Keysight DSO4024 vs Tektronix MDO3 - 200 MHz bandwidth vs Teledyne lecroy 3024Z

[KE5FX]

IMHO Windows has no business being on an oscilloscope.

The older TDS series work great, I have very few complaints. Why they started using Windows is beyond me. A scope shouldn't need to boot a fullblown operating system off a hard drive.

That's like arguing that a cell phone doesn't need a full-fledged operating system.  The market has spoken, the horse has left the barn, and the ship has sailed. 

Like a phone, an oscilloscope is just another device for gathering data, processing it, and communicating with other devices.  It needs an OS, and Windows is OK, I guess.

[2N3055]

IMHO Windows has no business being on an oscilloscope.

The older TDS series work great, I have very few complaints. Why they started using Windows is beyond me. A scope shouldn't need to boot a fullblown operating system off a hard drive.

That's like arguing that a cell phone doesn't need a full-fledged operating system.  The market has spoken, the horse has left the barn, and the ship has sailed. 

Like a phone, an oscilloscope is just another device for gathering data, processing it, and communicating with other devices.  It needs an OS, and Windows is OK, I guess.

This is 100% correct.
Also, all those scopes has extremely complicated signal analysis software. At one point, it get really complicated writing that  if you don't have full blown developer tools, high performance libraries and platform on which you don't have to write every single thing from the scratch. 
And contrary to all the haters, windows is the only one with very high performance graphics with plethora of support for writing graphical applications...

[james_s]

Well I can tell you that I will never buy a scope that runs Windows, not unless it's a dead one for pennies on the dollar to play with. I have to do enough support of PCs without having to tinker with it on my tools too. I'm not even sure why but at least XP and earlier which are common on scopes tend to deteriorate with age of the install.

[Mr. Scram]

Well I can tell you that I will never buy a scope that runs Windows, not unless it's a dead one for pennies on the dollar to play with. I have to do enough support of PCs without having to tinker with it on my tools too. I'm not even sure why but at least XP and earlier which are common on scopes tend to deteriorate with age of the install.

Until quite recently most of the Keysight kit came with Windows CE and that seems to work out well enough, boot times possibility excepted.

[KE5FX]

Until quite recently most of the Keysight kit came with Windows CE and that seems to work out well enough, boot times possibility excepted.

Some people cling to guns and religion, I cling to VxWorks.  Unfortunately, Keysight didn't.

[nctnico]

IMHO Windows has no business being on an oscilloscope.

The older TDS series work great, I have very few complaints. Why they started using Windows is beyond me. A scope shouldn't need to boot a fullblown operating system off a hard drive.

That's like arguing that a cell phone doesn't need a full-fledged operating system.  The market has spoken, the horse has left the barn, and the ship has sailed. 

Like a phone, an oscilloscope is just another device for gathering data, processing it, and communicating with other devices.  It needs an OS, and Windows is OK, I guess.

Not just that but about every oscilloscope (and every other piece of test equipment) released nowadays runs on Linux which is a full blown OS too.

[james_s]

Actually I don't even really care what's happening under the hood, but I don't want it to feel like software running on a pc with an underlying OS that I have to maintain.

When I power up my TDS scopes they come up to their user interface and whatever underlying operating system makes them tick is completely hidden. I have embedded Linux based devices that are similar, the firmware is a packaged deal, not an application that runs on top of a standalone OS with its own desktop. I wouldn't care if a scope had the windows kernel underneath but I don't want it to feel like a piece of crusty old software running on windows with all the baggage that comes with it.

[e0ne199]

people in this forum keep saying that 200MHz bandwidth is a bandwidth for entry level oscilloscope and yet i see this thread in which someone is asking for a recommendation about which 200MHz oscilloscope is the best for his professional use... why don't you recommend an oscilloscope whose bandwith is more than 200MHz? i am pretty sure it packs more features than 200MHz one.. just an opinion 😁

[tautech]

people in this forum keep saying that 200MHz bandwidth is a bandwidth for entry level oscilloscope and yet i see this thread in which someone is asking for a recommendation about which 200MHz oscilloscope is the best for his professional use... why don't you recommend an oscilloscope whose bandwith is more than 200MHz? i am pretty sure it packs more features than 200MHz one.. just an opinion 😁

And a valid one.

The scopes in question all have sampling rates of 4GSa/s or more and 200 MHz models are near the bottom of each of their ranges however such is pricing there are big jumps in $ when jumping to the next BW step.
Maybe the OP considers these are outside his budget.

Equally valid is why would one select a 4 or 5 GSa/s DSO for 200 MHz work when a 2 GSa/s DSO would be sufficient ? In this class there are certainly more options to consider and at considerably better prices.

[nctnico]

people in this forum keep saying that 200MHz bandwidth is a bandwidth for entry level oscilloscope and yet i see this thread in which someone is asking for a recommendation about which 200MHz oscilloscope is the best for his professional use... why don't you recommend an oscilloscope whose bandwith is more than 200MHz? i am pretty sure it packs more features than 200MHz one.. just an opinion 😁

Not necessarily. There are oscilloscope models which have several bandwidth options including going over 200MHz. It is not like a high featured oscilloscope isn't available as a 100MHz or a 200MHz model. In some cases you may want the higher end features but don't need the bandwidth. There is much more to a DSO besides bandwidth.

[Mr. Scram]

Actually I don't even really care what's happening under the hood, but I don't want it to feel like software running on a pc with an underlying OS that I have to maintain.

When I power up my TDS scopes they come up to their user interface and whatever underlying operating system makes them tick is completely hidden. I have embedded Linux based devices that are similar, the firmware is a packaged deal, not an application that runs on top of a standalone OS with its own desktop. I wouldn't care if a scope had the windows kernel underneath but I don't want it to feel like a piece of crusty old software running on windows with all the baggage that comes with it.

Both Linux and Windows based oscilloscopes do what you ask. Except the big boys maybe but you tend to very deliberately get into those.

[james_s]

people in this forum keep saying that 200MHz bandwidth is a bandwidth for entry level oscilloscope and yet i see this thread in which someone is asking for a recommendation about which 200MHz oscilloscope is the best for his professional use... why don't you recommend an oscilloscope whose bandwith is more than 200MHz? i am pretty sure it packs more features than 200MHz one.. just an opinion 😁

Not necessarily. There are oscilloscope models which have several bandwidth options including going over 200MHz. It is not like a high featured oscilloscope isn't available as a 100MHz or a 200MHz model. In some cases you may want the higher end features but don't need the bandwidth. There is much more to a DSO besides bandwidth.

You can also often get away with rather little bandwidth. For many years I used a 100MHz scope and it was fine. After getting a 1GHz scope it has made me a bit of a snob and I have trouble getting excited about anything less than about 500MHz. Still for 95% of what I do 100MHz would be fine.

[Wuerstchenhund]

You are making broad claims about the Tek's interface and your supposed experience.

Yes, because I had the displeasure to use it. As had with pretty much every Tek starting from the MDO3k and going up to the DPO-X.

I looked at your equipment list in your profile and if that's all you have then you should give more details on where your experience comes from along with your strong opinions because your collection is rather, err, basic.... No offense intended. 

My experience comes from being on the buying end of the T&M industry to equip a number of labs around the world with equipment they need to do high tech stuff. That's pretty much the short version.

But thanks for remining me of that profile list, and you're absolutely right, the list *is* dire (and no longer correct anyways). But hey, I'm living in a depressingly small and poorly built excuse of a house with literally no real space and that will only change once I have wound down all our UK operations, so there's little use to buy better gear. Even more so when I have all the great toys at work