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Mark,
thanks a lot for the extremely well done review. I've been waiting for some time to see the new Siglent in operation, as I am sure many other folks have as well. I was happy to see that you didn't fall into the trap, as many others might have, of simply finding and enumerating the small bugs in operation of the current firmware. Naturally it will have those, as all new units will, but those are the things most easily rectified, and thus most quickly made irrelevant in a review.
Instead, you focused on a functional evaluation, and put it in the context of another well-known, and high-quality, scope. I think that helped a lot, and not just for comparing two specific units. You also managed to maintain a fair perspective, which isn't always easy for those already owning a different option. I found your balanced criticisms of both units, as well as comments on their relative strong points, to be especially valuable. And providing an Index into the video will be especially helpful for anyone wanting to go back and review any specific aspect.
As for the unit itself, it looks like it has a lot of good capabilities. As well as some disappointing limitations. Some smaller examples would be it's lack of Advanced Operations in Math. On the Rigol, that enables things like defining CH1*CH1/8, which permits direct examination of amplifier power output (V-sqrd/loadR). And the inability to run Decodes on segmented acquisitions is a huge fail, in my book. However, assuming Siglent is committed to this product line (and I've seen nothing to suggest otherwise), I doubt it will take them 2 years to correct that, as it did Rigol on the DS2000 (and still haven't, on their DS4000). This is the type of thing that boggles my mind.
But most disappointing to me was the lack of any meaningful ability to navigate the huge sample sets that the unit is capable of capturing. Whether in Frame mode or History mode, it can collect more data than you could ever do anything useful with. Which is a real shame, since it basically negates a very powerful feature. It's bad enough that there is no quick access mechanism, just slow knob twiddling, but that's compounded by the inability to even vary the Playback speed. I wonder if Siglent is ready for the barrage of Carpal-Tunnel lawsuits that will follow.
[And guys, I'm only half kidding!]
[I sense a product opportunity though... a small motor with a knob gripper. Just press a a FWD or REV button, and let the motor churn away for a few minutes.
]
OTOH, the hardware seems very sound, both in design and implementation. Which means Siglent has a strong base to work from. Features can always be added, and rough spots in software smoothed out. But hardware issues are a much larger problem. So kudos to Siglent's hardware group for their accomplishment there, on this next generation of hardware capabilities for them.
Let's hope that their firmware team is hard at work improving things, and is being supplied with user experiences and concerns from the field. Once their embedded software catches up to their hardware, they'll have a very competitive product.
And for those concerned about the length of the review, I can't think of any way one could get a clearer picture of the strengths and weaknesses, or capabilities and limitations, than the video Mark has put together. Someone could take the time to write down a text summarization... but that would then be nothing more than a set of claims/opinions. The video let's you see things with your own eyes, so you can form your own conclusions. This isn't a verbose, hem-haw puff piece, as many amateur YT presentations often are. It's a solid set of visual demonstrations, combined with intelligent, informed commentary. Well worth investing 80-minutes of time, for anyone seriously considering purchasing a scope in this price/performance category.
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