Howdy All,
I've been researching an inexpensive digital oscilloscope. I have very little experience with oscilloscopes, mainly from school many moons ago. I realize that the Rigol DS1052e has been the popular entry level choice, but I noticed what appears to be a new line of budget scopes from Instek, the GDS-1000-U series
http://www.gwinstek.com/en/product/productdetail.aspx?pid=3&mid=7&id=1299 (not to be confused with the GDS-1000a or the GDS-1000a-U.) The 50MHz version (GDS-1052-U) is $299 at tequipment.com, a price point at which I'm essentially ready to just pull the trigger.
There are three main spec differences that I notice between this Instek and the Rigol. The Instek samples at 250 MSa/s (vs 1 GSa/s for the Rigol) which I'm not particularly worried about especially with a 50 MHz scope. The Rigol has a multiplication math function which the Instek lacks but I have no idea where I would ever need that function. Finally, the Instek has only a 4kpt record length per channel compared to the minimum of 8kpt on the Rigol (dual channel, 500 MSa/S) with the potential for 1Mpt using long memory at some sample rates. This small record length has me a bit worried although I'm not altogether sure whether that would even present a problem for me in the foreseeable future.
My primary uses would be debugging some hobby microcontroller projects including communications and sensor interfacing. I don't see me going over 20MHz clock frequencies anytime soon with most communications below 10kbps probably topping out at 115kbps.
Can anyone offer an example of where I would likely be limited by the 4kpt record length? Is there any other reason to hold off on just picking up this scope?
I can see that the Rigol is better in many ways, but I can't justify spending the extra $100 (I can barely justify spending the
first $300). I think that a less capable scope in my workshop is probably better than a more capable one that sits in the store.
Many thanks for bearing with me as a first time poster.