end scope but I couldn't resist the $285 price and, boy was I wrong.  Like I've said before, it does 99% of what I need and it would probably do 99.999999% of what you need.

JFBI.

PS. Anyone who wants to buy any of my scopes is welcome to make me an offer