Are those arduino oscilloscopes good for a biginner?

[tjeulink]

I have wanted to learn about electronic repair and design for ages but im a very slow learner so i often get discouraged by the bulk ahead. this is the main reason that keeps me from buying oscilloscopes second hand since most of those are either cheap and in bad shape(or in some remote place that i would have to pick it up from) or €100 or higher and in a somewhat okay state, which is just not worth it for the times i will actually have learned something from it beyond how to use it. so my question is, are those cheapish arduino oscilloscope shields and software worth it? can i actually learn with them as an absolute beginner? if so does anyone know what one is the best one? i googled it and an incredible amount of instructables etc popped up and i have no clue what i should look for, and what is worth the extra dime or not.

thanks for even considering helping me 

[Gmetal]

If it's really cheap, it might be an interesting thing to have, and better than nothing, but its pretty different to using an actual oscilloscope, and will be probably very limited in in usability.

Even 'proper' USB oscilloscopes i find to be a huge pain in the ass. See if you can find a cheap old oscilloscope, even if its analog, and shabby, as long as it works, you'll learn alot. After all you don't need complex features if your objective is to learn, you just need to see a couple waveforms and compare/ practice measuring signals etc, and you'll get a better feel for it with a real one. Sometimes universities throw out old ones, so see if you can pick one of those up if there is one near you.

Are there any particular projects you had in mind with the oscilloscope?

[tjeulink]

the problem is that everything that is in the kinda okay circle is more than 30 km from where i am and i dont own a car or have a driving license so the expense of getting it will always be high. the problem with the old shabby oscilloscopes is that the people selling them dont even know if they are functional 40% of the time, and when they are working for sure they are in some remote place not reachable with public transport without giving out more cash than the actual thing costs. everything that actually is displayed with its wave on is more than 50KM from where i live (and than still its all analog and chabby). maybe my budget is just set to low? because i want something for not (much) more than a €100 (about 120 us$)

the only real project i have in mind is trying to seek the defect on an old laptop motherboard of mine i have laying around. but i think thats far above my knowledge at this stage so i just want to do some practicing with breadboards etc until i feel comfortable in trying to fix (or at least find the defect) in said motherboard.

[Azhar]

I bought one of these ebay DIY kit scopes, it kinda does the job, but I probably used it ones since I bought it

[tjeulink]

the main reason i dont want one of those is that an arduino is multi purpose so i could always use it for some other project if i eventually upgrade to something better, but i dont know what the price of those DIY sets are and how they compare to the DIY one for arduino price performance wise. thanks for the suggestion though, hadn't even considered those yet.

[nowlan]

I thought you meant the kit 2 posts up. Both it and arduino use the same brains.
Dave has already declared them toys.

Is a courier too much to have a CRO shipped?

[nowlan]

Just had a look on ebay.nl, prices are out of your budget. You could always make an offer, since unlikely to be moving. However you need to make sure there is a warranty or at least some guarantee.

Id recommend you look at an analog discovery if your looking to learn. However the prices new are double your budget again. Are you are student? I think student pricing only applies to US students.
http://www.digikey.nl/product-search/en?mpart=410-321&v=1286

Alternative is to try posting WTB in the buy/sell forum here. Perhaps toploser/kjds have something?

[tjeulink]

Just had a look on ebay.nl, prices are out of your budget. You could always make an offer, since unlikely to be moving. However you need to make sure there is a warranty or at least some guarantee.

Id recommend you look at an analog discovery if your looking to learn. However the prices new are double your budget again. Are you are student? I think student pricing only applies to US students.
http://www.digikey.nl/product-search/en?mpart=410-321&v=1286

Alternative is to try posting WTB in the buy/sell forum here. Perhaps toploser/kjds have something?

ebay isnt really used over here, we already had our own version marktplaats.nl (marketplace.nl literal translation). but even there everything is more than 50 km from where i live and often costs more than i can afford if it even is in working condition.

i am a student but not a student in electronics so i dont know if it counts, i might look into that tho, thanks for the suggestion.

[tjeulink]

I thought you meant the kit 2 posts up. Both it and arduino use the same brains.
Dave has already declared them toys.

Is a courier too much to have a CRO shipped?

those things are quite heavy(so postal costs quite a lot) and the people selling on ebay like sites wont do postal so i either have to have someone pick it up or get it myself. i can order them from outside the netherlands but then postal often reaches 20 euro or higher(for neighboring countries), and 40 to 50 from the UK and france etc.

[Gyro]

I thought you meant the kit 2 posts up. Both it and arduino use the same brains.
Dave has already declared them toys.

Actually that kit is  Cortex-M3 ARM processor (STM32F103C8) based. Just for clarification.

[Refrigerator]

DSO138 is a great scope for a beginner as long as you measure frequencies lower than 200kHz.
I has helped me quite a bit in troubleshooting, especially when it showed me that my homemade lab PSU was oscillating at constant current mode, certainly something a DMM could never do.

[kunzem]

Imho you even better of with some old analog scope for 50 bucks from anywhere.

[tjeulink]

DSO138 is a great scope for a beginner as long as you measure frequencies lower than 200kHz.
I has helped me quite a bit in troubleshooting, especially when it showed me that my homemade lab PSU was oscillating at constant current mode, certainly something a DMM could never do.

im sure it is but im not looking for advice on an oscilloscope. the problem is the availability of any oscilloscope inside my price range at a reasonable to reach place.

Imho you even better of with some old analog scope for 50 bucks from anywhere.

yes i know this, the problem is that they are very sparsely available in that price in my country in "tested"(read checked if it turns on) condition. there are like 3 available in a 50 km range that dont show a sinus wave and the people offering them have no clue if they turn on or not. if i use public transport to get there its about 30$ and that at the risk of it not working when i try it at the pickup point. no thank you. ive checked several times a month and this situation has been continuously.

[Wor3d]

I have to agree with the DSO 138, although yes, Dave declared them as toys, but I am also a student, and in around me I dont have any affordable (even old analog) oscilloscopes to get from... You build the DSO yourself, which is part of learning too, you also get schematics, which you can look into later, when you maybe know more stuff, realizing whata you work with. I use the oscilloscope many many times, it's great for troubleshooting, much better than the cheapo multimeter that I got. You can use it as a "logic analyzer" (like, high/low ), or second multimeter, which is handy a lot. I use it all the time (but I am still looking for some old analog). I think is worth every cent from 20€ for people like you, and me. That's my opinion, cheers

[meeder]

@tjeulink: where do you live in the Netherlands? I might have something you probably could use. I have an old Philips PM3055 scope here.

[tjeulink]

@tjeulink: where do you live in the Netherlands? I might have something you probably could use. I have an old Philips PM3055 scope here.

i live in amersfoort, its 10 min away from utrecht. how much would you want for it?

[collingtech]

i have a very disapointing experience whit one arduino osciloscope thing, save the money and buy a used one , trust me

[daybyter]

http://www.stm32duino.com/viewtopic.php?t=107

[Renegade]

I bought one of these ebay DIY kit scopes, it kinda does the job, but I probably used it ones since I bought it

I bought one and will be assembling it sometime in the next week or two whenever I find time.

I look at these things like learning projects. Also, I can use that in situations that scare me where I refuse to use my brand new Rigol. If I fuck up... oh well. I blew up a $25 project that I learned something from.

DIY kits are great.

[rs20]

An oscilloscope is a tool for debugging your circuit. When debugging your circuits, the last thing you want to do is second-guessing your oscilloscope -- or worse still, getting let up the garden path by a poor oscilloscope.

For this reason, these Arduino oscilloscopes, funnily enough, require far more skill and understanding to use than a decent, proper oscilloscope. So I don't recommend it for beginners, you'll just end up blaming problems in your circuit on your oscilloscope and vice versa.

[SpidersWeb]

I much prefer the 30+ year old CRO I found at a local recycling center for $5, than my brand new low cost kit scope.
I'm a beginner myself, and found the kit scope to be quite frustrating at times - spent more times diddling around with it than I did the project.

Edit: would agree it'd make a fun DIY project though

[nealz]

Save you money and get either a used analog or look for a used rigol.

In either case spend time with scope before buying to be sure all is working

[fubar.gr]

An oscilloscope is a tool for debugging your circuit. When debugging your circuits, the last thing you want to do is second-guessing your oscilloscope -- or worse still, getting let up the garden path by a poor oscilloscope.

For this reason, these Arduino oscilloscopes, funnily enough, require far more skill and understanding to use than a decent, proper oscilloscope. So I don't recommend it for beginners, you'll just end up blaming problems in your circuit on your oscilloscope and vice versa.

Both of these statements are so true!

This should be made a sticky in the Beginners forum. It would save newbies from so much frustration.

[Renegade]

An oscilloscope is a tool for debugging your circuit. When debugging your circuits, the last thing you want to do is second-guessing your oscilloscope -- or worse still, getting let up the garden path by a poor oscilloscope.

For this reason, these Arduino oscilloscopes, funnily enough, require far more skill and understanding to use than a decent, proper oscilloscope. So I don't recommend it for beginners, you'll just end up blaming problems in your circuit on your oscilloscope and vice versa.

Interesting. I'd not thought of that before. (Beginner here.) I'll keep that in mind and use it as a learning opportunity. Thanks!

[exe]

Trust me, any scope is better than no scope. Even if it is DSO 138 . I've got two of them, they are not absolute garbage . But they are not precise, don't rely too much on read outs. The useful bandwidth is around 150-200KHz, noise floor around 3mV.