The race to the bottom continues. How many ultra-low cost entry level scopes does the industry need?
The race to the bottom continues. How many ultra-low cost entry level scopes does the industry need?
GW is only making a few dollars off each after distribution.
What are these plastic cylinders for?? A future expansion module for a DMM?
How do you know what margin they make?
The race to the bottom continues. How many ultra-low cost entry level scopes does the industry need?
As many as the market demands.
QuoteGW is only making a few dollars off each after distribution.
How do you know what margin they make?
Tens of thousands? That seems an order of magnitude low. Over a billion dollars worth of oscilloscopes are sold a year, and these low end models are going to significantly expand the market.
what would really make this a competition killer:
Toss out the little lcd and the me u buttons around it. Make that whole grey area around the lcd, the new lcd area. And make it a touch screen.
The rubber buttons areound the lcd are gone. If you pull up a menu they slide in, touc to activate.
Touch screens cost next to nothing. Larger lcds are also a dime a dozen.
Leave the roatry encoders and buttons in that area as they are. No need for pop up windows or pinch to zoom. Just a simple zone touch to reclaim the wasted area for the menu buttons around the lcd.
You would not need the pcb area for the buttons, would need the rubber button molding. And it would have an ipad mini sized screen. Something in the 1280x600 resolution...
It would add 10$ tops to the bom...
Yes! Maybe Jamicon isn't a brand to compare with Nippon Chemi-con, but I was surprised by Dave not having heard of Jamicon or call them "not a name brand".
I personally like the overall design of the oscilloscope - despite it may not "look" good, it is certainly much more functional than Rigol's multiplexed functions per button (namely the channel settings).
eg. The trigger section 'mode' button and LEDs above it are completely redundant. I always use the big chunky "Run/Stop" and "Single" buttons at the top. They also light up to tell you the current state.
I'd much rather have a proper 'select' button instead of pushing the multifunction knob to select things.
I'd much rather have a proper 'select' button instead of pushing the multifunction knob to select things.I think your point of view is perfectly valid for menu navigation, but it forcefully requires additional space in the front panel - thus it is a portability trade off (you wouldn't want to cram a button in exiguous spaces).
There is a thread where someone replaced the encoders with some from ALPS that required a bit more force to rotate.
I suspect it's not so much differences between channels, but parts randomly distributed around unused space in each channel section.
Just going by back-of-the-envelope product pricing:
The scope is $350, i.e. about $140-175 BOM through typical retailers
The ZYNQ is $60, the hittite ADC is $50 (both octopart 1ku pricing)
How do they get the rest of the BOM, including mechanicals, down to $50? That's insane!Its insane to think that serious buyers of the ZYNQ and Hittite ADC pay those prices when they negotiate for the supply of thousands per annum.