Good beginner oscilloscope and what to look out for?

[Mint.]

Good beginner oscilloscope and what to look out for? I am new to all of this, I would prefer an analog scope because they are so damn cool. Any recommendations?

[hacklordsniper]

You can find great analog scopes on ebay for few $. Its a proper way for a beginner to teach many things about the scope. A usual 200 MHz or more Tek you will find on ebay for few $ cannot be replaced by cheap DSO-s. Altrough the Rigol DS1052 is a favorite here or anywhere.

[ejeffrey]

For analog scopes, you can usually find name-brand equipment  cheap.  Do this.  Preferably get a Tek.  The reason is twofold.  First, they were built to last, and these days only cost a few $$$ more.  Second, the availability of parts and manuals is much better, which will be important if something does break.  If you get a reasonably popular tek scope, you can be confident that in 10 years you will be able to find a similar enough model you can cannibalize it to make yours work.

An analog scope is a great tool, and one that can't be completely replaced by a low-end digital scope.  It is particularly valuable as a learning tool, since there are fewer issues that can trip you up like aliasing at low sweep rates.  However, if I had to pick between a basic digital scope and a basic analog scope as my only tool, I would take the any day.  Some people will disagree with me, but I think that the ability to capture pre-trigger data and record single events more than outweigh all of the advantages of an analog scope.  In truth it depends on the type of work you are doing and the signals you will look at -- it is just my preference.  The other issue is that you can get a pretty nice used analog scope for much cheaper than a new budget DSO, so it isn't really a fair comparison.

[alm]

I agree that a basic DSO is more useful than a basic analog scope, but a basic DSO is about $350 (Rigol DS1052E). A basic analog scope can range from free to $200 for a nice one. For less than $350, I would recommend a good used analog scope over any of the inferior DSOs with low sample rate, short memory depth, low update rate and lousy UI.