Touch screen, fan and memory in the Keysight 3000T X-Series?

[eeguy]

Hello Keysight 3000T X-Series users, how useful it is to have the touch screen? Is the fan silent? Do you find the limited memory disadvantageous? What additional software options would be good to have? Please share your user experience. Thanks.

[Faith]

Hello Keysight 3000T X-Series users, how useful it is to have the touch screen? Is the fan silent? Do you find the limited memory disadvantageous? What additional software options would be good to have? Please share your user experience. Thanks.

If you're going to be spending that much on a scope, you really ought to demo it. That'll pretty much answer every single one of your questions. Guaranteed.

Even if you're not planning on going that route, the top two YouTube search results for "Keysight 3000T" will answer most of your questions.

Wuerstchenhund has already given you a quality reply in one of your previous threads on how you should be handling this.

Honestly, you're going about this the completely wrong way. The fact that you consider a $400 (DS1054z) together with a $3k+ scope (DSOX3000T) shows that you don't really know what you actually need. And without sorting that out first, you've set yourself up to a path that will very likely end you wasting a lot of money.

So the first step is to decide what it is that you want to do with the scope, now and in the foreseeable (say 3-5yrs) future.

1. What stuff will you work on with that scope? What type of signals do you want to assess? => this decides the frequency range which in turn tells you what scope BW you need (and be careful with the waveform type, i.e. a 200MHz scope can't show a 150MHz square wave correctly).

2. Can you do your work with standard passive probes, or will you need active probes? If you'll need active probes then you need a scope with active probe ports

3. Do you need logic analysis? If so, is a scope built-in SA (MSO) good enough, or is a separate USB LA (like a Salae) a better choice?

4. Do you need serial decode? If so for what protocols? => this might remove some scopes from the list as not all scopes support all protocols. Also consider an alternative to scope serial decoding, i.e. via a USB LA.

5. Do you need FFT? If so then you want a scope with strong FFT performance over a large sample size (i.e. 1Mpts)

6. Do you need specific scope applications (i.e. power analysis? Report generation?)

7. What's your max budget?

You should really step back and try to think about these seven points so that you can answer them with a certain confidence. Don't sway off into wishful thinking, try to stay realistic with what you want to do.

Once you've sorted that out you can then start narrowing down which scopes fullfill your requirements. And for that it's irrelevant if a manufacturer comes up with a new scope model next year, because it won't make the scope you bought less usable for your work. And that's all that matters.

[Keysight DanielBogdanoff]

I'm obviously biased, but having a good touchscreen + UI is really nice to have. I find myself touching the screens of other non-touch scopes as if they had that capability. Fan noise is pretty minimal, our scopes run cooler than a lot of others.

Software, of course, depends on what you are planning to do with the scope.

[Wuerstchenhund]

I'm obviously biased, but having a good touchscreen + UI is really nice to have. I find myself touching the screens of other non-touch scopes as if they had that capability.

Same here. I'm generally not a fan of touch interfaces but on scopes it can work really well.

[electr_peter]

I use X3000T and find it very quiet (compared to other gear). After using it for some time, I really like touch screen for some functions (like selecting trigger type, decoding mode or maths operation) and value entering - it is much quicker than knob. Touch screen can be disabled if you don't like it.
Advanced math and signal generator options are very useful for my purposes.

[mikeselectricstuff]

IMO the touchscreen can be very useful and certainly not a gimmick. Examples I use regularly:
Entering numeric values and labels.
Dragging digital channels where you want - this was a real pin on the older scopes
Can be quicker for selecting items from longer menus
I've very occasionally used the zone trigger.
I probably don't use it as much as I could as I'm so used to traditional UIs.

It can occasionally be annoying if you're used to pointing at the screen, but can be turned off.

Fan noise is barely noticeable.

Can't say I've really noticed lower memory ( compared to my previous MSO6034A)

Other things I like (again compared to MSO6034A)
Lots of trigger and measure options. e.g. ability to count pulses in a burst ( but for some reason this isn't available on digital channels)
Two decodes at once.

Things I don't like :
In slower timebase modes you don't get the sweep updating continuously across the screen - it does a whole screen at a time - this can be really annoying below about 50ms/div and probably my least favorite thing.
Longer bootup time.
There are a very, very few occasions I've seen it get a bit slow and clunky - I think this was with decodes and measurements.
Lower screen resolution. The time I've really found this a pain is that serial decode doesn't show as many characters onscreen as it could do with a smaller font and more screen resolution.
 

[eeguy]

Under what situations do we need to enter numeric values and labels?

[electr_peter]

Under what situations do we need to enter numeric values and labels?

Numeric values are used often in FFT, signal generator, maths operations, other settings. Touch screen is very easy to use for numeric entry, while rotary knob input is a bit tricky and slow.

Character labels are used for naming analog and digital channels, reference waveforms, on screen labels. Label function is used very rarely (in comparison to numeric entry), but touch screen keyboard makes it easier and faster. This means that you are more likely to make labels in the first place.

[rx8pilot]

I love the touchscreen and would be very disappointing if I had to go back. One of the additional benefits of the UI being setup for touch is that it also works with a mouse quite well. The targets are big to work with your fingers so your mousing precision can be terrible.

The tasks that I do with an oscilloscope are WAY faster than they were before the Keysight scope arrived. All the little details that do not come through in a review video are my favorite things now. When I am struggling to sort out a circuit, I want to focus on the circuit and not the scope. That is what the touch UI has delivered to me.

No, I don't have any obligation to say nice things about Keysight scopes.

As for memory - I am always hoping for more. In daily reality, I have learned how to use the segmented memory and the advanced triggers to get what I want inside the confines of the memory. It has not been a critical limitation for the work I have done so far. If you are not familiar with the advanced triggers and segmented memory, it will be more of a limitation if you are searching for occasional events. I use the color grading, persistence, zone trigger, and others to dig out the events that happen very occasionally and I don't have to scroll through a massive capture to do it.

At the end of the day, my favorite feature is that the scope is not the center of attention - my DUT is. The scope conceptually disappears and I just do the work. That is exactly how it should be.

[mikeselectricstuff]

Under what situations do we need to enter numeric values and labels?

Labelling traces ( esp. digital)
Entering specific holdoff times - e.g. if you already know the rep. rate it's quicker than using the knob.
Entering baudrates for serial decode
Entering oddball time/div values - e.g. to line up signals with the divisions, can be quicker than knob.
Filenames for saved setups/traces

[JonM]

I have had my new DSOX3024T for about a month. Not being a touchscreen fan (I do use an i{Pad,Phone} but have no desire for a touchscreen PC) I thought that I might disable Touch on the scope. However, I have found Touch to be useful, and so far my screen appears to be smudge-free. Touch makes it easy to enter numbers (like FFT ranges), navigate menus, etc. I have found the use of a soft tip tablet/phone stylus helpful in some cases where precision better than my finger provides is needed such as drawing a trigger box. I have had a few issues when using just a finger, like moving a baseline following a menu operation, but that is probably due to my clumsiness.

Jon