Oscilloscopes and cheap

[Sherlock Holmes]

I bought a Siglent 1204X-E and more recently the SLA1016 too, this is not for professional work, but technical hobby and past time use. It's definitely a pretty good quality, the spec is adequate for my modest needs too. I have quite a bit of Siglent gear now, a decent PSU SPD3303X-E, two SDM-3055 bench multimeters and an older SDG 1025 sig gen. I'm not disappointed in the brand at all, generally a very good experience.

This review on this site too, was instrumental in me deciding to buy, very in-depth.

https://www.eevblog.com/forum/testgear/siglent-sds1104x-e-in-depth-review/msg1371771/#msg1371771

This is the full review as a document, worth printing if you have this or related scope:

https://www.thethingsnetwork.org/forum/uploads/default/original/2X/2/25812d0268adafb481b43e2c1a042cc09f90f24b.pdf

[george.b]

Maybe don't buy bogus chinesium trash 'looks like the big name brand' garbage!!! Nothing wrong with dirt cheap Tek gear!! Pure analog stuff is o.k., 2215 etc. can be had in working condition with right-of-return warranty cheap enough. The Tek lunchbox scopes are very nice but more pricey. I paid $500.00 for a Tek TDS2004B and I love it!!! It can be hacked (with much effort) out to I believe 200Mhz. I picked up a TDS644B 500Mhz 4 channel color scope from the dumpster at work. The VGA output was working but the internal screen was blank. All it needed was a new crystal. The old one wouldn't oscillate. $5.00 fix for a scope worth over $1000.00  I generally rely on my analog scopes for most projects and repairs. The TDS644B rarely sees use and mainly for very transient signals or glitch detecting which it can do very well. No chinameese shit for my lab!! The reason I selected the TDS2004B was because a local manufacturer had nearly 100 of the similar models in daily use and only one ever failed in years of use!!

For $500 I'd take "chinameese shit" (Rigol, Siglent) over an old Tek with inexcusably small memory depth (2.5kpts for your TDS2004B) and generally outdated features any day. Older low-end Teks are only worth it if they can be had for cheap.

[Doctorandus_P]

Something worth keeping in mind is that scopes like the Rigol and presumably Siglent hold their value really well, on multiple occasions I've seen used Rigol scopes sell ...

I've got an old Rigol DS1052E and thinking of replacing it with a more modern 4-cannel Siglent (Not the bare boned "U" version) and I'm quite surprised my old scope can still be bought new.

https://www.batronix.com/shop/oscilloscopes/Rigol-DS1052E.html

https://www.reichelt.nl/nl/nl/digitale-geheugen-oscilloscoop-50-mhz-2-kanalen-1gs-s-rigol-ds1052e-p239299.html?&trstct=pol_2&nbc=1

My scope is plagued by the faulty encoders,and I think this is a quite common failure mode for these rigols. It started within a year of purchcase, and it's one of the reasons my next scope will probably be a Siglent. FFT in the DS1052E is also abysmal, while the siglent has a pretty good FFT for a scope.

[tautech]

I bought a Siglent 1204X-E and more recently the SLA1016 too, this is not for professional work, but technical hobby and past time use. It's definitely a pretty good quality, the spec is adequate for my modest needs too.

Today there are better choices with the SDS2104X Plus on special at $999.
SDS1204X-E is $ 775 plus SLA1016 and licensing is another $ 450 although for SDS2104X Plus one still needs shell out for SLA2016 that is a far nicer product than SLA1016 however SLA2016 is also on promotion for just $ 219 with licensing and the FG license for the X Plus model's inbuilt AWG too.
That's a killer deal that is only until years end if anyone is serious about upgrading their gear.

This review on this site too, was instrumental in me deciding to buy, very in-depth.

https://www.eevblog.com/forum/testgear/siglent-sds1104x-e-in-depth-review/msg1371771/#msg1371771

Yes from the chap that is Siglents lead beta tester so knows this DSO inside out and back the front.
We are fortunate Siglent listen to feedback and pick up on quality suggested improvements and implement them.

[BeBuLamar]

Depends on what you use the scope for. For me a cheap one is good enough for what I do. I don't need anything above 100kHz so a 10MHz unit is good enough. A digital unit with data storage is needed. I can have that for $150 with a USB unit from Picotech.

[Alex Eisenhut]

What's wrong with a multimeter, a logic analyzer and a logic probe? What benefit is a scope supposed to bring in this case?

[paulca]

What's wrong with a multimeter, a logic analyzer and a logic probe? What benefit is a scope supposed to bring in this case?

I have used both and the LA is much more of a pain in the ars to setup and use.  LAs tend to be more capture and analayse.  So you kinda have a forced cadence on what you are doing.  The scope will happily sit triggering constantly on the output waveform.

Maybe that depends on the LA in use.

Besides.  Sometimes it's not the digital aspect that is the problem.  Sometimes the LA will show garbage like the application does.  The only way to figure out why is to "see what the LA and application" are seeing.  For that you need a scope.  All it takes is too much noise or a poor ground connection and your lovely square wave starts looking more like a roller coaster.  That could take quite a while to figure out on an LA alone.

[rstofer]

What's wrong with a multimeter, a logic analyzer and a logic probe? What benefit is a scope supposed to bring in this case?

You can't check signal integrity with a LA.  If the signal goes a distance, who knows what it looks like at the other end?  Maybe communications is intermittent?

A multimeter is essentially useless for AC signals above a certain low frequency spec.  It is absolutely useless on a 10 MHz SPI bus.

There's a reason folks buy a scope and it's not love for the manufacturer and a willingness to dump money on them.

[paulca]

Yeah! The SDS1104Xe arrived!

My UARTS have shocking over/undershoot!

[BillyO]

Shocking as in not very much at all? 

[james_s]

I'm not familiar with the Siglent UI but is that set to 1X? The voltages look odd to me so I'm wondering if it's a 10X probe with the scope on 1X. For what it's worth, when a probe is switchable I usually glue the switch on 10X, it is very rare that I've ever intentionally used a 1X probe and it makes it more likely to damage the scope. I have no idea why almost all low cost probes are switchable.

[paulca]

Yea, sorry it was set to 1x with a 10x probe.  With the scope set right, it's about 1.4V!  I'm putting that down to breadboard inductance.

The overshoot portrait is below.

And... that 50MBit/s SPI decode.





Probe trouble comes from hitting the "Default" key.  I shall program a default with all of them set to 10X.

[BillyO]

Looks like a sub-10ns rise time.  That is pretty fast.  That ringing could be coming from the scope ground (try a little spring ground), breadoard wires,  impedance mismatch, ground bounce or more than likely a combination of all 4.