Author Topic: Lecroy - HDO4034A vs Tektronix - MDO3104  (Read 5601 times)

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Offline PlasmateurTopic starter

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Lecroy - HDO4034A vs Tektronix - MDO3104
« on: May 13, 2019, 05:00:45 pm »
We are having a bit of a debate in the lab as to which scope to purchase, personally I want to go with the Lecroy while another scientist wants the Tektronix just because that's the only scope brand they've ever used.

Here's the specs that I've compared between the two scopes.

   
Code: [Select]
                        Lecroy - HDO4034A         Tektronix - MDO3104                 Winner
Release Date         Apr-17                         Jun-15                                 Lecroy
Price                 $11K                          $14K                                 Lecroy
Resolution         12bit - (15bit enhanced) 8bit - (11bit Hi Res)                 Lecroy
Mem Depth         50 Mpoints                 10 Mpoints                         Lecroy
Bandwidth            350 MHz                         1 GHz                                 Tektronix
Rise Time         .75 ns                         .4 ns                                 Tektronix
Sample Rate         10 Gs/s                 5 Gs/s                                 Lecroy
Enhanced SR         125Gs/s Repetitive         Not Available                         Lecroy
Screen Size         12.1"                         9"                                 Lecroy
Noise Floor         145 uVrms @ 1mV                 179uVrms @ 1mV                         Lecroy
Channel Isolation 1000:1 @ DC-200MHz         100:1 @ DC-100MHz                 Lecroy
Stray Capacitance 15 pF                         3.9 pF                                 Tektronix

Any opinions?
« Last Edit: May 14, 2019, 03:52:46 am by Plasmateur »
 
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Offline Kean

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Re: Lecroy - HDO4034A vs Tektronix - MDO3104
« Reply #1 on: May 13, 2019, 05:15:17 pm »
What are your actual needs?
Have you looked at R&S?
 
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Offline PlasmateurTopic starter

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Re: Lecroy - HDO4034A vs Tektronix - MDO3104
« Reply #2 on: May 13, 2019, 05:29:40 pm »
What are your actual needs?
Have you looked at R&S?

My needs and my colleagues needs are a bit different. I want to have the high bit depth because I will need to see relatively small signals buried within another relatively large signal.

Also, I need to use a Harmonic mixer to mix down a carrier frequency (60GHz) resolve something close to the carrier, like 60.006GHz, to look for non-linear interactions.... but I would need a really high sampling rate to do this.     
 

Offline simone.pignatti

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Online JPortici

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Re: Lecroy - HDO4034A vs Tektronix - MDO3104
« Reply #4 on: May 13, 2019, 05:54:23 pm »
Ask for a test drive. Even better if you can get them in the same week
 
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Offline dzseki

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Re: Lecroy - HDO4034A vs Tektronix - MDO3104
« Reply #5 on: May 13, 2019, 06:47:39 pm »
At work we have DPO3034 which is I believe a very close match to that MDO. After 10 years the rotary encoders went bad, the official repair quote was 3000€, of course we did not bought it, instead did it in DIY way. As for the hardware, not sure if the MDO is significantly better but ours is really not that fast when using the full memory depth, let alone I you switch on math and measurements... the default capture depth is 100kpts at which the scope fares well.
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Offline mk_

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Re: Lecroy - HDO4034A vs Tektronix - MDO3104
« Reply #6 on: May 13, 2019, 06:52:43 pm »
We are having a bit of a debate in the lab as to which scope to purchase, personally I want to go with the Lecroy while another scientist wants the Tektronix just because that's the only scope brand they've ever used.

Any opinions?

I work with several LeCroys, own a Tek MDO3054.

If the money is aviable I would never buy the TEK again but look to R&S or LeCroy.

Reason: The userinterface of the MDO is one of the inconsistentest and ugliest UIs I ever had to work with, it`s getting slow when doing a little bit of math and the surrounding support is bad - compared with the LeCroy.

One of my customers has a HDO6104 (12 bit, 4 channel, 1GHz with 250MB memory/channel). It`s great to have the raw data (which is huge when using all that memory) from the LeCroy downloaded via LAN and then running Octave or similar.

At the customers site there are also about 10 or 12 year old probes from LeCroy, still useful on the newest units. Try this at TEKs... if you buy probes now - in 3-5 years expect them to throw them away because some clever guy decides to invent a new probe.interface.... This alone is a solid argument against TEK BTDT.

And yes, ask for testsystems and enough testingtime. Start a competition inside your lab for difficult measurements... and see how it can be done with the different units..

 
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Offline Mr Nutts

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Re: Lecroy - HDO4034A vs Tektronix - MDO3104
« Reply #7 on: May 13, 2019, 08:52:05 pm »
We had Tek MDO3000s at the college I went to and they were truly horrible, not just because everything on them was so slow, the knobs and buttons lock up when the scope is doing something demanding like FFT or just serial decoding, and quite often it crashed, too :(

The "spectrum analyzer" part in the MDO was poor, too, because it's just FFT and not a real spectrum analyzer like a swept spectrum on. I guess even a cheap SA made by Rigol or Siglent will perform much better ;)

The college only bought Tek because most of the profs didn't know any better and because Tek was the best thing since sliced bread last time they had contact with actual industry (which usually was in the 70s or 80s) :(

One prof who was still an active engineer who also did part-time teaching introduced us to Keysight and LeCroy. What a world of difference ;)

BTW, according to a former member who deals with lots of test equipment and knows these instruments inside out even Tek's latest scopes are still poor, and he said whoever considers Tek for a scope needs to get his heat examined  :D

Personally I ended up with Lecroy LT374 and Agilent Infinum 8064. Both are old by today's standards but still worlds better than the POS Tek scopes at college ;)
 
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Offline nctnico

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Re: Lecroy - HDO4034A vs Tektronix - MDO3104
« Reply #8 on: May 13, 2019, 09:05:59 pm »
What are your actual needs?
Have you looked at R&S?
I second this. R&S also has several different acquisition modes (including peak detect) which the Lecroy doesn't have.
There are small lies, big lies and then there is what is on the screen of your oscilloscope.
 
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Online dietert1

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Re: Lecroy - HDO4034A vs Tektronix - MDO3104
« Reply #9 on: May 13, 2019, 10:03:46 pm »
I think your table was clear enough and if you put the extra 3K the Tektronix costs into a higher bandwidth version of the HDO, another two of the three Tektronix wins may disappear. As interesting as it is, the low input capacitance of the Tektronix vanishes as a win as soon as you want to measure above 100 or 200 MHz, since that probably means using active probes.

Regards, Dieter
 
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Offline tautech

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Re: Lecroy - HDO4034A vs Tektronix - MDO3104
« Reply #10 on: May 13, 2019, 10:12:26 pm »
We are having a bit of a debate in the lab as to which scope to purchase, personally I want to go with the Lecroy while another scientist wants the Tektronix just because that's the only scope brand they've ever used.

Here's the specs that I've compared between the two scopes.

   
Code: [Select]
                        Lecroy - HDO4034A         Tektronix - MDO3104                 Winner
Release Date         Apr-17                         Jun-15                                 Lecroy
Price                 $11K                          $14K                                 Lecroy
Resolution         12bit - (15bit enhanced) 8bit - (11bit Hi Res)                 Lecroy
Mem Depth         50 Mpoints                 10 Mpoints                         Lecroy
Bandwidth            350 MHz                         1 GHz                                 Tektronix
Rise Time         .75 ns                         .4 ns                                 Tektronix
Sample Rate         10 Gs/s                 5 GHz                                 Lecroy
Enhanced SR         125Gs/s Repetitive         Not Available                         Lecroy
Screen Size         12.1"                         9"                                 Lecroy
Noise Floor         145 uVrms @ 1mV                 179uVrms @ 1mV                         Lecroy
Channel Isolation 1000:1 @ DC-200MHz         100:1 @ DC-100MHz                 Lecroy
Stray Capacitance 15 pF                         3.9 pF                                 Tektronix

Any opinions?
What happens when you throw a $7.5k 1 GHz 4ch Siglent into the mix ?
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Offline nctnico

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Re: Lecroy - HDO4034A vs Tektronix - MDO3104
« Reply #11 on: May 13, 2019, 10:38:31 pm »
Nobody gets fired for buying Tektronix...
Tektronix does have a new 4 series scope coming out in a couple of weeks which probably is a better alternative to the MDO3k/MDO4k series. These have 6 channel models as well. If there is time I would get one of these on loan to see how it compares.
There are small lies, big lies and then there is what is on the screen of your oscilloscope.
 

Offline Mr Nutts

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Re: Lecroy - HDO4034A vs Tektronix - MDO3104
« Reply #12 on: May 13, 2019, 10:55:27 pm »
Nobody gets fired for buying Tektronix...

Yeah, right, if you're a government employee or work in education maybe ;)

Quote
Tektronix does have a new 4 series scope coming out in a couple of weeks which probably is a better alternative to the MDO3k/MDO4k series. These have 6 channel models as well. If there is time I would get one of these on loan to see how it compares.

If the existing MSO5 and MSO6 are an indicator then the new Tek 4 series scope will again perform poorly and be full of bugs :(

And it appears Tek support is poor, too :(

Why would anyone buy Tek if there are much better alternatives out there?  :-//
« Last Edit: May 13, 2019, 11:00:46 pm by Mr Nutts »
 
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Offline 0xdeadbeef

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Re: Lecroy - HDO4034A vs Tektronix - MDO3104
« Reply #13 on: May 13, 2019, 11:26:20 pm »
I'd personally always choose a LeCroy over a Tek. Letting aside the GUI, the much better measurement possibilities and stuff like WaveScan: LeCroy has the same probe interface for some decades now while Tek changes it every few years. The only benefit I see for the Tek MDO line is the somewhat questionable spectrum analyzer (which is even more crippled in the MDO3000) and the existence of keygens for options (but 1GHz bandwidth is only possible on the the MDO3104).
What about a compromise? Sacrifice the 12bit resolution but get the 1GHz bandwidth with a WaveSurfer 510.
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Offline DaJMasta

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Re: Lecroy - HDO4034A vs Tektronix - MDO3104
« Reply #14 on: May 14, 2019, 12:28:55 am »
They are sort of in different classes in terms of bandwidth, but especially with the feedback from the thread so far.... the LeCroy is just obviously a newer generation scope.  If you don't need the super high bandwidth, the specs are basically all in favor of the LeCroy, and it sounds like the UI, responsiveness, and connectivity options are a ways ahead of the Tek.  FWIW, I think the MDO4000 series from Tek probably is a much better match, the MDO4034C is pretty close for price and bandwidth, but offers the 6GHz SA in place of the better frontend and acquisition of the basic channels on the LeCroy, and it should be a bit more modern feeling and performing than the MDO3000 series, which I believe was their first iteration of the MDO series.
 

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Re: Lecroy - HDO4034A vs Tektronix - MDO3104
« Reply #15 on: May 14, 2019, 01:21:17 am »
If the existing MSO5 and MSO6 are an indicator then the new Tek 4 series scope will again perform poorly and be full of bugs :(
That is a bit early to say. I'll admit the MSO5 and MSO6 didn't seem to work very well when released but it would be reasonable to expect most of the teething problems have been ironed out by now. However I don't have any information on the current state so the best advice is to get one on loan if you are looking at a scope in this price range. Maybe it is perfect for the job. Maybe not. Either way no harm is done and at least you went through all the possibilities.
There are small lies, big lies and then there is what is on the screen of your oscilloscope.
 

Offline snoopy

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Re: Lecroy - HDO4034A vs Tektronix - MDO3104
« Reply #16 on: May 14, 2019, 01:32:36 am »
We are having a bit of a debate in the lab as to which scope to purchase, personally I want to go with the Lecroy while another scientist wants the Tektronix just because that's the only scope brand they've ever used.

Here's the specs that I've compared between the two scopes.

   
Code: [Select]
                        Lecroy - HDO4034A         Tektronix - MDO3104                 Winner
Release Date         Apr-17                         Jun-15                                 Lecroy
Price                 $11K                          $14K                                 Lecroy
Resolution         12bit - (15bit enhanced) 8bit - (11bit Hi Res)                 Lecroy
Mem Depth         50 Mpoints                 10 Mpoints                         Lecroy
Bandwidth            350 MHz                         1 GHz                                 Tektronix
Rise Time         .75 ns                         .4 ns                                 Tektronix
Sample Rate         10 Gs/s                 5 GHz                                 Lecroy
Enhanced SR         125Gs/s Repetitive         Not Available                         Lecroy
Screen Size         12.1"                         9"                                 Lecroy
Noise Floor         145 uVrms @ 1mV                 179uVrms @ 1mV                         Lecroy
Channel Isolation 1000:1 @ DC-200MHz         100:1 @ DC-100MHz                 Lecroy
Stray Capacitance 15 pF                         3.9 pF                                 Tektronix

Any opinions?

waveform update rate and dedicated spectrum analyser ?
 
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Offline Mr Nutts

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Re: Lecroy - HDO4034A vs Tektronix - MDO3104
« Reply #17 on: May 14, 2019, 02:46:49 am »
If the existing MSO5 and MSO6 are an indicator then the new Tek 4 series scope will again perform poorly and be full of bugs :(
That is a bit early to say.

That's what people who evaluated these scopes on multiple occasions say. It appears Tek has added some more options but the basic firmware is still full of bugs :(

And then there's also the user interface, which it seems on the MSO5 and MSO6 is as illogical as on other Tek digital scopes. And there's even less chance that this will be fixed :(

Quote
I'll admit the MSO5 and MSO6 didn't seem to work very well when released but it would be reasonable to expect most of the teething problems have been ironed out by now.

Last time I used the MDO3000 at college the series was on the market for over three years, and still with the latest firmware there were crashes :(

Last I heard, this has barely changed with today's firmware :(

I guess you'd have to be a hardcore Tek fan to overlook all these things ;)


FWIW, I think the MDO4000 series from Tek probably is a much better match, the MDO4034C is pretty close for price and bandwidth, but offers the 6GHz SA in place of the better frontend and acquisition of the basic channels on the LeCroy, and it should be a bit more modern feeling and performing than the MDO3000 series, which I believe was their first iteration of the MDO series.

The MDO4000 my college had were not much better than the MDO3000. I think the biggest benefits were the larger display and that the "spectrum analyzer" could be used at the same time as the scope function (on the MDO3000 you can have either scope or spectrum analyzer). It was still slow and the user interface was basically the same as on the MDO3000 :(
« Last Edit: May 14, 2019, 03:03:19 am by Mr Nutts »
 

Offline Mr Nutts

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Re: Lecroy - HDO4034A vs Tektronix - MDO3104
« Reply #18 on: May 14, 2019, 02:56:39 am »
waveform update rate and dedicated spectrum analyser ?

I don't know the exact data but the trigger rate on the MDO was very low, like a few thousand updates per second. There's fastaq but that works with data reduction and excludes most of the scope's functionality when active :(

Also:

https://forum.allaboutcircuits.com/blog/the-truth-about-oscilloscope-waveform-update-rates-and-why-not-to-fall-for-it.1514/

It appears the trigger rate of the MDO300o is 2200 per second in normal mode.

The "spectrum analyzer" is very poor, not just in its performance. It's just FFT and like everything else on the MDO3000 is so slow that it hurts :(
« Last Edit: May 14, 2019, 02:58:31 am by Mr Nutts »
 

Offline PlasmateurTopic starter

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Re: Lecroy - HDO4034A vs Tektronix - MDO3104
« Reply #19 on: May 14, 2019, 03:55:10 am »
What happens when you throw a $7.5k 1 GHz 4ch Siglent into the mix ?

What's the highest sampling rate you can give me?
 

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Re: Lecroy - HDO4034A vs Tektronix - MDO3104
« Reply #20 on: May 14, 2019, 04:10:54 am »
What happens when you throw a $7.5k 1 GHz 4ch Siglent into the mix ?

What's the highest sampling rate you can give me?
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Offline snoopy

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Re: Lecroy - HDO4034A vs Tektronix - MDO3104
« Reply #21 on: May 14, 2019, 11:39:45 am »
waveform update rate and dedicated spectrum analyser ?

I don't know the exact data but the trigger rate on the MDO was very low, like a few thousand updates per second. There's fastaq but that works with data reduction and excludes most of the scope's functionality when active :(

Also:

https://forum.allaboutcircuits.com/blog/the-truth-about-oscilloscope-waveform-update-rates-and-why-not-to-fall-for-it.1514/

It appears the trigger rate of the MDO300o is 2200 per second in normal mode.

The "spectrum analyzer" is very poor, not just in its performance. It's just FFT and like everything else on the MDO3000 is so slow that it hurts :(

Yes the Teks normally default to slow update rates as usual but the Tek has Fast Acquisition mode or DPO mode as well as a Fast Frame capture mode using segmented memory. Don't think the Lecroys have ever offered fast acquisition  rates. The Intensity graded display of the Tek is useful to display AM waveforms etc or anything that you would use a normal CRO to display.

I believe the spectrum analyzer on the MDO is more like a normal spectrum analyzer rather than FFT so there are some benefits of doing this in hardware.

cheers
 

Offline Mr Nutts

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Re: Lecroy - HDO4034A vs Tektronix - MDO3104
« Reply #22 on: May 14, 2019, 06:14:28 pm »
Yes the Teks normally default to slow update rates as usual

Because Tek's architecture is slow as hell ;)

Quote
but the Tek has Fast Acquisition mode or DPO mode as well as a Fast Frame capture mode using segmented memory. Don't think the Lecroys have ever offered fast acquisition  rates.

No? ;)



And as far as I know this intensity mode works with the full sample rate and all scope functions are still available when it's enabled - unlike Tek fastaq ;)

Quote
The Intensity graded display of the Tek is useful to display AM waveforms etc or anything that you would use a normal CRO to display.

You say that as if intensity graded display was something special - it isn't. Even my old Lecroy LTs have it, in monochrome (analog scope style) and color, and even as a waterfall display And these scopes are over 16 years old ;)

Quote
I believe the spectrum analyzer on the MDO is more like a normal spectrum analyzer rather than FFT so there are some benefits of doing this in hardware.

You may believe this (probably because of Tek marketing BS) but the reality is the "spectrum analyzer" of the MDO3000 and MDO4000 is just FFT, not a real swept spectrum analyzer. And it suffers from the same limitations re. span vs RBW as the scope FFT due to the limited FFT size :(

And like the scope FFT, the SA is painfully slow unless you select a very short span with a large RBW :(

A cheap Siglent or Rigol spectrum analyzer is a much better investment if you work with RF than using the MDO3000's built-in "spectrum analyzer" POS ;)
« Last Edit: May 14, 2019, 06:26:32 pm by Mr Nutts »
 

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Re: Lecroy - HDO4034A vs Tektronix - MDO3104
« Reply #23 on: May 14, 2019, 06:39:48 pm »
waveform update rate and dedicated spectrum analyser ?

I don't know the exact data but the trigger rate on the MDO was very low, like a few thousand updates per second. There's fastaq but that works with data reduction and excludes most of the scope's functionality when active :(

Also:

https://forum.allaboutcircuits.com/blog/the-truth-about-oscilloscope-waveform-update-rates-and-why-not-to-fall-for-it.1514/

It appears the trigger rate of the MDO300o is 2200 per second in normal mode.

The "spectrum analyzer" is very poor, not just in its performance. It's just FFT and like everything else on the MDO3000 is so slow that it hurts :(

Yes the Teks normally default to slow update rates as usual but the Tek has Fast Acquisition mode or DPO mode as well as a Fast Frame capture mode using segmented memory. Don't think the Lecroys have ever offered fast acquisition  rates. The Intensity graded display of the Tek is useful to display AM waveforms etc or anything that you would use a normal CRO to display.

I believe the spectrum analyzer on the MDO is more like a normal spectrum analyzer rather than FFT so there are some benefits of doing this in hardware.

cheers

MDO3000 and MDO4000 doesn't have FastFrame or any type of segmented memory...
It's spectrum analyser is direct sampling type using Z-chirp transform.
It is exactly similar to FFT based solution, but it has user interface that is SA like and it is optimized  for best performance possible with built in A/D. It's performance is a bit better that usual FFT on a scope but is significantly worse that real SA.
Fast Acq mode has nice waveform rate, but display has sampling artefacts (it looks like it's rendered from short horizontal lines not dots) and it's biggest problem is that when you use it ALL measurements are disabled.

Except 1 GHz, there is nothing going for Tek MDO3000 series. LeCroys are superior in every way, Keysight 3000T too, R&S 3000 series also, if money is tight new Siglent 5000X series is orders of magnitude better ..
 

Offline 0xdeadbeef

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Re: Lecroy - HDO4034A vs Tektronix - MDO3104
« Reply #24 on: May 14, 2019, 06:47:22 pm »
Some (?) LeCroy had/have a special mode called "WaveStream" which is meant to simulate an analog scope (like "digital phophor" etc.).
Actually an older/lesser XP based Wavesurfer 64xs (or so, can't recall the exact model number) has this feature, while a more modern and higher end Win7 based Waverunner 6zi doesn't.
I somewhat assume that for the lesser scopes it was some kind of FPGA feature while for the higher end scopes they rely on the CPU power to do intensity grading in SW.
For sure though the intensity grading is much less pronounced on a LeCroy than on any Agilent/Keysight.
To be honest, I'm not a big fan of this anyway. While it's true that you might spot glitches because of fast update rate, a glitch is always very dark due to the intensity grading logic. On a LeCroy, you would rather use advanced measurement/analysis/trigger features to spot issues than to stare at the screen.
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Re: Lecroy - HDO4034A vs Tektronix - MDO3104
« Reply #25 on: May 14, 2019, 07:10:24 pm »
One thing that is good with fast retrigger is that when you are measuring a parameter and gathering statistics is that with fast rettriger you gather data faster. 
It all depends what you do. For interactive work Keysight concept is king. If you tend to grab data and massage it, LeCroy concept is better.
Also, problem with LeCroy is that cheaper scopes don't have many advanced analysis options that you would use it to make up for lack of speed.
There is no such thing as perfect scope. For instance, little Rigol DS1000Z has some triggers Keysight 3000T doesn't have. But, combined with Zone Trigger, I yet have to find something I can't trigger on..

Best advice is what Nctnico said: get few candidates on a loan and try doing your job.. Showstoppers will reveal themselves.

 

Offline nctnico

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Re: Lecroy - HDO4034A vs Tektronix - MDO3104
« Reply #26 on: May 14, 2019, 07:58:52 pm »
To be honest, I'm not a big fan of this anyway. While it's true that you might spot glitches because of fast update rate, a glitch is always very dark due to the intensity grading logic. On a LeCroy, you would rather use advanced measurement/analysis/trigger features to spot issues than to stare at the screen.
I agree that triggering is the best option to capture unexpected events. Staring at a screen is not a good use of time. BTW the R&S RTM3000 has an inverse intensity grading mode. The rare signals stick out like a sore thumb. IMHO having many levels of intensity grading is nice eye candy but there is very little practical value. 16 levels starting at 50% brightness is more than enough. There is only so much visual information you can process.
« Last Edit: May 14, 2019, 08:02:34 pm by nctnico »
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Re: Lecroy - HDO4034A vs Tektronix - MDO3104
« Reply #27 on: May 15, 2019, 12:30:42 am »
Quote
but the Tek has Fast Acquisition mode or DPO mode as well as a Fast Frame capture mode using segmented memory. Don't think the Lecroys have ever offered fast acquisition  rates.

No? ;)



And as far as I know this intensity mode works with the full sample rate and all scope functions are still available when it's enabled - unlike Tek fastaq ;)
That shows the trigger rate, which can be unrelated to what data is actually arriving at the screen. There are many brands of scope which can be put into configurations where the trigger output shows impressive rates, but the data isn't arriving on the screen. There isn't a simple way to test the waveform update rate in those cases.

The value of those different modes and waveform update rate are entirely down to the user and their applications.
 

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Re: Lecroy - HDO4034A vs Tektronix - MDO3104
« Reply #28 on: May 15, 2019, 12:37:09 am »
Yes the Teks normally default to slow update rates as usual but the Tek has Fast Acquisition mode or DPO mode as well as a Fast Frame capture mode using segmented memory. Don't think the Lecroys have ever offered fast acquisition  rates. The Intensity graded display of the Tek is useful to display AM waveforms etc or anything that you would use a normal CRO to display.
You have come to the same juncture as many before you, the division between scopes with an emphasis on realtime display, and those with an emphasis on deep memory and analysis of that offline.

Lecroy WaveJet is one of their few realtime designs, and has a really good graded display that works simultaneously with segmented memory so you can also step through the individual waveforms when stopped. A great basic scope but its quite an old platform so may not be as competitive as other options.
 

Offline snoopy

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Re: Lecroy - HDO4034A vs Tektronix - MDO3104
« Reply #29 on: May 15, 2019, 02:09:28 am »

You say that as if intensity graded display was something special - it isn't. Even my old Lecroy LTs have it, in monochrome (analog scope style) and color, and even as a waterfall display And these scopes are over 16 years old ;)


Proper intensity grading ? lets see what it looks like on an AM waveform ;)

btw I have an old Tek TDS784A from the 90's that can capture waveforms at a rate of 390,000 wfs and display rare events. Donlt think any of the competitors had that at the time ;) And a TDS7054 does proper intensity grading with up to 200 K wfs with all measurement ability available. Both scopes have equivalent time sampling of up to 250 Gs/s. Unfortunately they dropped this in the later scopes.

cheers
 

Offline Mr Nutts

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Re: Lecroy - HDO4034A vs Tektronix - MDO3104
« Reply #30 on: May 15, 2019, 03:35:41 am »

You say that as if intensity graded display was something special - it isn't. Even my old Lecroy LTs have it, in monochrome (analog scope style) and color, and even as a waterfall display And these scopes are over 16 years old ;)


Proper intensity grading ? lets see what it looks like on an AM waveform ;)

If you want me to post a screenshot of an AM modulated waveform then you'll have to wait until next week when my lab redecoration is finished  ;)

Quote
btw I have an old Tek TDS784A from the 90's that can capture waveforms at a rate of 390,000 wfs and display rare events. Donlt think any of the competitors had that at the time ;) And a TDS7054 does proper intensity grading with up to 200 K wfs with all measurement ability available. Both scopes have equivalent time sampling of up to 250 Gs/s. Unfortunately they dropped this in the later scopes.

I'm no expert (and I think waveform rates are way overvalued) but wasn't there the HP 54600 series with MegaZoom that was even faster and didn't even need a special mode to reach high waveform rates? ;)

But that doesn't matter because no matter how fast your scope is you still never know if there's that very rare anomaly because it most of the time it's still completely blind ;)

My old LT will capture rare anomalies every time because of its sophisticated set of triggers ;)

TDS7000 are ancient, and as far as I know they run the code of early TDS scopes on a separate computer inside the scope and wrapped a Windows GUI around it which is why all these scopes are so horribly slow. My college had Tek  DPO3000 and MDO3000 (which were the standard scopes), a few MDO4000, I think two TDS6000 and a DPO7000 (and maybe others I can't remember), and all of them were slow as wading through molasses :(

And ETS at 250GSps, who cares? It's not giving you any advantage over the 200 GSps in ETS as on the Waveruner xi, or even the 20GSps I could get from my LT. And who cares about ETS anyways? ;)

I'd rather use an Agilent Infinum or Lecroy X-Stream scope over any Tek scope - no matter if TDS, DPO or MDO. Less frustrating and better performance ;)
 

Offline Mr Nutts

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Re: Lecroy - HDO4034A vs Tektronix - MDO3104
« Reply #31 on: May 15, 2019, 03:37:18 am »
Lecroy WaveJet is one of their few realtime designs

Lecroy Wavejet is not Lecroy design. It's a rebadged Iwatsu scope (was mentioned often enough in this forum) ;)
 

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Re: Lecroy - HDO4034A vs Tektronix - MDO3104
« Reply #32 on: May 15, 2019, 04:30:54 am »
Lecroy WaveJet is one of their few realtime designs

Lecroy Wavejet is not Lecroy design. It's a rebadged Iwatsu scope (was mentioned often enough in this forum) ;)
Didn't say it was, Lecroy offer and still sell a scope of the realtime design even if it is rebadged or co-designed.
 

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Re: Lecroy - HDO4034A vs Tektronix - MDO3104
« Reply #33 on: May 15, 2019, 06:14:36 am »
Proper intensity grading ? lets see what it looks like on an AM waveform ;)

who cares? unless all you need to do is look at AM sine waves
Color temperature intensity grading is much more useful IMHO. I may be wrong but in the lecroy WS3K i could also decide the colours for hot/cold so i could also achieve the inverted colour grade. For my experience i have to agree with nico, 16 levels have been plenty in the real world for me.

Even better, launching an histogram of that area shows me much more than what intensity grading tells me.
« Last Edit: May 15, 2019, 06:16:24 am by JPortici »
 

Offline snoopy

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Re: Lecroy - HDO4034A vs Tektronix - MDO3104
« Reply #34 on: May 15, 2019, 12:57:38 pm »

You say that as if intensity graded display was something special - it isn't. Even my old Lecroy LTs have it, in monochrome (analog scope style) and color, and even as a waterfall display And these scopes are over 16 years old ;)


Proper intensity grading ? lets see what it looks like on an AM waveform ;)

If you want me to post a screenshot of an AM modulated waveform then you'll have to wait until next week when my lab redecoration is finished  ;)

Quote
btw I have an old Tek TDS784A from the 90's that can capture waveforms at a rate of 390,000 wfs and display rare events. Donlt think any of the competitors had that at the time ;) And a TDS7054 does proper intensity grading with up to 200 K wfs with all measurement ability available. Both scopes have equivalent time sampling of up to 250 Gs/s. Unfortunately they dropped this in the later scopes.

I'm no expert (and I think waveform rates are way overvalued) but wasn't there the HP 54600 series with MegaZoom that was even faster and didn't even need a special mode to reach high waveform rates? ;)

But that doesn't matter because no matter how fast your scope is you still never know if there's that very rare anomaly because it most of the time it's still completely blind ;)

My old LT will capture rare anomalies every time because of its sophisticated set of triggers ;)

TDS7000 are ancient, and as far as I know they run the code of early TDS scopes on a separate computer inside the scope and wrapped a Windows GUI around it which is why all these scopes are so horribly slow. My college had Tek  DPO3000 and MDO3000 (which were the standard scopes), a few MDO4000, I think two TDS6000 and a DPO7000 (and maybe others I can't remember), and all of them were slow as wading through molasses :(

And ETS at 250GSps, who cares? It's not giving you any advantage over the 200 GSps in ETS as on the Waveruner xi, or even the 20GSps I could get from my LT. And who cares about ETS anyways? ;)

I'd rather use an Agilent Infinum or Lecroy X-Stream scope over any Tek scope - no matter if TDS, DPO or MDO. Less frustrating and better performance ;)

By all means show us then ! And that HP scope scope you quoted is a sub-sampling scope with a 20 msps max sampling rate for a quoted bandwidth of 100MHz. I very much doubt that claim you made about it because I used one of these scopes once and its single shot performance was terrible showing a sparse collection of dots or jagged lines on the screen which made it pretty much useless for single events !

And there is no point in trying to capture an anomaly using triggering if you don't know what kind of anomaly it is ! Once you characterize the anomaly then you can setup your trigger to capture it ;) That's why Tek brought out Instavu on some of its early scopes, one of which I have. And it does capture rare anomalies that other scopes completely miss.

Also ETS scopes display information much more accurately approaching the nyquist frequency compared to scopes that use interpolation ;)

And your description of the TDS7000 scopes is way off too. You can sse in this video differences in performances of scopes with different WUR !

https://youtu.be/2465uN-qpIY?t=1316



« Last Edit: May 15, 2019, 12:59:18 pm by snoopy »
 


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