Recent Posts

1

General Technical Chat / Re: Cable Management

« Last post by edpalmer42 on Today at 10:17:46 pm »

I came across an Ikea wire rack for holding stemware glasses at a bar.  I mounted it on the end of one of my shelving units and adjusted the width of the slot so that it holds a BNC connector while allowing the cable to slide in.  I slid vinyl tubing over the rails so that the cables didn't slide on the chrome rails.

I'm going to build another cable holder.  Take a flat piece of wood and mount dowels or threaded rods that are spaced to hold the connectors while allowing the cable to slide between the rods.  Put vinyl tubing over the rods and ensure that the tubing sticks out beyond the end of the rod so that if someone bumps into it they hit vinyl tubing rather than the wood or metal rod.

2

RF, Microwave, Ham Radio / Re: fake MPF102s from AliExpress

« Last post by Alex Nikitin on Today at 10:16:49 pm »

Just curious. Is there anything special about MPF102? Could J304 be a suitable replacement?

Cheers

Alex

3

Repair / Re: Mig welder wire feeder controller board not working

« Last post by .RC. on Today at 10:06:07 pm »

I have been doing the ear plugs on the wire for quite a few years now.   I did at first have those special foam things, but earplugs are much cheaper.  I do not so critical structural welds so I do put corrosion inhibitor on the wire as a roll may last quite some time.  I cannot say I have had porosity issues because of it. 

4

Test Equipment / Re: Siglent SDS3000X HD and upgraded SDS1000X HD

« Last post by Martin72 on Today at 10:04:48 pm »

I would rather enjoy the fact that there has never been so much “scope” for the money as there is now, instead of brooding about it.
Not so long ago, the 12-bit ADCs used were cited as one of the reasons why the 2000X HD was twice as expensive as the 2000X plus.
Now you can get them in a 500€ model.

5

Projects, Designs, and Technical Stuff / Re: Reactive Source Resonant Transformer

« Last post by Benta on Today at 09:55:16 pm »

Well..,
"This design posses (sic!) the potential to"... do something. Perhaps provide a therapy for AntiVaxxers? Or QAnon followers?

I dunno.

6

FPGA / Re: Analog video output with FPGA ?

« Last post by Jaunedeau on Today at 09:55:06 pm »

Since you mentioned using MCUs (I think?), note that generating RGB video at these resolutions would be plenty feasible with just a RP2040 and its PIO. But given its limited number of GPIOs, you'd probably have to limit the bit depth to something lower.

The PIO is plenty of fun and I'll try playing with PDM on the PIO, but with max overclocking and 4 bit depth per component, I would get only 3 samples per pixel with pwm and 160 px per line... still a bit low for my all grey / alternating black and white pixels problem. I even thought of a dual rp2040 solution with one acting as an SPI ADC, but the stm32g4 (170MHz, requires no external flash, $2.5 for one piece in 64pins package / 52 gpios and has an real datasheet ^^) seems a simpler solution if an R2R ladder + calibration can do the job.

7

Test Equipment / Re: SDS800X HD Wanted Features

« Last post by tautech on Today at 09:54:12 pm »

How about making the tabs a tiny bit smaller too?

Not possible without sacrificing space needed for indication of channel settings.
BW limit, Hidden (but active) etc.

8

Beginners / Re: LiPo battery charging problem

« Last post by amyk on Today at 09:53:26 pm »

I assume this is a 3s pack? Yes, there are lion cells which are rated at 4.4v full:

https://electronics.stackexchange.com/questions/519625/4-4v-li-ion-polymer-battery

The disadvantage of charging them to less than 4.4v is lower capacity, but the advantage is they'll last longer.

9

Projects, Designs, and Technical Stuff / Re: Drive 36" long pcb traces

« Last post by davethomaspilot on Today at 09:52:08 pm »

Found a couple of useful "nuggets".

Typical propagation delay of a signal with FR4 substrate is 6 inches per nanosecond.

The empirical data found in the test is that when the signal delay on the pcb trace is higher than 20% of the rising edge of the signal, the signal will produce significant ringing.

So, one approach would be to add a series resistor at the source to slow the rise and fall times so they are slower than 5x the signal propagation delay.  If the resulting tr/tf is too slow, break the long trace into segments driven by separate buffers.

36" is 6 nanoseconds prop delay by the above guideline.  So, Tr/Tf would need to be longer than 30 nanoseconds.

That seems reasonable for 2 Mhz--60 nanoseconds for Tr/Tf and (500-60)/2  = 220 nsec for the up and down times of the the clock signal).

So, I can pick resistor value based on what I actually see once I get pcbs back.

Comments?

10

Test Equipment / Re: SDS800X HD Wanted Features

« Last post by eTobey on Today at 09:48:08 pm »

Any advanced user with some active Math channels.

A few more words would have been useful, and would have sounded much nicer...

From 8+ tabs there is a point that would make those buttons actually better than scrolling IMHO. But then i would say drop that timestamp (make it floating or whatever) and make those buttons slightly bigger, and have the fifth element beeing covered less.

How about making the tabs a tiny bit smaller too? There is some room in the middle.