EEVblog #310 - Cheap Siglent and Agilent scopes

[rohitdesa]

Owon's SDS7102 is also under 400USD

SDS7102 for under 400? Where? Its got a *nice* display!

That said dave has said why PC scopes are a POS for their price

I disagree with you about PC scopes being rubbish for the price. Of course buying a Cleverscope or Picoscope is very expensive. If I was going to spend that much money in the first place then I would put it into a 'proper' bench scope. But then these PC scopes fulfill a certain niche. I also think that there is a a market segment that doesn't want to spend more than $250 on a scope. For this segment it is perfectly adequate to view general waveshapes. Here extreme precision is not really the purchasing criterion - low cost, with reasonable accuracy is. I don't know about the other scopes, but the Hantek DSO2xxx are pretty good 'student' scopes. However, I find now that I've 'outgrown' it, and am looking to buy something better. Depending on how you look at it (and what your need is) the 400 buck scopes are absolute trash compared to Agilent's Infiniium 90000 Q series. Would I like to have one of those? Sure! Do I have the money? No chance in hell! But most importantly do I have any real need for such a scope? Nope, not at all.

The DSO2090 has its flaws. You don't even have to look close and you'll find many of them. But for the price, I think it packs a reasonable punch.

[EEVblog]

Depending on how you look at it (and what your need is) the 400 buck scopes are absolute trash compared to Agilent's Infiniium 90000 Q series. Would I like to have one of those? Sure! Do I have the money? No chance in hell! But most importantly do I have any real need for such a scope? Nope, not at all.

The Agilent 90000 is in fact absolute trash if used as an everyday use scope!
Weighs 30kg+, the fans sound like a wind test tunnel, and the touch screen Windows XP driven interface makes you want to put a sledgehammer through it.
If I actually had it in my lab, it would simply gather dust in the corner 
USB scopes are the same, but opposite end of the spectrum. Annoying, but have their niche use.

Dave.

[T4P]

USB scopes have problems like
1)200meg samples hanteks costs an 500meg samples siglent 
2) your DSO2090 is good for at most 20MHz according to shannon-nyquist, and 13.3MHz at x8 sampling factor without aliasing

Advantages
1) Portable sure, but you still need a laptop
2) Doesn't chew power as much compared to a normal bench scope
3) throw inside backpack kind of device

The owon is
399USD at precisegauge

[rohitdesa]

^^To the question "which scope is good?" I can draw this conclusion from both the above replies - depends entirely on your need. Now I need something better. So I'm hoping to see a low-end scopes comparison. I can imagine that this is going to be a ton of work and will take up a huge chunk of time.

Dave (EEV): my 'expert' suggestion - group scopes by bandwidth - 25MHz, 50-60MHz, 100MHz and 200MHz. In each category compare features like samples per sec, memory depth, screen refresh rate, etc. Useability is important - cluttered menus, poor LCD contrast, etc. If you do tear them down (which I think would be absolutely awesome!), it would be interesting to see the similarities/differences in each category - overall internal build and layout, AFE/input, chips used (local vs. quality manufacturers), CPLD/FPGAs, memory (SRAM/DRAM), DSP chip, power supply quality, fan :-P etc. If you could also point out the features that most annoy you, and the 'coolest' features that in that particular scope, we'd be able to make a better informed decision.

You could make 4 videos; one for each bandwidth range. Cover 4-5 of the most common scopes in each category. The first one would take the longest time, but I think things would become easier and quicker after that.

Take my word for it - this will be exceedingly helpful to scope noobs and people buying their first decent scope. Lots of work, but thou shalt have our adulation

[rohitdesa]

The owon is
399USD at precisegauge

Thanks! Just checked shipping to India though - 72 bucks :/ Its 40 bucks cheaper shipped from AliExpress. Though I'm worried about getting burned by AE. That *is* such a nice display....

[T4P]

Ya sure, but precisegauge's owner has promised me that these are the ones with LAN. And he can addon a battery and VGA if you send him email ( not contact )
for not much of a fee
and many on aliexpress never answered me 

[Stonent]

Hi,

Yes, I'd love to know who is actually making what!
The panel layouts & GUI are almost identical, so obviously re-badged.

Tenma:-


Uni-T:-


Unique:-
From what I can see Unique don't do the widescreen layout versions so the layout is a little different.

http://octopart.com/datasheet/72-8395-tenma-7876149-862478

The Unique appears to be this Tenma scope.

[Bored@Work]

All the above are UNI-T instruments.

Tenma does not develop instruments. They are a brand of Element14/Farnell/Newark/CPC/<insert name of the day here>. Farnell slaps the Tenma brand on whatever cheap instrument they can get from whatever manufacturer, to increase the "value".