Electronics > RF, Microwave, Ham Radio

VNA recommendation

<< < (13/13)

G0HZU:
Yes, the times are certainly changing... at work there has been a significant shift away from purchasing test gear and at least half of the test gear is now rented. This is a fairly significant experiment for the company and I'm not sure how typical this approach is in 2022.

It's not unusual to get a repair quote from Keysight for £15k just to repair a 15 year old Agilent spectrum analyser and the cost of maintaining and calibrating the older test gear is part of the reason there has been this shift away from owning expensive test gear. A lot of it ends up rotting on a shelf once it is more than about 10-15 years old and it becomes a money pit to maintain it all. Where I work, it is often a case of renting a spectrum analyser or a sig gen for 1-3 months at a time. The old stuff is gradually migrating to the skip as each item eventually develops a niggly fault or fails to pass the annual calibration.

I'd expect that universities and research agencies could swap across to Siglent if you make the performance/price ratio attractive enough. Where I work it will always be Keysight, Tek or R&S and this decision is made up at a high level.

tautech:

--- Quote from: G0HZU on February 07, 2022, 10:58:04 pm ---I'd expect that universities and research agencies could swap across to Siglent if you make the performance/price ratio attractive enough.
--- End quote ---
That's happening to some degree already.....at least for us.


--- Quote ---Where I work it will always be Keysight, Tek or R&S and this decision is made up at a high level.
--- End quote ---
Yes without the historical relationships between HPAK and Rigol and LeCroy and Siglent these up and coming competitors would still be C brands along with some of the other rubbish out there and be of zero challenge to the big boys.
Now they are making significant technological advances and putting gear in the hands of techs and hobbyists at prices we only dreamt about just a decade ago and at sufficient numbers to fund further development the next 20 years will be staggering to see where it all ends up unless the A brands make significant investment to holdoff the upward march of the leading Chinese brands.
There's no real indication the A brands give a damn and appear to imagine their hard won reputations will carry the day. How long will that last ?  :-//

Mechatrommer:

--- Quote from: tautech on February 07, 2022, 10:36:01 pm ---Quite agree however the TE landscape is rapidly changing where zeros have been stripped from pricing that A brands want for their gear.

--- End quote ---
maybe you should aim at new emerging small companies. doing promotion at under or post graduate etc, giving free education etc. when new companies can perform just as well as big stubborn companies, then the big companies may start to rethink their common sense about certain brands. ymmv.

tautech:

--- Quote from: G0HZU on February 06, 2022, 11:41:28 pm ---I'm not sure but the datasheet implies the Siglent SVA3012X VNA power is fixed at -5dBm so maybe the operator is also overdriving the amplifier in the demo video as the ZKL-2R7 has 24dB gain and output P1dB of about +17dBm. From what I can see the VNA doesn't display the source power level so it's unclear what the source power is set to. Hopefully it has been set to something like -20dBm or lower.

--- End quote ---
Just had a chance to get mine out and check.
In VNA mode you can access the Port 1 output level by pressing the TG button on the front panel where you have -20 to 0dB available. -5dB is default.

However you make a good point that the stimulus level is not plainly visible whereas for some uses it certainly should be. New feature request.......

Marcel G:
You should take a look at an Agilent E5062A.

This device is now affordable (no ebay) if you can live with Windows 2000.

The device is started you don,t really have to worry about it anymore.

The only real drawback I think is that it not the best in trace noise, only 1 USB on the front and the image quality could be a bit better.

Have had sereral devices side by side also a lot more expensive but for me it just started to get fun with either an N9923A Fieldfox or an E5062A.
Older and other brands disappointed me.

What i,m actually waiting for someone to really test the Siglent VNA.
The demo videos on internet don,t tell me enough to buy a Siglent VNA (up to 4.5 GHz and a two ports version).
For this low price it is almost impossible to imagine that they can put this on the market.

Marcel

Navigation

[0] Message Index

[*] Previous page