I wanted to give advice to Dave to be more polite, but I know the answer in advance ("my forum -- my rules, I do whatever I want and if you are disagree go duck yourself").
If the thing is any good then why would Dave complain about it?
Since when has it become a crime to point out things that I notice? And to ask questions and have an opinion?
Yes I could gush on about all the wonderful things for hours, but am I obligated to do that? No I am not, but I have given credit were credit is due.
The great things about this scope are
plainly obvious, I shouldn't have to harp on about them.
I think there is more value in pointing out things that aren't right, or are lacking, or weren't as expected, or if there are practical issues etc, I always play devils advocate. In case some people have forgotten, that's
what I do.
Yet I now seem to be branded some sort of Tek hater who just wants to hate on this scope,
Why have I harped on about a couple of "negative" things about this scope? Probably because the marketing and hype rubbed me the wrong way, I don't like being rubbed the wrong way. Is it Tek's fault that it didn't quite match what I expected? No, of course not, it just didn't quite match what I expected. And there are couple of plainly poor decisions that went into this, so I pointed them out.
Seriously, if Tek wanted to make this a "game changer" for Jill Engineer then they should at least throw in digital probes for free. (You watch, they will once they reailse it's not getting the uptake they expect, just like the MDO), probably ditch the 4CH version, or at least make it much cheaper or something, or include other options for a better "entry level" system. Perhaps they will in a year's time with a smaller lower bandwidth model?
I think they have a huge opportunity here with say a low-ish to mid range 500MHz max model (1GHz is all but useless without expensive active probes) using the new 6GS/s ASIC (the 10 times bandwith is ideal), 4 channels only, existing external 16CH digital probes (if possible architecturally), and a smaller screen that's still HD. They'd own the 500MHz scope market. i.e. an R&S RTB2004 killer. That's kinda what I was hoping for with a new Tek scope. Ok, not price matched with the RTB because of the 12bit converter etc, but you know, in the ballpark.
As it stands, whilst it being an awesome scope, I don't really see the 5 Series being the go-to choice for a general lab MSO for those on reasonable budgets (sub $20k). Same for Lecroy of course.
It's more of >$20k signal analysis scope, and would probably be the pick above that price range for general use.
For specific high channel count (be honest, 64 digital and zero analog is fairy land) and really detailed signal analysis on screen (performance nit-picks aside), I think the Lecroy probably has it beat.