Teledyne LeCroy WaveRunner 64xi, morphed to differential probes...

[tautech]

Hmmm, IME the 80 conductor cable has an inactive conductor between each active on to reduce crosstalk

Correct.

and they were quite available in the days of IDE.

Yes, for desktop IDE components (which used a 40pin connector). But not for the much narrower 44pin variant used for laptop drives. The main reason is that laptops rarely use cables to connect to hard disks but direct connectors.

Of course. 

[joeqsmith]

Just be careful with SSDs in that scope, as they tend to suffer from file system corruption (I tried several ones, including the Transcend PATA SSD on your picture), and all suffered from the same problem.

The reason seems to be that the SSDs only really support UDMA modes, which for PATA requires a 80 conductor cable to work reliably. The scope however uses a 44pin cable (there are no 84 conductor cables, at least I'm not aware of them) which is not really suited for UDMA66 or faster modes. Another forum user (Tunersandwich) who has the same scope made the same experience, he also tried a SSHD but that was a no-go either.

In the end I went back to spinning rust, i.e. a modern fast SATA laptop drive connected through a cheap SATA-PATA bridge. Works fine and absolutely reliable.

$7350 for the Rigol DS6064 or $9660 for the DS6104.  I assume this is the market LeCroy is going after.   

Not really. The WaveRunner Series starts quite a bit above that.

The WaveSurfer 3000 is the one that competes with the Rigol DS6000 scopes, although no-one really buys them anyways due to their poor value for money.

64xi was $11,500 new.  A little higher price than the Rigol.  I would like to see how the DS6104 compares.   

No problems at all with the 8500A using the PATA to SATA with the SSD.   It's been in there about four months now.   

I looked up the controller and old drive.  Both supported UDMA5.  Appears to be running in UDMA2.   Guess they just skimped on the cable.   

I ran the 64xi at least 10 hours over the weekend.   Maybe 5 power ups.   I'll post if it starts to have any troubles. 

You still have one of these right?  Does your DAQ have the same rework?


 

 

[XFDDesign]

Out of curiosity, how old is the unit?

[Wuerstchenhund]

$7350 for the Rigol DS6064 or $9660 for the DS6104.  I assume this is the market LeCroy is going after.

Not really. The WaveRunner Series starts quite a bit above that.

The WaveSurfer 3000 is the one that competes with the Rigol DS6000 scopes, although no-one really buys them anyways due to their poor value for money.

64xi was $11,500 new.  A little higher price than the Rigol.

Yes but that was $11,500 in 2006, not in today's dollar. These days (2nd gen successor) WR6zi starts at around $13,900.

I would like to see how the DS6104 compares.

Not well.  The DS6000 is a very simple scope. Only very basic maths, slower sample rate (5GSa/s for the Rigol vs 10GSa/s for the WR64Xi), slower max waveform rate (180k for the Rigol vs 1.2M for the WR64Xi), only simple and basic measurements, no advanced options (i.e. Advanced Math, Jitter Analysis, Power Analysis, Serial Decode for a ton of standards, or one of the ton of other options that exist for the WR64Xi), and because it's essentially the same platform as the smaller Rigol models (embedded Linux) there's no Windows, and no means to install Mathlab, LabView or any other program directly on the scope.

The Rigol does have larger sample memory (140M) but that isn't of much use as there's no search capability whatsoever, and scrolling through the memory is slow on the Rigol.

The DS6000 is completely overpriced for what it offers, not just in comparison with older scopes like the WR64Xi, but also in comparison with current scopes in the same price bracket like the WaveRunner 3000 or the R&S RTM2000/RTE, or even the (aside from the new touch screen functionality pretty dated) Keysight DSOX3000T Series.

No problems at all with the 8500A using the PATA to SATA with the SSD.   It's been in there about four months now.

Yes, but that is a scope with a standard 40pin SATA connection used in desktop PCs, and the 8500A also came with an 80 conductor cable. 

I ran the 64xi at least 10 hours over the weekend.   Maybe 5 power ups.   I'll post if it starts to have any troubles.

Please do, it would be interesting. I had these problems with a scope from 2006, and the one Tunersandwich has is IIRC from 2008, and he was affected as well. But it took a while to show. 

You still have one of these right?  Does your DAQ have the same rework?

Yes, I have. I can't remember about any rework but I see if I can take some pictures.

[joeqsmith]

I was just trying to find the highest end Rigol offers to compare and assumed it would be lower cost.     

Was not sure about the features.    This one only has the DFP2 enabled.   Wonder what they would charge turn turn on all of the features at this point.     With the 8500A, they wanted the full price for the JTA2 until they offered it for making that video. 

Wonder it the quality is any better on the Rigol.  The 64xi is only 8 years old. Been in for service at least once for dead channel.  You were saying yours has dead channels as well with the connector problems.    Wonder how the Rigols are holding up.     

Yes, the 8500A uses the full size 80-pin cable.  Not sure what UDMA mode it is using with that crazy setup.  The 33MHz mode should be fine on the 64xi.  Maybe something else was causing your problems.    Any idea how long yours ran for before running into problems?   Did it just fail to boot?

[Wuerstchenhund]

Was not sure about the features.    This one only has the DFP2 enabled.   Wonder what they would charge turn turn on all of the features at this point.     With the 8500A, they wanted the full price for the JTA2 until they offered it for making that video. 

Well, the price for the software options very much depend on if you're a business (and if so, how good you're at negotiating) or a hobbyist (in which case you might even get some enabled for free).

Wonder it the quality is any better on the Rigol.  The 64xi is only 8 years old. Been in for service at least once for dead channel.  You were saying yours has dead channels as well with the connector problems.    Wonder how the Rigols are holding up.

I'd guess a bit better (they are pretty simple scopes with I guess a single PCB), and build quality wide the WR64Xi is really a few steps down from other LeCroy scopes. The successor (WRXi-A) uses the same chassis, but apparently the build quality has improved a lot in them.

Yes, the 8500A uses the full size 80-pin cable.  Not sure what UDMA mode it is using with that crazy setup.

I'd guess it's running at UMDA/133. I wonder why you used the PATA cable for the SSD, as the WM8kA should have SATA ports on its mainboard which would be easier (and a bit faster, too).

The 33MHz mode should be fine on the 64xi.  Maybe something else was causing your problems.

UMDA33 is fine, however most SSDs seem to want to switch into faster modes, and without the additional conductors in the cable there is some corruption.

Any idea how long yours ran for before running into problems?   Did it just fail to boot?

Difficult to say, in some cases it showed after several boots, in others it ran fine for a few days. Most of the time it booted, but after a while I got strange errors, and when I checked the file system I found some corruption. The scope's hardware is fine, as were the drives. And it never happens with hard drives (SATA or PATA), only with SSDs.

[joeqsmith]

I wonder why you used the PATA cable for the SSD, as the WM8kA should have SATA ports on its mainboard which would be easier (and a bit faster, too).

My 8500A has an Intel D845GE motherboard and no support for SATA.  I thought about adding a card but then wanted to add the 1G Ethernet board. 

Difficult to say, in some cases it showed after several boots, in others it ran fine for a few days. Most of the time it booted, but after a while I got strange errors, and when I checked the file system I found some corruption. The scope's hardware is fine, as were the drives. And it never happens with hard drives (SATA or PATA), only with SSDs.

Good to know.  I'll start keeping a record for it.  I would guess it now has at least 20 power ups and 20 hours of operation with the SSD installed.   When I store data, I have been using an external USB stick.   
 

[XFDDesign]

Do you know if all/most of the LeCroys in this series have replaceable PC kit? I've been looking at the WaveJet line, but the WaveSurfer isn't too much more money for a bit better digitizer engine.

[Wuerstchenhund]

Do you know if all/most of the LeCroys in this series have replaceable PC kit? I've been looking at the WaveJet line, but the WaveSurfer isn't too much more money for a bit better digitizer engine.

Depends on what you mean with "replaceable PC kit". All LeCroy scopes starting with the WaveSurfer Series are Windows (and thus more or less "PC") based. In fact, using "PC" technology (i.e standard computer technology) is one of the reasons LeCroy got to where they are, which is the top of all high end scope vendors.

Scopes below the WaveSurfer Series (like the WaveJet) are just bought in as complete package from Siglent and Iwatsu and rebadged with a LeCroy label.

However, if you ask if you can swap mainboards around in those scopes, then the answer is 'no' aside from the WaveMaster 8k(A), WavePro 7k(A) and WaveRunner 6k(A) (which use standard intel business mainboards), and even on those scopes the choice of mainboards is very limited due to the display controller. The WRXi and most other LeCroy Windows scopes use industrial mainboards in a specific configuration.

The PC part should really be considered as any other part of a modern scope, i.e. manufacturer proprietary. What usually can be swapped however are hard disks, RAM and the processor, which is useful as LeCroy tended to skimp on the processor they put in their older Windows scopes. The WRXi for example comes with a 1.3GHz Celeron M with 512k cache and 400MHz FSB, and upgrading mine to a P-M 1.8GHz with 2MB and 533MHz FSB made a huge difference, simply because a LeCroy X-Stream scope does all calculations in the very fast CPU cache.

[XFDDesign]

LeCroy was actually at my day job today, showing off their full suite of products.

On the HDO6k scopes, they're using a standard form-factor mainboard, and they have access to that area without a lot of fuss. The WaveSurfer3k series is all embedded stuff, no desktop processors in the thing. Part of the question was in terms of repair capacity but unlike Tek, LeCroy has a support sustaining model that is quite nice.

The space of the question, was if it was possible to buy an identical (chipset & class) mainboard, would it be possible to sustain the use if/when the thing burns out, and if that was common for this line of scopes. With the HDO6k at least, it appears the answer is yes.

[XFDDesign]

On the HDO6ks, it's basically a micro-atx mainboard and periphery set. It appears (I didn't get to take one apart) that it should be removing the back panel to get access to it. Much less hassle than you  went through.

I think you mentioned you have used a number of LeCroy systems. How do you like them overall (factoring in this experience)?

[joeqsmith]

As much as I bitch about them, consider this is all I have for scopes at home should tell you what I think of the brand overall. 

I would guess the original price for the 7200, 7200A and 8500A were all well over $60K new.  These are all very nice systems.  I would put my first 7200 up against most of the new DSOs and it was built 1989.  Consider it came from the USAF, that thing was put through the ringer and is still rock solid to this day.    The performance and features were second to none at that time.   You will see I still use the 7200A in most videos I make.  That DSO had the SCSI and deep memory options and I would guess it was part of IOMega's production test setup.   Again, very reliable.     

Video I made showing my old 8500A with the JTA2 enabled.   It's all about the phase noise you asked about...



Considering the age of this setup I would like to see what they have now.   

Where I currently work, we had been using LeCroy for some time for the higher end DSOs.   The software, firmware and FPGA updates for them were a nightmare.  They would make changes and it would break something.    Interesting enough, when I got the 8500A, I installed all the latest updates and tested against every problem I had found with X-stream and I am VERY happy to say it has been VERY stable and bug free.    But these are pretty mature systems now.

Some of the people I have had help me from LeCroy were second to none.  Over all I have been very happy with their service, even for my home hobby sort of work they have really done more than I could ask for to help me out.   

At work I sent one of the high end systems in for a cal one time.  These don't get used very often and when it was returned it sat for a fair period of time before I needed it.   Turned out a channel was dead.  This DSO was never used by anyone but myself.   I called LeCroy, explained the whole thing.  Was told it had been too long.   $3K and they repaired the damaged channel.    For the high end DSOs, this is the only failure that system ever had and I believe it happened during calibration.     

For work we starting using these low end systems like the 64xi for general work.   I have heard of several failures with them at work.    This particular 64xi was scrapped a few years ago when channel 3 failed a second time and they quoted $5K to repair it.   At work these scopes get a lot of hours on them as they are used in various test fixtures.   They really only get bounced around when they are sent out for cal. 

We have since started buying all Agilent DSOs except for the automated tests where the code base is big enough we stay with LeCroy.  I have not heard of any failures with the Agilents.   It's too early to say how the black ones are going to hold up in a test environment.   Ask me in a few years.   

Again, I would like to get my hands on a top of the line Rigol and see how it compares.  Right now my 64xi has minimal features so wouldn't make for much of a demo.   At least it's running good and has all the knobs now.   

If I needed a high end scope for work again and was looking to spend $80K, Teledyne would be the first call I made!   

[XFDDesign]

Good to know, thanks!

When LeCroy visited here, I got to fondle the WaveSurfer3054 and found it to be a very nice scope. I particularly liked how they do their "analog persistence" as it "feels" (i.e. is subjective) much closer to the classical CRO display. What has pushed me over the fence towards that scope, on top of its capabilities, is their support system. 3 year warranty over Tek's 1, and 7 year sustaining support after they EOL the line, and after that "as best as we can do." So again, many thanks for the information you provided (even though this particular scope is at their low-end of in-house products).

[free_electron]

I was walking with the 64xi and some of the knobs fell off.

All the newer LeCraps have this problem. i don;t know if it is the plastic of the knobs that becomes weak , or the shaft fo the encoders that shrinks. but every single LeCroy i worked with ( waverunnners, waveace's , 7zi's ) suffer from this problem...

[joeqsmith]

I was walking with the 64xi and some of the knobs fell off.

All the newer LeCraps have this problem. i don;t know if it is the plastic of the knobs that becomes weak , or the shaft fo the encoders that shrinks. but every single LeCroy i worked with ( waverunnners, waveace's , 7zi's ) suffer from this problem...

I don't think its the shafts.   The new replacement knobs they gave me for it are very tight.   On the two larger ones, to the point of needing to hold the back of the circuit board to press fit them into place.   

BTW, I have been running the system every day from a cold start and not a single problem with the SSD.   Continues to boot up and have waveforms in about a minute.

Gotta say, it's starting to grow on me.


 

[joeqsmith]

Printing with the WaveRunner and WaveMaster is a snap.  Press print and your done.   It was not so simple with the 7200.   You had to connect your printer/plotter to the Centronics port.   Maybe an AB switch or two.       If you wanted to print to an Ethernet server, there were no options.   I built this little reverse print server that connected to a standard printer port and then sent the data onto an Ethernet printer.   

This used a Motorola MC6811 because I had them laying around still.   I modified my old Pentica ICE to support an 8MHz clock rate.   An Altera FPGA read data from one of the printer ports and DMA'ed it into DRAM.   I wrote the stack in assembler. 

It was fairly fast.   Printing a screen from the 7200A at 75 DPI with the printer connected directly to the port requires 24 seconds.  Over Ethernet it requires 28.   At 150 DPI, a direct print was 30 seconds and 40 using Ethernet.   Using the serial port at 150 DPI was 2 mins 3 seconds!   

[joeqsmith]

This is a block diagram for the reverse print server.     

[joeqsmith]

Printing with the two LeCroys to an Ethernet print server.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l0GiC-dw9W8&feature=youtu.be

[joeqsmith]

No probes came with the 64Xi. I am looking for some general purpose, low cost ones and came across Hantek.   I am interested in the T3100 and the PP200.   Reviews on Amazon seem good. 

http://www.hantek.com/en/ProductDetail_15_74.html
http://www.hantek.com/en/ProductDetail_15_73.html

Specs on the T3100 seem decent.  1KV up to 7MHz.   500V to 100MHz. 

Also looking at the Probe Master 4906-1RA and the 4910-2RA.   They cost more but they have no specs that I see.   

http://www.probemaster.com/product_info.php?products_id=71


Would like to see a scope probe shootout.

[Sailor]

Wow, good job   I haven't built a wire-wrap system for 30-35 years - well, actually I didn't build them, my wife did. I would give her lists of thousands of connections and she would work day and night with only one, maybe two errors per thousand. I couldn't do better than 1 in a 100, my mind would always be thinking about the next step. I've still got the OK mains-powered gun, and a bunch of sockets and Vero Hi-Density Eurocard boards somewhere. If you cross-gridded the power and ground, put plenty of bypasses, and ran clocks and other critical signals by twisted pair, you could easily get 20MHz operation.

And I'm glad to hear that there is someone else who still writes in assembler

[joeqsmith]

All of the low cost probes arrived today from Amazon.   I had ordered two of the Hantek T3100s from here:

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0030L0X58/ref=oh_aui_detailpage_o00_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1

However, what I received I suspect are Siglent P4100s.   What is funny is the package is marked Hantek.   The Hantek T3100s are rated for their full 2KV up to 1MHz and 1KV at 7MHz.    It is difficult to tell on the data sheet that came with the the P4100 but it appears to be good only to 40KHz at the full 2KV.  At 1MHz they derate to 100 volts!   

I had made up a test jig to try out the Hantek probe but it will have to wait.   

I was not expecting much for a $25 probe except I did order their 100MHz probes as well.  These were $17.50 for 2 of them.   These actually came in as a Hantek part and wow!   I am comparing it with my higher end probes and they are impressive. 

[tautech]

However, what I received I suspect are Siglent P4100s.   

I very much doubt they are.
What makes you think they are Siglent probes?

Just checked all my price lists and the don't list a 100:1 probe.
Even the website doesn't show one:
http://www.siglentamerica.com/prodcut-fjxx.aspx?fjid=355&id=27&tid=1&T=2

[joeqsmith]

I just put P4100 into Google and got this for the first hit:

http://www.siglent.eu/p4100-100mhz-100x-high-voltage-probe.html

See attached if you can't view the site for some reason.   The probe itself and the manual have no brand markings that I see.

[joeqsmith]

If you go to this site, towards the bottom you will see the data sheet.  This is very close to the data sheet that was included with these probes.  The derate curve appears to be the same.

http://globaltone.en.alibaba.com/product/301181277-210286086/P4100_High_Voltage_Oscilloscope_Probe_2KV_probe_Oscilloscope_digital.html

[tautech]

I just put P4100 into Google and got this for the first hit:

http://www.siglent.eu/p4100-100mhz-100x-high-voltage-probe.html

This is not the first time Siglent EU has caused confusion, why?
From their website:

Siglent.eu is a trade name and part of JR Special Electronics.

So not all of their products are sourced from Siglent.
You'll also see they have P6100 probes available, also definitely not from Siglent.