New Rigol DS1054Z oscilloscope

[David Hess]

Does the fact that lots of people buy and use the scope happily mean it's a bad design?

No, the fact that many functions are broken and Rigol is deceptive and lies about its capabilities makes it a bad design.

[thomastheo]

Does the fact that lots of people buy and use the scope happily mean it's a bad design?

No, the fact that many functions are broken and Rigol is deceptive and lies about its capabilities makes it a bad design.

We're 139 pages into this thread, I had hoped we would have moved on from this point by now. Is there an emergency stop button anywhere around here?

[tooki]

You even quoted me yourself:

Sure, the Rigol software often appears to be a set of "kludges" that were cobbled together by a committee of junior programmers who have never actually used an oscilloscope... but who remember playing with those complicated Chinese puzzle boxes as kids.

I don't see how that quote supports any argument you're making.

What I -have- done is explain how many of the problems people have reported are user-related, often due to not RTFM or not understanding how a particular control actually works.

"user related problem" is what shitty designers say to justify their shitty designs. Do users sometimes make mistakes? Of course. But when you've got something that routinely confuses and/or annoys users, it's a shitty design. UIs should be designed around human needs. If you can't make sense of a UI without the fucking manual, it's a shitty design. Good user interfaces are self-explanatory.

Funny... I am often criticised by certain individuals as being a Rigol-basher, and now I'm accused of being a fanboy. Make up your minds, people! If you don't like the scope, DON'T USE IT -- unless of course you absolutely need to use a scope and it's the only one handy --- or affordable. And by all means... RTFM !!!

I didn't make any claims as to you being a Rigol basher or fanboy. I'm saying that you're talking out of your ass with regards to user interfaces, and as someone with both a formal background and professional experience in that field, I stand by that opinion.

Well tooki, here's the way I look at it. I've got one and other than the quirks we all talk about, it's perfectly acceptable for my ham radio/electronics hobby needs and that's what many people use it for. I ain't trying to fix the Superconducting Super Collider with it. I, like alsetalokin4017, have used some of the best test equipment made when I was working (I'm retired now). I know what a piece of total junk is like to work with. This thing is really perfectly acceptable for the price and performance.

The thing is, look at the forum stats. This thread is in the Top Ten forum thread list by relies AND by views. This thread is 139 pages now! If this scope was a total piece of s*** the talk would have long since stopped after a few pages of reviews and replies, and the scope would not be selling like it is. It's a tantalizing situation, in that it's very good for the price, and what a lot of people think is how a few more hours of work by Rigol on the thing would make it better, but they don't seem to want to go that last mile, for whatever reason. OK, well, they probably think that since it's selling so well and recommended so much, why do it. I don't know - I don't run the company. But again, the thing is it's so good for the price it's been examined down to a gnat's ass and that's what all the posts are about - people using it for all sorts of tasks and exposing the last few irritating bugs.

But what do I know? 

I didn't say it's a bad product overall. We were talking about the user interface of the measurements feature, which is a pain point for many users. The poor UI of the measurements stand out in part because the rest of the unit is pretty damned good. (Other than the non-detented rotary encoder for the multipurpose dial, the hardware design is good, and the build quality is excellent.)

[alsetalokin4017]

You may be the expert you claim to be, but I find your language and your approach to this discussion offensive. Do you talk to people like that when you are face-to-face with them?

I don't see how that quote supports any argument you're making.

That is right, you don't see. Do you see this:

You've done nothing but disagree with everyone who complains about this bad UI.

The quote to which you refer directly contradicts your statement and proves that you are wrong about me.

Do you actually own a DS1054z? One wonders why you bother with this thread at all.

[David Hess]

We're 139 pages into this thread, I had hoped we would have moved on from this point by now. Is there an emergency stop button anywhere around here?

I will move on and change my opinion of Rigol after they fix the problems with their products and their misleading documentation; they have had years to do so.  There is no statute of limitation for shady companies which remain shady.

[tooki]

You may be the expert you claim to be, but I find your language and your approach to this discussion offensive. Do you talk to people like that when you are face-to-face with them?

Absolutely, when my patience has run out. I feel no obligation to pussyfoot around someone who's been nothing but a pain in the ass to people attempting to have a real discussion about a real problem that bothers them. I tried to reason with you, it didn't work.

I don't see how that quote supports any argument you're making.

That is right, you don't see. Do you see this:

You've done nothing but disagree with everyone who complains about this bad UI.

The quote to which you refer directly contradicts your statement and proves that you are wrong about me.

In your mind perhaps. But explaining HOW the Rigol software got to be how it is is not germaine to the discussion. You have only dug your heels in in claiming it's the users' fault for not being able to use the bad measurement UI, and that because it's an inexpensive instrument, we have no right to complain. With both of those opinions I vociferously disagree.

Do you actually own a DS1054z? One wonders why you bother with this thread at all.

Yes, I do own it, and the measurements drive me nuts. So yeah, I'm personally invested in this.

[kcbrown]

For one, price has little correlation with the quality of usability.

Really?

What inexpensive items can you think of that nevertheless have excellent usability and aren't clear derivatives of more expensive items of the same type?

People who know what they're doing cost money, period.   If you want a good user interface in a commercial product, you have to get it designed by someone who knows what they're doing when it comes to user interfaces, and that costs more than having it designed by someone whose expertise lies with some other area that is necessary for the project.  More precisely, it is not uncommon for software, especially, to have its user interface designed by the same people who designed and implemented the rest of the software, since the necessary expertise to design and code the software is much more fundamental to the success of the software than is user interface expertise.  While someone who doesn't know a whole lot about user interfaces can put together a poor but functional one, someone who doesn't know a whole lot about coding can't design and code a functional piece of software at all.

Indeed, as regards user interfaces, it's even worse than that.  A good user interface not only adheres to general usability principles, it's designed so that the target users can properly use it.  That means that the usability expert has to not only have expertise in user interfaces, he must also have expertise in the domain the product is intended to target.  As regards oscilloscopes, it means the user interface expert must understand the features of the oscilloscope and how they are to be used.  Merely being good at designing user interfaces isn't enough.

Many very expensive products have terrible user interfaces.

Yes.  But that alone doesn't break the correlation.  While many very expensive products have terrible user interfaces, few inexpensive products have good user interfaces (but see below, as there are clear exceptions to that).   Good user interfaces are more easily found in expensive products than in inexpensive ones.  Look at Linux and Windows, in contrast with Mac OS, for an excellent example.  Apple products command a premium in part because Apple spent the money up-front on usability, and focused so much on it that usability became their signature trait.

(For example, the first generation of BMW's iDrive became famous for how terrible a UI it was.)

Yes.  How long did it continue to have a terrible UI?  The first generation of anything isn't necessarily a good metric to use for determining whether there's a correlation between expense and quality of the UI.

If anything, you often see the opposite, that expensive (i.e. non-mass-market) products have terrible UIs because they're made in such small numbers that the manufacturer can't invest in big UX projects.

Then how is it that Windows, a mass market product with many more seats than Mac OS, has a much worse UI than Mac OS?

There are products that are relatively inexpensive which have solid user interfaces, but those tend to be mainstream products for which a poor user interface would be a major competitive disadvantage, or which are heavily regulated (e.g., avionics), or which have to be competently implemented because a screwup on the part of the operator could cost lives (e.g., cars, for which the controls for the major systems are almost always well-designed).

In the end, it comes down to the ability and willingness of the manufacturer to spend the needed extra money on user interface design.  That money will increase the cost, so the expenditure has to be justifiable somehow.

While there's no question that the DS1054Z's user interface has problems, exactly what would be the justification for Rigol to spend the extra money on people who know how to design solid user interfaces, given their target market and general market strategy?  How would you expect them to recover their increased costs as a result?

[Fungus]

While there's no question that the DS1054Z's user interface has problems, exactly what would be the justification for Rigol to spend the extra money on people who know how to design solid user interfaces, given their target market and general market strategy?  How would you expect them to recover their increased costs as a result?

It certainly wouldn't silence the haters. They'd just find something else about it to bash.

We've seen it in this thread a hundred times - every time a bug is fixed the Rigol-haters instantly just move on to something else. Not enough bugs left? Lets moan about the UI instead. 

Would they really prefer a world with no $400, 4-channel, 100MHz oscilloscopes in it? Where oscilloscopes are all perfect but start at $5000?

How about cars? Should we remove all the sub-$30,000 cars from the market because of their poor performance and sub-luxury comfort levels?

Me? I'm more than happy with the amount of value my DS1054Z gives me. It's hard to imagine doing electronics without it.

[BravoV]

Its getting really tiring to read all the waves of waves of whiners/bashers come and go in this thread .... really. 

To all DS1054Z haters, please, don't ruin your life and your sleep, just sell it, post it at the Buy/Sell/Wanted section.

PS : This applies only to owners of course, as I suspect there are few "frequent" bashers here don't own it. 



Regarding the selling market price for used one, worry its too low ?


C'mon, its nothing compared to the misery you've been thru ...

.... unless ... you are really enjoying "the whining" it self.

[Housedad]

Almost everything is produced to fit a price point.  The level of that price point and expected market sales will limit the design, development, and features of a product.  Each and every piece of test equipment is made to fit a need and price point.  Where there is a market for a item of a certain cost, there is someone that will try to meet that market need.    While snobbery makes one feel better about the high priced or subjectively "better" equipment, that same equipment, even used will not always meet the needs or expectations of others. 
That is the rub about opinions.  Many times, they are worth only what you pay for them.

[JPortici]

ours shouldn't be (always) seen as whining.
the "is only 400$" cannot be a justification to everything. that's right, this scope is only good if you don't know better. if rigol decided not to focus on this project because its very low cost and margin it would be understandable, but yet we keep seeing updates and promises of updates, with little improvement but new shiny functions. for one i'm sure we now have the full memory FFT because the intern at that time told them he knew how to do it.. how hard is it to fix a fucking spelling error that was introduced with an update and promptly reported? one update later, we see shiny full screen XY (still hardly usable but hey, that's how it is on a DSO under many figures)
consumer chinese electronics at its best. get some hardware, slap together some software and sell. how better it would have been if they decided to putt LESS functions but implementing them right.. want more stuff? get the higher end models, how it is for everything. see gwi, another chinese company but at least they do things right, their base model has a faster architecture but with less functionality. want more? pay more but still receive quality.

rant over, i became dubious of selling my 1054 after i saw the post of that guy that installed linux on it, hope is not yet lost

... not over. i'll add one more thing.
One could make a topic about the issues in the 1054z, how to see them, how to test them and how to get around them (if possible)
i'm pretty sure the first pages would be flooded by yours "it's only 400$" comments. for each post a reply

[alsetalokin4017]

Yes, I do own it, and the measurements drive me nuts. So yeah, I'm personally invested in this.

Then by all means, sell it immediately and put the money you get towards getting a "properly designed" R&S or Agilent or Tek or LeCroy scope.  I am certain that there are many people who would be very happy to have a DS1054z, relatively unused, at a nice price, warts and all. And nobody wants you to be driven nuts by the equipment you have to use daily.

[alsetalokin4017]

Absolutely, when my patience has run out. I feel no obligation to pussyfoot around someone who's been nothing but a pain in the ass to people attempting to have a real discussion about a real problem that bothers them. I tried to reason with you, it didn't work.

Once again I find your characterization of me offensive, but also simply WRONG. If you look back in this thread you will find many posts from me where I actually help people to understand, track down problems and issues, and even point out problems and criticize the scope's software. Not only that, but I am on my THIRD DS1054 unit, after returning one to the vendor and one to RigolUSA for replacement, due to hardware and software issues.

I tried to reason with you... and correct your misconceptions about the scope, about me and my posts... and it didn't work. Have YOU actually ever HELPED anyone in this thread to use or understand their scope? I think not.

[alsetalokin4017]

i'm pretty sure the first pages would be flooded by yours "it's only 400$" comments.

You'll have to ask Fungus about that.

[MrW0lf]

While there's no question that the DS1054Z's user interface has problems, exactly what would be the justification for Rigol to spend the extra money on people who know how to design solid user interfaces, given their target market and general market strategy?  How would you expect them to recover their increased costs as a result?

What extra money? I bought this funny box, paid money for it, spent about 2 months dissecting it's programming & GUI based on my ~20year pro experience in GUI/software design. Did gave feedback incl. directly to Rigol, for free (as many others have done before!). Result? 0.
It's not about the money. It's about some amateurs (regarding GUI design / math at least) getting a high ranking position in company. Luckily for them if product is cheap enough there always will be fanboys who will find excuse for every flaw or situation as whole.
So at least can agree with fanboys on one point - I this box insults your intelligence - sell it. It's not going to get better anytime soon.
You only have to spend about 3dB more to get combination of two other products that will do almost everything miles better.

[alsetalokin4017]

Actually... Rigol has been quite responsive, if somewhat slow, in fixing errors in the software. Sure, the errors shouldn't have been there in the first place, one could argue, and rightly so. If you are experiencing a "failure to communicate"... maybe you should look to your style of communication as being at least part of the problem.

And I am very offended by "tooki's" constant mischaracterization of me. It really rankles, because I have been a very vocal AND EFFECTIVE critic of the bugs and certain other infecilities in this scope.  But things like the "fan noise" and the "encoder problems" which have caused some people to void their warranty by actually replacing hardware have not been an issue for me at all. The fan in my unit is not nearly as loud as the fans in my computer, and the "encoder problems" are happening because people just aren't using their fingers properly. I have no trouble at all getting the option I want when pressing the encoder button. It just takes a steady hand.

Here are two examples. In the screenshot below, which I have posted several times, you can see 5 "bugs" or errors at once. Rigol has fixed _every one_ of these, except the silly "pluses" spelling error, in the current firmware.

In this video you can obviously tell that I am frustrated.

This is the video that caused RigolUSA to contact me (after I filed a bug report and started communicating with a Rigol tech named Jason) and _they_ asked _me_, not the other way around, to return that unit for a replacement, which I did, and they even sent me the replacement _before_ I sent the old unit back to them, so I could test them both side-by-side for a few days. And yes, they paid for shipping both ways. Would that have happened with Siglent or GWInstek or Agilent or Tektronix? I don't know.

I wonder how many of the "complainers" bought their scopes, as I did, because of our kind host's rave reviews, and then found out about the various bugs and UI problems, which weren't mentioned at all in his reviews.

[MrW0lf]

If you are experiencing a "failure to communicate"... maybe you should look to your style of communication as being at least part of the problem.

If it's the case it's again non-professional approach from their part. Professional has not the slightest interest in customers mood, attitude, skin color or hairstyle. Only about what customer has to say about product, with all "extra info" simply ignored. At least I'm very grateful even for angry calls when some little bug has slipped thru to live system. It's much worse when they just keep it silent and move to competitors system...

[Assafl]

Given the amount of activity I thought there was a new firmware. Instead this again...

Why would anyone spend time in a thread about a product they dislike? I guess everyone is in love with the over-promise of what a DS1Z could have been had they delivered all the promises they made. But not everyone handles the disappointing letdowns the same: Some are more sensitive than others.

The animosity towards the product is a specular reflection of the love they have for the product it could have been - what they wanted it to be.

But (unfortunately) as Fungus points out - it is still in its own Niche in town - and until someone like Tek or Keysight or Lecroy or Sigalent delivers a competing low end design at a similar (or at least same ball park price) - I don't see why Rigol should invest much in improving the design. Market forces trump corporate altruism for successful companies.

It desperately needs a competitor. Perhaps people here can Gang up on Daniel and have him drop Keysight prices?

   

[JPortici]

I wonder how many of the "complainers" bought their scopes, as I did, because of our kind host's rave reviews, and then found out about the various bugs and UI problems, which weren't mentioned at all in his reviews.

well i did, but i couldn't do any better. i was young(er), with a lot less experience and without any possibility to check it firsthand
now that i know better, if i could do it all over again i would have never gone for the rigol, i would have got a picoscope in a heartbeat

for what it's worth i find the new keysight to be an excellent competitor, for a fraction of keysight's cost you get a real keysight. i am willing to put aside every ""shortcoming"" one could find and get something that on paper might be less, but in facts is actually more.

well, the keysight is positioned to be against the rigol 2000A so it's not a real comparison, no matter what they try to tell you on sale sheets. keysight also appears to be the only one who wants to get to student and hobbyists.. lecroy and tek are just not interested. (the "cheap" lecroy is the rebadged siglent sds3000, you know. good hardware with lecroy software)

[tooki]

For one, price has little correlation with the quality of usability.

Really?

What inexpensive items can you think of that nevertheless have excellent usability and aren't clear derivatives of more expensive items of the same type?

People who know what they're doing cost money, period.   If you want a good user interface in a commercial product, you have to get it designed by someone who knows what they're doing when it comes to user interfaces, and that costs more than having it designed by someone whose expertise lies with some other area that is necessary for the project.  More precisely, it is not uncommon for software, especially, to have its user interface designed by the same people who designed and implemented the rest of the software, since the necessary expertise to design and code the software is much more fundamental to the success of the software than is user interface expertise.  While someone who doesn't know a whole lot about user interfaces can put together a poor but functional one, someone who doesn't know a whole lot about coding can't design and code a functional piece of software at all.

Indeed, as regards user interfaces, it's even worse than that.  A good user interface not only adheres to general usability principles, it's designed so that the target users can properly use it.  That means that the usability expert has to not only have expertise in user interfaces, he must also have expertise in the domain the product is intended to target.  As regards oscilloscopes, it means the user interface expert must understand the features of the oscilloscope and how they are to be used.  Merely being good at designing user interfaces isn't enough.

Many very expensive products have terrible user interfaces.

Yes.  But that alone doesn't break the correlation.  While many very expensive products have terrible user interfaces, few inexpensive products have good user interfaces (but see below, as there are clear exceptions to that).   Good user interfaces are more easily found in expensive products than in inexpensive ones.  Look at Linux and Windows, in contrast with Mac OS, for an excellent example.  Apple products command a premium in part because Apple spent the money up-front on usability, and focused so much on it that usability became their signature trait.

(For example, the first generation of BMW's iDrive became famous for how terrible a UI it was.)

Yes.  How long did it continue to have a terrible UI?  The first generation of anything isn't necessarily a good metric to use for determining whether there's a correlation between expense and quality of the UI.

If anything, you often see the opposite, that expensive (i.e. non-mass-market) products have terrible UIs because they're made in such small numbers that the manufacturer can't invest in big UX projects.

Then how is it that Windows, a mass market product with many more seats than Mac OS, has a much worse UI than Mac OS?

There are products that are relatively inexpensive which have solid user interfaces, but those tend to be mainstream products for which a poor user interface would be a major competitive disadvantage, or which are heavily regulated (e.g., avionics), or which have to be competently implemented because a screwup on the part of the operator could cost lives (e.g., cars, for which the controls for the major systems are almost always well-designed).

In the end, it comes down to the ability and willingness of the manufacturer to spend the needed extra money on user interface design.  That money will increase the cost, so the expenditure has to be justifiable somehow.

While there's no question that the DS1054Z's user interface has problems, exactly what would be the justification for Rigol to spend the extra money on people who know how to design solid user interfaces, given their target market and general market strategy?  How would you expect them to recover their increased costs as a result?

You ask some very good questions, but I'm worried about further derailing this thread by going even farther astray from the concrete product at hand!

Most of what you ask is addressed by my prior statement that people will tolerate a bad UI up to a point; Windows is a perfect example of this. It's not as good as Mac, but not so bad as to make most users run and scream.

You are right that good UIs cost money, and absolutely 10000% correct that the designer must truly understand the task at hand. (Having worked in UX, and having had to spend 6 months immersing myself in library science for one project, I truly cannot agree with you more!) But I think your examples are kinda flawed: Microsoft spends a fortune on UX research and design, but various other factors resulted in bad UIs despite this. Linux is really the example of what happens when there's little investment in UX.

It's hard to find examples of things that are good and cheap and "not derivatives" because the normal progression of technology is for things to begin expensive and then get copied cheaper. But look at the context of this discussion: a cheap scope which is clearly "derivative" of more expensive DSOs, and we have people arguing that because it's cheap, we must accept the bad UI.

Nonetheless, I would posit that there's lots of inexpensive software, for example, with excellent UIs. And lots of expensive software (*cough* Eagle *cough*) whose UIs make me want to gouge my eyes out.

[Fungus]

It desperately needs a competitor.

Yep.

Perhaps people here can Gang up on Daniel and have him drop Keysight prices?

I don't think Daniel has that power.

[Fungus]

for what it's worth i find the new keysight to be an excellent competitor, for a fraction of keysight's cost you get a real keysight. i am willing to put aside every ""shortcoming"" one could find and get something that on paper might be less, but in facts is actually more.

Certainly a lot more money than a DS1054Z.

PS: If you're going to spend $1000+ then there's already 'scopes out there that are quite decent, no need to wait for Keysight.

[Assafl]

Perhaps people here can Gang up on Daniel and have him drop Keysight prices?

I don't think Daniel has that power.

I was being facetious. I apologize.

Then again - there is no harm trying

[EEVblog]

I wonder how many of the "complainers" bought their scopes, as I did, because of our kind host's rave reviews, and then found out about the various bugs and UI problems, which weren't mentioned at all in his reviews.

If I found any bugs I would have shown them and mention them.
How can a reviewer possibly be expected the test every combination and permutation of every feature to find every bug? That's a totally unrealistic expectation.

[Fungus]

It desperately needs a competitor.

Yep.

Sometimes I wonder where everybody else is. It's obvious that Rigol sells a lot of DS1054Zs. You can see the stock numbers going up/down on sellers like Batronix.

Is there no bean-counter from another company watching those numbers? The Rigol is 2+ years old now so it must be possible to build something cheaper using more integrated chips, etc.

The only explanation I can come up with is that every other company is just not willing to make something at that price because it would have an effect on the sales of their own more expensive products and be a net loss for the company.

Me? I'm happy with my $400 DS1054Z. Build quality is good, the wiggly lines on screen work, frequency measurements work, storage/zoom works. Everything else is just gravy as far as I'm concerned.

The UI could use some work, particularly the menu system* and the left/right scrolling when zoomed.

(*) Using a rotary knob to go up/down menus and select things when it has up/down arrow buttons next to the menu?