SDS1202X-E as a ham station monitor

[borjam]

The other day I was asked about the suitability of the SDS1202X-E as a station monitor. For example, to check your audio transmission envelope.

There was a video of a really frustrated guy who, it seems returned the oscilloscope. I guess he is mostly familiar with analog scopes, he didn't engage the roll mode in his Siglent.

In this hideous video (poor lighting, not exactly stellar voice and, well, English is obviously not my mother tongue) I can show a simple practical example: using the SDS1202X-E to adjust an audio compressor (A DYC-8x7 connected to a Yaesu FT-817nd). RF was sampled with a DL-1A dummy load by EA3GCY (http://ea3gcy.blogspot.com.es/2016/04/dl-1a-20w-dummy-load.html)



So, is it suitable or not? I would say yes, indeed! And the same can be applied to any DSO with a roll mode.

P.S: No actual ether was mistreated to perpetrate this video. I used a dummy load.

[cvanc]

Nice use of the scope, thanks for posting.

[borjam]

Also, someone asked me for advice on the Rigol DS1000Z vs the Siglent SDS1202X-E.

It's sometimes difficult to compare scopes, so many features and subtle differences you only notice with real usage.

But in this case the Siglent is a clear winner.

The fastest time base for which the Siglent is capable of working in roll mode is 50 ms/div. The slowest is 100 s/div.

For the Rigol, however, the fastest time base in roll mode is 200 ms/div, which is too slow to be able to see the audio envelope properly. The slowest timebase is 50 s/div.

50 ms/div gives you a pretty good detail of your transmission envelope, allowing you to see individual phonemes, while 200 ms/div mostly shows complete words.

As a makeshift data recorder for slowly changing parameters, the Siglent wins as well. Remember that one of the functions of an oscilloscope is to be like a magnifier of the time domain

[tautech]

Very very late (and the video is a bit silly, I should have prepared it much better, this is a one shot thing) but I found the original materlal.

I've put it on Dropbox.

https://www.dropbox.com/s/bpnmue4tdrm89uq/StationMonitor.mov?dl=0

Have fun and don't laugh much. And I know, the uncorrected tungsten light is ghastly!

borjam PM'ed me saying he'd found the original video and I stumbled across this recent post by him ^^^

As it was done a while back it would be interesting to compare the X-Y mode results with much later firmware like the current V1.3.26 version.

[borjam]

As it was done a while back it would be interesting to compare the X-Y mode results with much later firmware like the current V1.3.26 version.

Pssst this is roll mode, not XY mode

[tautech]

As it was done a while back it would be interesting to compare the X-Y mode results with much later firmware like the current V1.3.26 version.

Pssst this is roll mode, not XY mode

Had big weekend so a bit broken today.