HP 54503A Oscilloscope. Any good?

[ElektroQuark]

Its in working order for about 250€.
What to look at for this specific model?
Any advice?
Opinions please!
TIA.

[amspire]

You do not want it. 

It is a sampling digital scope, so although it can do 500MHz with a repetitive signal, real sampling is 20MHz which means for real time sampling it is around a 2 to 4 MHz oscilloscope.

Also you will find the controls are not very convenient.

It would only be useful if you knew you were only going to look at repetitive signals, and if you did, why not look for a good analog scope? Better controls, more serviceable and never any anti-aliasing problems.

If you want a digital scope, even a Rigol 1052E would be far more useful with up to 1GHz digitizing.

Richard

[ElektroQuark]

So a low price for a 500MHz oscilloscope was strange. Now I knowwhy.
Thanks amspire.

[EEVblog]

So a low price for a 500MHz oscilloscope was strange. Now I knowwhy.
Thanks amspire.

Yeah, these sampling scopes go cheap for a reason.
But they are a bit of a bargain if you actually need the bandwith and are happy with repetitive sampling, but not many people do, hence the low prices for such analog bandwidth.

Dave.

[reagle]

A few years ago I managed to get an HP 54645D for about that many USD on ebay-  a much nicer/newer model plus a logic analyzer built in, though still only 200MS/s sampling rate. These days, Rigol is probably a better deal (or a proper  cheap analog scope)

[EEVblog]

A few years ago I managed to get an HP 54645D for about that many USD on ebay-  a much nicer/newer model plus a logic analyzer built in, though still only 200MS/s sampling rate. These days, Rigol is probably a better deal (or a proper  cheap analog scope)

I love the 54600 series scopes, used one as my main scope for many years.

Dave.

[reagle]

They are excellent!  Only complaint is the damn logic probes cable costs $300 every time I check
On the other hand the 100Mhz Rigol DS1102E is now $399 in at least two places in the US which also happen to be Dave's advertisers

http://www.tequipment.net
and http://www.saelig.com

A few years ago I managed to get an HP 54645D for about that many USD on ebay-  a much nicer/newer model plus a logic analyzer built in, though still only 200MS/s sampling rate. These days, Rigol is probably a better deal (or a proper  cheap analog scope)

I love the 54600 series scopes, used one as my main scope for many years.

Dave.