EEVblog #511 - Rigol DP832 Power Supply Teardown

[EEVblog]

What's inside the Rigol DP832 precision lab power supply. Is it identical to the DP832A
Photos: http://www.flickr.com/photos/eevblog/sets/72157635251122253/

[Hydrawerk]

Thank you for the teardown. I wonder why Rigol deletes markings on the ICs. They want the machine to be unrepairable! Does any other manufacturer do that?? I do not remember it from any Agilent scope for example...

[tinhead]

unrepairable!

no, they simply stupid. It make no sense to delete marking but leave JTAG.

That 8051, hehe, no Dave, this is KSZ8051 (Ethernet PHY) and not 8051-core based what so ever

[m12lrpv]

Thank you for the teardown. I wonder why Rigol deletes markings on the ICs. They want the machine to be unrepairable! Does any other manufacturer do that?? I do not remember it from any Agilent scope for example...

Perhaps those IC's form part of the difference with the "A" model

[marshallh]

Rigol is one of the few chinese OEMs... they don't want their design copied by cloners looking for an easy target.
It won't stop someone who's dedicated, but I'd say its not completely pointless.
It's a different mindset.

[Dread]

Rigol is one of the few chinese OEMs... they don't want their design copied by cloners looking for an easy target.

Ironic isn't it!

[Citizen]

I don't know, maybe it is just me, but teardowns getting less interesting. Every? new TT is just like one before. To be honest I was googling my own stuff while listening to Dave with one ear...
 Perhaps it is just because those teardowns are only interesting for people, who are going to buy this unit, but for others its is just another PSU. They look pretty same inside, don't they?
Routine : here is a transformer, here is a boring chip, here are caps. Nothing special for me, we saw it many times already.
The main idea of TT was to show how does interesting, unusual equipment works inside.How different, complicated problems are getting solved  by professional engineers, so  we can learn something from it. The last few TT were just dry lists of facts.
I even laughed to myself this time: "wow, even me could do this teardown , just name what you see , no special knowladge recquired"

But then again, just my humble opinion.

[m12lrpv]

Not as uninteresting as your trolling

[george graves]

But then again, just my humble opinion.

Ha!  Well, the other side of the coin is that if you're about to buy what he's tearing down(or something like it), you might watch it 2-3 times!

I know I've watched some videos more then once before making a purchase.  I think Dave is doing a great job mixing it up with test equipment and consumer stuff.

[Dread]

Yeah but as Dave says some people like it.
I would prefer tear downs of simpler devices so that the actual circuit design can be looked at it in greater detail.  You can learn so much more with just basic designs, they add to your knowledge and are useful for making your own stuff.

[RupertGo]

Well, I love linear electronics teardowns almost as much as I love RF, so I loved this one. Particularly because so much of the design was old school - although why was there no relay output isolation (which may also help with the power on excursions)? And what were the triacs doing? Crowbars? (Been a long time since I thought about that).

One point, though: the reason toroidal transformers are more efficient and radiate far less (E)MI is because of their geometry - there's nowhere for the flux to escape from, unlike the Ts and Cs and beeswax laminated core brigade. There's a lot of cool maths involved which I don't understand without far too much effort, but if anyone wants to va-va-voom with the vectors the Wikipedia page looks promising. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toroidal_inductors_and_transformers

[synapsis]

Is someone making a Dave English -> Amurrican English dictionary? I'm not quite sure what to make of "It's the duck's guts." Is that a good thing?

[tinhead]

http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=duck's%20guts

[FrankBuss]

I don't know, maybe it is just me, but teardowns getting less interesting. Every? new TT is just like one before. To be honest I was googling my own stuff while listening to Dave with one ear...

Maybe you should have listen with two ears?

Perhaps it is just because those teardowns are only interesting for people, who are going to buy this unit, but for others its is just another PSU. They look pretty same inside, don't they?
Routine : here is a transformer, here is a boring chip, here are caps. Nothing special for me, we saw it many times already.

Well, the toroidal transformer was interesting and all the constructions are different inside.

The main idea of TT was to show how does interesting, unusual equipment works inside.How different, complicated problems are getting solved  by professional engineers, so  we can learn something from it. The last few TT were just dry lists of facts.
 again, just my humble opinion.

IMHO Dave explained quite a lot, at least for beginners like me. Interesting facts about the transformer and why and where you use it, explaining the signal paths and how the boards are interconnected, explaining the power path, highlighting details which someone could use for their own designs, like covering mains voltage on the small PCB, and complaining about not so good solutions, like soldering nuts instead of using proper washers etc.

[Citizen]

Yeah but as Dave says some people like it.
I would prefer tear downs of simpler devices so that the actual circuit design can be looked at it in greater detail.  You can learn so much more with just basic designs, they add to your knowledge and are useful for making your own stuff.

I also prefer test gear,because it  normaly has more strict requierements like precision and stability. Thus you can learn how to solve this problems wisely.But PSU is just trivial and we had it alrwady many times.

[FrankBuss]

I also prefer test gear,because it  normaly has more strict requierements like precision and stability. Thus you can learn how to solve this problems wisely.But PSU is just trivial and we had it alrwady many times.

One solution would be that you don't watch PSU teardowns, if you don't like PSU teardowns.

[EEVblog]

That 8051, hehe, no Dave, this is KSZ8051 (Ethernet PHY) and not 8051-core based what so ever

Oops, yeah, that's what I get for using stuff instead of checking. 

[BravoV]

But then again, just my humble opinion.

Good , hopefully you stay humble and humbly understand and agree that your taste do NOT represent majority of the viewers. 

[jasonbrent]

... and here I am to talk about the color screen again... :-) If these are the same, that means that it's likely possible to turn a non A into an A via software and then get a full color display (yes, I realize that some like the vertical layout per channel vs. the angular layout...).

(not watched the video yet...)

-jbl

[jancumps]

I don't know, maybe it is just me...

What's the point, Citizen. You carefully put this comment both on the blog andd youtube comments.
For a few video's already.
The obligatory Citizen rant.
Blogger envy?

[EEVblog]

What's the point, Citizen. You carefully put this comment both on the blog andd youtube comments.
For a few video's already.
The obligatory Citizen rant.
Blogger envy?

It seems all he does is complain, so I'll no longer respond to his comments directly.
Of course, he conveniently forgets the fact that my previous teardown video (the UPS) combined whiteboard stuff with the teardown which made it quite popular. But no, that doesn't fit with his opinion that my teardowns are just the same and useless, so he ignores those ones.
This one was obviously for those who wanted to see inside the Rigol supply, and nothing more. I never claimed it be anything more.

[BravoV]

I don't know, maybe it is just me...

What's the point, Citizen. You carefully put this comment both on the blog andd youtube comments.
For a few video's already.
The obligatory Citizen rant.
Blogger envy?

Do you mean envy as like from a competing party ?

Meh .. just look at the "attitude" at his videos, always proclaims it proudly ...  "I dubbed the video with the song I personally love so much, and it is the best song in the world, if you don't like it, screw you and you all (the audiences  ) are tasteless, go away !".

Definitely not even the same league as Dave's, let alone a competing video blogger. Its just merely an act from a very lonely individual, and very likely an attention whore too. 

[warp_foo]

What's the point, Citizen. You carefully put this comment both on the blog andd youtube comments.
For a few video's already.
The obligatory Citizen rant.
Blogger envy?

It seems all he does is complain, so I'll no longer respond to his comments directly.
Of course, he conveniently forgets the fact that my previous teardown video (the UPS) combined whiteboard stuff with the teardown which made it quite popular. But no, that doesn't fit with his opinion that my teardowns are just the same and useless, so he ignores those ones.
This one was obviously for those who wanted to see inside the Rigol supply, and nothing more. I never claimed it be anything more.

Thanks for the look into a PS I purchased. I appreciate the effort, and I hope to see you/support you down the path you've chosen.

newb

[free_electron]

.But PSU is just trivial and we had it alrwady many times.

Really . Psu's are trivial ? You obvisously have never torn down something like a 3631 with its charge balancing adc and demuxed dac and analog optocouplers, or a 6032 resonant power supply, or a 6632 machine with down programmer or a battery emulator supply. Or a big hinking 6624a...

There is tons of shit to be learned from those beasts.

This rigol may be less i teresting but i still like to see what componets they used, how the postioned their parts on the board, what connectors are used, and other little details for construction. There is always some tidbit to be learned or something to see that may give you idea's.

[pickle9000]

I totally enjoy the teardowns, I tend to think of the people behind the design and manufacture. Look at the Siglent and Rigol rust thing. Did they know? Did they care? If they did know what would be the point at which you have to fix it? What would you do to fix it is there a chemical to stop it, and on and on. Those are real life questions and the answers will make and brake personnel and companies.