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Oscilloscopes For Modern Engineers?
Every few years someone asks this community for advice on oscilloscopes. Reader dawning writes "I've just graduated with a degree in Computer Engineering (and did a Comp Sci one while I was at it) and I'm finding myself woefully under-equipped to do some great hardware projects. I'm in major need of a good oscilloscope. I'm willing to put down $2,000 for a decent one, but there are several options and they all seem so archaic and limited. I'm happy to use something that must be controlled through a PC if that gives me more measuring features. What would you, my esteemed Slashdot colleagues, get for yourself?"
Or you can get a $370 Rigol DS1052E, and software-hack it to enable 100MHz mode. Not quite as good as a Tek, but significantly cheaper and well worth the money, especially if you're on a smaller budget. I recently got one (it's about time I bought a scope) and I've been quite happy with it for my purposes.
Info on the hack here.
I have a very nice, for me, rackmount 350MHz 4 channel Tek scope with some very killer plugins.
The scopes I used at work today are really beyond anything needed for home use, unless you're into some extremely expensive hobbies.
The portable scope is a 3054B; 500MHz x4 channels. (~$10k, with options) The good one is an 11GHz x2ch Lecroy ($ almost 6 digits), I made picosecond-order measurements with it today.
The differential probe was $5k each; (wasn't that what gov. spitzer paid? lol.) our newb has killed two. (4Vmax) $2k each to fix.
If you can afford it for home use, I'd recommend the Tek 3054 or a lower bandwidth cousin. They're very easy to use.
If you can get surplus scopes coming out of downsized companies, you can get a deal; that's how I got my rackmount and a stack of plugins for $130. It was a production fixture at a missle plant in the 90s. :)
Digital is great, as long as you realize the limitations; digital displays lie sometimes. If you're going to base a paper on it, use multiple measurements with different equipment. :) I've seen fresh engineers embarrassed by artifacts.
Truth isn't Truth - Guliani