Rigol MSO7000 Unboxing & First Impressions

[rsjsouza]

My Rigol DS4000 scope has a CapXon populated switching supply in it, and it has been working fine for six years.

Similar scenario here, but mine is 2015. I suspect Rigol is (rightly so) giving business to their fellow countrymen and Capxon seems to have improved their product.

It's not unusual, especially with low voltages. Instead of stringing power traces all over, convert it where it's needed.

Exactly, as you can see the thing wants about 10 different voltages, and you don't want to put that all in the PSU. And splitting it between the PSU and main board just doesn't make sense.

Not only that, but a golden rule of electrical power transmission: the higher the voltage, the smaller the losses. The board already heats up as is, imagine carrying higher currents in longer traces.

One interesting detail I found funny about the teardown was Dave's comment about the HW revision in resistors - I found the same in my DS4014.
https://youtu.be/zbU2our0qCI?t=12m43s

[Fungus]

One interesting detail I found funny about the teardown was Dave's comment about the HW revision in resistors - I found the same in my DS4014.

Makes sense that the hardware revision is hard-coded.

Do these new ASICs and integrated front-end amplifier chips mean that Rigol can basically own any market segment where the competition is still using FPGAs and op-amps?

[nctnico]

One interesting detail I found funny about the teardown was Dave's comment about the HW revision in resistors - I found the same in my DS4014.

Makes sense that the hardware revision is hard-coded.

Do these new ASICs and integrated front-end amplifier chips mean that Rigol can basically own any market segment where the competition is still using FPGAs and op-amps?

No because 'consumer' components will always be cheaper. IMHO it is a mistake to think that very expensive to produce ASICs can somehow be used cost effectively in a low cost oscilloscope. Just look at the number of memory chips around the ASICs. A Xilinx Zync based scope just needs a multi-channel ADC and one memory chip to function. You can't beat that with an ASIC.

[bitseeker]

It's not unusual, especially with low voltages. Instead of stringing power traces all over, convert it where it's needed.

Not only that, but a golden rule of electrical power transmission: the higher the voltage, the smaller the losses. The board already heats up as is, imagine carrying higher currents in longer traces.

Exactly.