Electronics > Beginners

My purchase list for my new lab -- budget $1000+, thoughts?

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nanofrog:
Anyone used the 8174- SMD Gripper set from Probemaster?

I like the look of the stuff from Cal Test, but they're definitely a bit on the pricey side (~$125 - $237 on DigiKey).

atmfjstc:
I'd like to reinforce what some of the others here have said and, with all due respect, warn the OP against spending a lot of money in the beginning on all sorts of tools and components, all at once. I'm relatively (2-3 years) new to electronics myself, and my experience has been that there is no way to correctly predict what the perfect set of tools for your job will be. You shouldn't be afraid of starting small, with a limited set of cheap tools, strictly what you need for your initial simple projects. As you use those tools more and more, and you take on new projects, you will start to intimately understand what their limitations are, which tools you are missing, and which tools you don't really need. This will help you know what to upgrade and when. Don't worry about "paying more in the long run" if you upgrade tools along the way. You'll spend waaay more than $1000 on this hobby, and high-end tools have such extortionist prices that your initial tools are little more than a rounding error by comparison :)

Same goes for components. The tools and components you keep in stock should be a function of your project. Building robots, reverse engineering, repairing appliances, radio/RF work, power electronics, teardowns, all these require different sets of tools and components, and if you're just starting off, it'll take a while till you find a focus (which may also change later in life).

One final thing, expect some mechanical work to go with the purely electronic side of things. If you're building anything that moves or needs to be mounted in an enclosure, you'll eventually need to have tools for cutting, punching holes in things, and keeping things together (screws, glue etc.).

rstofer:
Buy to needs!  There are things on this list that I don't have yet and I've been playing with this stuff since I was a kid - say 60+ years.  I have some stuff and the majority of it was bought in the last year or so.  And then only because I could, not because I needed anything.  But my projects have always been digital.  When I moved to analog, I needed a +- 15V supply so I bought the DP832 and I bought the DS1054Z because it would do decoding (digital).  The Siglent AWG was an extravagance.

ez24:

--- Quote from: atmfjstc on August 03, 2018, 07:31:37 pm ---I'd like to reinforce what some of the others here have said and, with all due respect, warn the OP against spending a lot of money in the beginning on all sorts of tools and components, all at once.


--- End quote ---

I believe the OP has already bought most stuff, especially high ticket items ?

bitseeker:
So, AnyNameWillDo, now that you're all decked out with gear and parts, what's your first project?

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