Test Equipment Anonymous (TEA) group therapy thread

[bd139]

Just scored a clean 100MHz TDS2012B in good condition for not much cash. No I'm not keeping it 

How much would a TPS2024 go for these days?

Stupid money. £450 to 1520 looking at eBay.

Then again they are somewhat more specialised!

[tggzzz]

Just spent an hour stirring shit. If you give anyone an inch in the UK they will use it as an excuse not to do their job in some way. It is always “how can we not do X” rather than “how can we do X”. So I went and did their jobs in significantly less time than they usually do them. Then I ask why we need them if their job was so easy. This raised a few eyebrows and shit a few pants. Hopefully that will cause an increase in productivity for a bit.

Bureaucracy is all we export here. Also software projects do not benefit from management material. They are just sand in the gears.

Perhaps not coincidentally, but the three places I enjoyed working were where people enjoyed helping others.

The only type of management that is worthwhile is the type that asks you what they need to provide in order for you to be able to do your job better.

[xrunner]

This is a teaser notice - another tale of "Friday afternoon at the assembly plant and I want to go to happy hour". Remember the Tektronix PG501 pulse generator that had a factory defect ? To refresh your memory, see the attachment. It had a factory original unsoldered BNC connector with several component leads that were just left hovering in mid-air? I guess it was Friday and happy hour was on the mind of the workers.

Well, this time the same sort of situation but different manufacturer - all will be revealed soon ... 

[AVGresponding]

ugh... just pulled the trigger on a Siglent SDS1202X-E. Now I am poor until pay-day   

No doubt tautech is cackling as I complete my journey to the dark side...



On the plus side I bagged a Chauvin Arnoux F21, which is a THD clamp meter, pretty much NIB, for £42.65 shipped which is pretty much peanuts for one of these (around 10% of list price).



Swings and roundabouts.

[Cerebus]

Just spent an hour stirring shit. If you give anyone an inch in the UK they will use it as an excuse not to do their job in some way. It is always “how can we not do X” rather than “how can we do X”. So I went and did their jobs in significantly less time than they usually do them. Then I ask why we need them if their job was so easy. This raised a few eyebrows and shit a few pants. Hopefully that will cause an increase in productivity for a bit.

Bureaucracy is all we export here. Also software projects do not benefit from management material. They are just sand in the gears.

Perhaps not coincidentally, but the three places I enjoyed working were where people enjoyed helping others.

The only type of management that is worthwhile is the type that asks you what they need to provide in order for you to be able to do your job better.

A cross posting (I almost typed "cross probing" I dread to think what was at the back of my mind) of a comment I just made in relation to "ON Semiconductors" rebranding to "onsemi":

I struggle to think of a corporate rebranding that didn't make me roll my eyes. Even more so since they are usually announced with such fanfare, it's hard to believe that there are people on the payroll who actually think changing an established brand to make it fresh or that coming up with gushing corporate wank actually impresses the people who buy the products. Marketers exist in a different reality than engineers.

you are probably not the intended audience. The numb-nuts at the stock-market that will run after anything "new" is

I suspect that isn't the real audience. A few people inside a company that's rebranding might use that as an excuse, but the real audience is the instigators. They need to convince themselves that they are doing something. At least it is less destructive than any number of 'bright ideas' for changes in the company that they might have. It's surprising how much better companies work when the senior management don't do anything at all. Sometimes playing golf all day or going on junkets is the best thing they can do for the company.

[Robert763]

Had a look at another of my purchases from the St Neots rally. A small box of Japanese consumer electronics. I immediately paid the £2 asking price without even digging into the box. Why? Because I could see that there was a Sony Video Walkman in there.
Emptying the box produced a GV-D800E, 3 GV-U5Es, some chargers/PSUs, battery and a NIB 30mm 2x teleconverter.
The GV-D800E is a 8mm/Hi8/Digital8 Video Walkman in a clamshell design. It records and plays composite video, S-Video and Firewire (DV IEEE 1394). Set it up and it all works perfectly, digital and analog.
I'm going to flip this one as I already have one. Because they are so useful for dubbing old camcorder tapes to DVD or computer and the camcorders don't seem to survive, these are in fairly high demand. There is also a niche market for people who need to record analogue video. I expect to make at least 100 times what I paid based on recent sale prices. Some ebay asking prices are insane £600-1000.
The GV-U5E is called a Video Walkman but they have no display. They are Video 8 record and playback only. All three seem to work 
I Think I'll keep one to record the output of my WASP thermal imager. Less faffing around than a laptop and USB frame grabber.

[factory]

Anyone after a hp high frequency probe 11096A for their 427A or other meter? new & sealed for not too much (US only). 
https://www.ebay.com/itm/304131322529



David

[bd139]

Just spent an hour stirring shit. If you give anyone an inch in the UK they will use it as an excuse not to do their job in some way. It is always “how can we not do X” rather than “how can we do X”. So I went and did their jobs in significantly less time than they usually do them. Then I ask why we need them if their job was so easy. This raised a few eyebrows and shit a few pants. Hopefully that will cause an increase in productivity for a bit.

Bureaucracy is all we export here. Also software projects do not benefit from management material. They are just sand in the gears.

Perhaps not coincidentally, but the three places I enjoyed working were where people enjoyed helping others.

The only type of management that is worthwhile is the type that asks you what they need to provide in order for you to be able to do your job better.

That’s exactly the culture I am trying to bring in and use with my own team. Everyone helps everyone. Probably why i spend 4 hours a day on zoom calls working through problems with people. However when your team is entirely wedged on other people’s bureaucracy outside your control you have to break balls. And the best way to break balls outside your team is to enable the business loudly which is what happened here.

Grr.

Some of it is as trivial and obvious as purposely misunderstanding process to slack off then claim ignorance. Makes me soooo fucking angry.

[25 CPS]

Just spent an hour stirring shit. If you give anyone an inch in the UK they will use it as an excuse not to do their job in some way. It is always “how can we not do X” rather than “how can we do X”. So I went and did their jobs in significantly less time than they usually do them. Then I ask why we need them if their job was so easy. This raised a few eyebrows and shit a few pants. Hopefully that will cause an increase in productivity for a bit.

Bureaucracy is all we export here. Also software projects do not benefit from management material. They are just sand in the gears.

Perhaps not coincidentally, but the three places I enjoyed working were where people enjoyed helping others.

The only type of management that is worthwhile is the type that asks you what they need to provide in order for you to be able to do your job better.

That’s exactly the culture I am trying to bring in and use with my own team. Everyone helps everyone. Probably why i spend 4 hours a day on zoom calls working through problems with people. However when your team is entirely wedged on other people’s bureaucracy outside your control you have to break balls. And the best way to break balls outside your team is to enable the business loudly which is what happened here.

Grr.

Some of it is as trivial and obvious as purposely misunderstanding process to slack off then claim ignorance. Makes me soooo fucking angry.

If you hear someone pulling that stunt say the phrase, "I need a bagel", good luck because you won't see them again for an hour, minimum.  Ask me how I know.

[Cubdriver]

Anyone after a hp high frequency probe 11096A for their 427A or other meter? new & sealed for not too much (US only). 
https://www.ebay.com/itm/304131322529



David

Damn you, David!!       

-Pat

[bd139]

ugh... just pulled the trigger on a Siglent SDS1202X-E. Now I am poor until pay-day   

No doubt tautech is cackling as I complete my journey to the dark side...



On the plus side I bagged a Chauvin Arnoux F21, which is a THD clamp meter, pretty much NIB, for £42.65 shipped which is pretty much peanuts for one of these (around 10% of list price).



Swings and roundabouts.

If that’s the one on eBay I saw earlier that was a good deal 

[AVGresponding]

ugh... just pulled the trigger on a Siglent SDS1202X-E. Now I am poor until pay-day   

No doubt tautech is cackling as I complete my journey to the dark side...



On the plus side I bagged a Chauvin Arnoux F21, which is a THD clamp meter, pretty much NIB, for £42.65 shipped which is pretty much peanuts for one of these (around 10% of list price).



Swings and roundabouts.

If that’s the one on eBay I saw earlier that was a good deal 

The Siglent or the C-A ?   

[bd139]

Siglent. No comment on the other stuff as I don’t know 

[Cubdriver]

And buying the RF probe then prompted me to buy a tee...

https://www.ebay.com/itm/182916486108?epid=1019412258&hash=item2a96ac13dc:g:My4AAOSwJtdaFGS2

-Pat

[Specmaster]

Re-watched Back to the Future parts 1 & 2 last night, and noticed the name on the side of the manure truck that Biff crashes into twice. Would have been just a random name back when I watched it in the past, but is nowadays quite amusing...



Finally managed to score one of the cheap GW Instek scopes on CDL this morning. They still have a few unsold that will be relisted, so there's a possibility they'll get cheaper yet. If you tilt at one remember to check the pics first; some have screen damage.

I have them in my watch list as well, what did you get yours for in the end?

Mine was £81 (70+11), and one of the ones with a perfect screen. Let's hope they don't fuck up with which one they send, given how many they had listed.


EDIT: They just relisted some, and a few are opening at £40, but one of those has a damaged screen, and two don't have a picture with them turned on...

Thanks for that, I'm removing them from my watch list, decided that they come a poor second best to my PM3390B which can do all that they do but with an extra 50Mhz bandwidth chucked in as well as a few other niceties thrown in.   

[shakalnokturn]

 

[Specmaster]

Well thats the car sorted out with 4 new tyres, serviced, MOT'd, taxed and next week insured so thats me officially skint now till my next pension is paid in a weeks time 

Tomorrow is my ruby wedding anniversary, so I doubt that I'll be on discord unless I want WW3 to be declared  , it probably will be though because I haven't got SWMBO a present yet, so I may be sleeping in the dog house, OO er, we don't have a dog, so no dog house, oh well, the garage then 

[med6753]

Well thats the car sorted out with 4 new tyres, serviced, MOT'd, taxed and next week insured so thats me officially skint now till my next pension is paid in a weeks time 

Tomorrow is my ruby wedding anniversary, so I doubt that I'll be on discord unless I want WW3 to be declared  , it probably will because I haven't got SWMBO a present yet, so I may be sleeping in the dog house, OO er, we don't have a dog, so no dog house, oh well, the garage then 

Well, if you do wind up in the garage (dog) house get on a laptop and join us for Discord. 

[bd139]

I think I only got to my dung wedding aniversary 

So discord it is for me 

[Vince]

Tomorrow is my ruby wedding anniversary, so I doubt that I'll be on discord unless I want WW3 to be declared  , it probably will be though because I haven't got SWMBO a present yet, so I may be sleeping in the dog house, OO er, we don't have a dog, so no dog house, oh well, the garage then 

So you have got less than 24Hours to get busy in the lab and design some electronic gadget for her ! 

[Vince]

OK good find, can't believe nobody else thought about diodes... now it's only all too predictable that in 2 months someone will post a picture of a 1N4148...    and if nobody does I WILL !

[Saskia]

discord sounds like a plan.
Wondering if Med has considered the offer for a google pixel that I have floating around

[xrunner]

OK good find, can't believe nobody else thought about diodes... now it's only all too predictable that in 2 months someone will post a picture of a 1N4148...    and if nobody does I WILL !

I got lots of diodes ...

[Neomys Sapiens]

Just scored a clean 100MHz TDS2012B in good condition for not much cash. No I'm not keeping it 

How much would a TPS2024 go for these days?

Why do you ask? Got one to spare?

[med6753]

discord sounds like a plan.
Wondering if Med has considered the offer for a google pixel that I have floating around

Thanks for the offer. I am looking at some unlocked alternatives here as opposed to what my provider is offering. If I decide to go with your offer I'll let you know.