Flood of new Agilent 82357B GPIB-USB adaptors on eBay the real deal?

[wkb]

I sure hope China start 'producing' their own MBAs that push our homegrown MBAs out of a job. Might be enlightening for those buggers to go and collect food stamps.

Blergh

[Noise Floor]

Not helped by the absurd margins Agilent & NI expect on their gear. If it was manufactured in the USA then fair enough, but the corporate scum want to sack all their western staff, pay peanuts to china, then sell it back to us for even more than they used to charge because Danaher, buying out competition, monopolisation, etc...

What the MBA dickwads don't understand is when you give your crown jewels to any Tom, Dick or Harry in China, India, etc... don't expect to hold on to them for long. 

Is the official adapter made in China?  I don't own one.  All my Agilent gear was made in Malaysia. I'm looking at a used E3600 but will require an adapter to control it; wondering which to get.

[Macbeth]

Not helped by the absurd margins Agilent & NI expect on their gear. If it was manufactured in the USA then fair enough, but the corporate scum want to sack all their western staff, pay peanuts to china, then sell it back to us for even more than they used to charge because Danaher, buying out competition, monopolisation, etc...

What the MBA dickwads don't understand is when you give your crown jewels to any Tom, Dick or Harry in China, India, etc... don't expect to hold on to them for long. 

Is the official adapter made in China?  I don't own one.  All my Agilent gear was made in Malaysia. I'm looking at a used E3600 but will require an adapter to control it; wondering which to get.

By all accounts go for the $85, $51 compatible one. It works with the official drivers, has proper buffers (unlike Prologix), and looks better built than the fakes too.

I would have one and I don't have any need for it. But the seller is an idiot if you are English.

[plesa]

I'm curious how long it will take them to clone Prologix GPIB adapter.
http://sigrok.org/wiki/File:Prologix-usb.jpg

Why would anyone want to do that? It doesn't use proper GPIB bus transceivers, and it doesn't have VISA or GPIB32.dll support... it is (was) a toy for hobbyists. The 82357B clones and compatibles are affordable and available, and are so much more useful that there would be no point. Even hobbyists should opt for the 82357-alikes.

Prologix clone? Who knows...
http://www.ebay.com/itm/PROLOGIX-GPIB-USB-CONTROLLER-/252054027293?hash=item3aaf973c1d
Same seller.

[MarkL]

Similar to SkyMaster in post #121, I also purchased a (purported) Agilent 82357B from nettcy168 on eBay for $115:

  http://www.ebay.com/itm/261397671097

At first I suspected a possible driver problem, but I eventually discovered that it wouldn't even _start_ enumerating on USB most of the time.  And when it did decide to run, it would crash within an hour or two of use and need to have the firmware reloaded.

I returned mine for a refund on a "defective" basis, and received a refund for it and the shipping.  nettcy168 initially wanted to send me a replacement to preserve the sale.  No thanks.

I returned it to a US address in Delaware, which was odd since it was shipped from Hong Kong.

Also, like SkyMaster, according to Keysight's web page the serial number on the unit and box showed a manufacture date of Nov 28 2009, but the box had a printed date of Oct 16, 2014.

What a waste of time.  Beware.

[plazma]

Received my 51$ unit today. DHL delivered it to my work address. I opened it and soldering quality is just fine. Will test functionality tomorrow. I'll replace a qenuine one with the clone and see if it work.

[plesa]

Today received the http://www.ebay.com/itm/82357B-GPIB-USB-Interface-Compatible-with-AGILENT-82357B-new-version-/251692772284?hash=item3a9a0eebbc

first several connection - not possible to obtain identificators. After about 10 connecting and disconnecting cycles start working.
I will run some overnigh test, but it looks like that something is wrong with this modules.

[dadler]

Are you sure the USB connector is seated fully? I had similar trouble until I realized the USB connector wasn't making good contact and had to really force it in. Then it worked for a couple of hours without issue (the extent of my testing).

[MarkL]

Are you sure the USB connector is seated fully? I had similar trouble until I realized the USB connector wasn't making good contact and had to really force it in. Then it worked for a couple of hours without issue (the extent of my testing).

I suspected a mechanical problem too and did some wiggling and bending of the connectors on both sides, but I couldn't find any correlation.  However, I agree that it still doesn't rule out a mechanical issue.

When plugged into a single piece of test equipment, there was a 0% success rate of it coming up, regardless of whether the test equipment was powered on or not.  Completely unplugged on the GPIB side, it took 2 to 3 tries of unplugging and plugging the USB to get through enumeration.

But it's returned now, so it doesn't matter.  I'm just documenting it for anyone else.

In my haste to jump on what I thought was a great deal, I didn't notice it was from China.  I would not have ordered it.  For the hours I spent trying to get this thing to work and going through the non-standard return process with nettcy168, I could have spent $550 for a new one from Keysight.

[Bud]

@KE5FX

Sorry to steer off topic but since you are here- are you the author of 7470 ? If so can you tell if the GPIB adapter from the other thread work with your software ? (may be you could throw a line there)

https://www.eevblog.com/forum/testgear/flood-of-new-agilent-82357b-gpib-usb-adaptors-on-ebay-the-real-deal/

Yes, that's me, and I actually just bought 3 of those for a $100/each best offer.  Assuming they are the real deal, they should work OK with most of the toolkit apps after you enable NI488.2 compatibility in the Agilent config utility.

I'm going to try to support them natively to dispense with that step.

The quote is from a different thread but is on topic.
Happy to report this thingy works with KE5FX's plotter emulator 7470 program:

http://www.ke5fx.com/gpib/7470.htm

[Bud]

When plugged into a single piece of test equipment, there was a 0% success rate of it coming up, regardless of whether the test equipment was powered on or not.  Completely unplugged on the GPIB side, it took 2 to 3 tries of unplugging and plugging the USB to get through enumeration.

Since this adapter is powered from USB, could its firmware possibly was not properly negotiating the power with the computer, or consuming over 500mA so the computer could not do it.

[Electro Fan]

As promised, here are pictures of the Clone unit I purchased for $51 shipped @ http://www.ebay.com/itm/82357B-GPIB-USB-Interface-Compatible-AGILENT-82357B-new-version-/251692772284

I actually think this one is higher quality than the faux-"Agilent" version that I paid ~$130 for. The circuitry is clearly different, though. Seems to work fine in BenchVue. For the price, I think this is a pretty good deal. I've only played with it for about 30 minutes, but seems ok so far.

I really am surprised that they can blatantly sell products with the "Agilent" name plastered all over them, and not get hassled by Agilent/Keysight?



A few more pictures: https://www.dropbox.com/sh/kse4k3pw103qaq9/AACxiQPkh3lCRIQAjZYc2R6Ha?dl=0

Dadler, your last photo shows the interface connected to your test equipment with a cable but presumably the interface could plug directly into the test equipment without the cable?   And it should work with GPIB and "HPIB"?  Thanks, EF

[Bud]

Happy to report this thingy works with KE5FX's plotter emulator 7470 program:

http://www.ke5fx.com/gpib/7470.htm

Replaced (I hope) my oldy trusty Do It Yourself workhorse thingy. Men, cant believe I made it.

[SkyMaster]

Replaced (I hope) my oldy trusty Do It Yourself workhorse thingy. Men, cant believe I made it.

Yeah, but your "Do It Yourself workhorse thingy" is genuine 

While the counterfeit "Agilent 82357B GPIB-USB adaptor" from eBay is... counterfeit 

[HighVoltage]

I just opened one of my Agilent 82357B to see if it is real of fake.
Based on what I have seen in some pictures in this thread, the soldering in my item looks real genuine.
What do you think?

[HighVoltage]

Well, I just opened a REAL genuine Agilent 82357B

What a difference !
The one shown in pictures of my previous post are from a FAKE one!
It is a difference between night and day between the fake and the real one.
But it is only really noticeable, if you have one for comparison.
Unreal !
 
Anyone in the market to buy my fake one?
It works great!

[TheAmmoniacal]

Well, I just opened a REAL genuine Agilent 82357B

What a difference !
The one shown in pictures of my previous post are from a FAKE one!
It is a difference between night and day between the fake and the real one.
But it is only really noticeable, if you have one for comparison.
Unreal !
 
Anyone in the market to buy my fake one?
It works great!

Could you post similar shots of the genuine one? (to compare)

[dadler]

As promised, here are pictures of the Clone unit I purchased for $51 shipped @ http://www.ebay.com/itm/82357B-GPIB-USB-Interface-Compatible-AGILENT-82357B-new-version-/251692772284

I actually think this one is higher quality than the faux-"Agilent" version that I paid ~$130 for. The circuitry is clearly different, though. Seems to work fine in BenchVue. For the price, I think this is a pretty good deal. I've only played with it for about 30 minutes, but seems ok so far.

I really am surprised that they can blatantly sell products with the "Agilent" name plastered all over them, and not get hassled by Agilent/Keysight?



A few more pictures: https://www.dropbox.com/sh/kse4k3pw103qaq9/AACxiQPkh3lCRIQAjZYc2R6Ha?dl=0

Dadler, your last photo shows the interface connected to your test equipment with a cable but presumably the interface could plug directly into the test equipment without the cable?   And it should work with GPIB and "HPIB"?  Thanks, EF

It can plug directly into the unit, I just don't have much clearance behind the PSU.

And GPIB/HPIB are equivalent. HPIB is the old name when it was Hewlett-Packard exclusive, rename GPIB "general purpose" vs "HP".

[Bud]

Yeah, but your "Do It Yourself workhorse thingy" is genuine 
While the counterfeit "Agilent 82357B GPIB-USB adaptor" from eBay is... counterfeit 

Sure it is, but it only was good for use with one instrument at a time (did not have proper bus buffers) and the firmware had  to be updated for every new instrument. It also was prone to unexplained hang ups during transfer of big chunks of data (i.e. VNA S-parameter files). GPIB signaling is convoluted, I gave up at trying to debug, though it also may had been the Microchip Serial USB framework which was giving the headache.

[HighVoltage]

Could you post similar shots of the genuine one? (to compare)

Sure, here you go....

Let's start with the housing.
Real: copper colored metal coating inside the shell housing (Conductive < 1 Ohm from end to end)
Fake: No metallic coating inside

USB connector
Real: metal shielding around the USB connector on the PCB
Fake: No shielding at all

 
Notice that the light pipe in the fake one is loose in the housing and the real one holds the light pipes really good in position

[HighVoltage]

And here are a few pictures of the Real PCB
(Sorry, no more pictures of the fake one, it was sold because of this thread)

[HighVoltage]

For completeness, I have opened up my National Instrument GPIB-USB-HS and took some pictures.
What also sticks out right away, is the fact that the housing is also coated with some metal and at the end where the GPIB connector is located, there is even some metal mesh for further RF shielding.

[HighVoltage]

And for even more completeness, I have opened up my old trusted "A" version of the Agilent 82357A (Not 82357B).
This "A" version is limited to USB 1.1 speed.

And - of course - no surprise here,
1. coated plastic housing,
2. shielded USB connector,
3. extremely high quality soldering on all IC's
4. Light pipe fixed in holder
5. sharply printed silkscreen
In short: Really good Agilent quality, as expected.

Here are some pictures of the 

[HighVoltage]

Ok, here is my last set of pictures.
There are the molded writings on the outside and the Agilent "spark" (Logo) in the middle.
Sorry, I do not have made comparison pictures of the fake one.
But it was clearly visible, that the depth of these letters and logo patterns were about half as deep on the fake one.

These following pictures are made of the REAL 82357B

[BloodyCactus]

thanks for those pics, I need to find a genuine  GPIB-USB-HS off ebay... pricing on those on ebay is fairly set, but paying 200+ without being able to know if its a knockoff ugh