thinking about getting a 2465B

[Housedad]

I have a Rigol DS1054z now, and a Instek gw GOS-6112.(2 channel 100mhz analog)  I do find that they are not very useful at higher frequencies. 

IS the Tek 2465B worth having on the bench? $500 to $700 for a good working scope of 400mhz seems pretty good compared to later units.

[tautech]

First, ask yourself which technology do you prefer to use, CRO or DSO ?
OK so you want higher BW, how much higher, is 200 MHz enough ?

Or does a spectrum analyser fit you needs better ?

[BravoV]

Imo, $500 to $700 is very high for 2465B, own it and DS1104Z (just another 1054Z variant).

Also be warned about it's size, even though front face area size are almost identical (see photo below), but the Tek is very long compared to your 1054Z, you should consider this if you have shallow bench space.

[tggzzz]

I have a Rigol DS1054z now, and a Instek gw GOS-6112.(2 channel 100mhz analog)  I do find that they are not very useful at higher frequencies. 

IS the Tek 2465B worth having on the bench? $500 to $700 for a good working scope of 400mhz seems pretty good compared to later units.

Useful to do what?

To look at signal shape in the time domain, i.e. signal integrity: yes.

As a pleasure to use: yes.

To look at RF signals: possibly, and possibly better than a low-end digitising scope. But would a spectrum analyser or modulation domain analyser be the more appropriate tool?

To capture rare events: no.

To to post-processing in either the scope itself or on a PC: no.

To analyse digital messages: no. Use a logic analyser or printf statements.

If you do decide to get one, make sure it is working and the calibration constants are intact. Ideally the PSU and A5 board should have been recapped.

[branadic]

I do have a Tek 2465A for sale, backup battery was replaced last year. It's fully working without any issues. If you are interested please let me know.

-branadic-

[Tom45]

The Tek 2465 is definitely a nice scope and is the scope I use first unless I need features better handled by something else.

I have the base 300 MHz 2465 rather than the 400 MHz 2465B. The 2465 doesn't have the problem of losing calibration if the battery backed sram is lost, as is the case for the 2465A and 2465B. Before you buy a B or A 2465, ask if the backup memory has been updated.

The 2465 has a very non-standard Siemens  fan that over time starts to get noisy bearings. It needs to be rebuilt as there is no replacement for it. Or kludge in a modern fan. The A and B models wisely went to more common fans.

The photo shows a comparison between my DS1074Z and 2465. The top trace is Dave's scope test signal: 1 MHz carrier AM modulated by 1 KHz. It shows the difference between Rigol's UltraVision and a real analog scope.

The bottom trace is a 1 MHz carrier AM modulated by 2.2 KHz. The 2465, as is true of many Tek scopes, is able to trigger on each individual channel. A feature I've never seen in a DSO. Both channels are stable on the 2465 but channel 2 isn't synced at all on the 1074Z. The camera's 1/100 shutter speed makes the Rigol's channel 2 trace look better than it actually is.

[james_s]

Seems high to me, it's often accepted that the going rate for analog scopes is roughly $1/MHz of bandwidth.

I think I have about $600 in my TDS784 and that's a 1GHz 4 channel DSO with a color display.