Products > Test Equipment
Digilent. The opposite of a rant.
KungFuJosh:
--- Quote from: Fried Chicken on April 10, 2024, 06:41:19 pm ---buried fucking here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Instruments?useskin=vector#2010s
--- End quote ---
Eww, Texas. 😉😉
horse_battery_staple_guy:
--- Quote from: David Aurora on April 10, 2024, 12:34:36 pm ---Look, I'm pretty good at pissing and moaning about all sorts of things, but I really feel like I need to give credit where it's due. Every single time I ask a stupid question or make a request about their Waveforms software the response is basically "The feature you're looking for is ____, it's in the ____ menu. Here's how to use it" or "We'll try to add that", usually followed closely by an update with the exact feature I was asking about. It's just unbelievable how damn helpful they are (especially Attila).
Nobody is twisting my arm to say this, I'm getting nothing for it, but after yet another great experience I just felt the need to give them a massive thumbs up because it's so damn rare to see a company work that hard to make their tools nice to work with. Software kicks ass. Support kicks ass. Hardware has worked flawlessly and done exactly what I've needed it to do (I've been using an AD2 for a bit of a niche task for a couple years now).
/end praise
--- End quote ---
It's kinda hard to believe they're owned by NI (Now Emerson), considering that NI practically murdered their entire customer support. Hopefully it doesn't go through the same things LabVIEW did throughout the years.
rpro:
--- Quote from: Anthocyanina on April 10, 2024, 03:19:07 pm ---
--- Quote from: rpro on April 10, 2024, 03:13:25 pm ---Sorry, the specs say 500uV/Div and 200uV/Div for the AD2 and AD3 vertical min. sensitivities. Maybe you meant something else.
Yes, their product support is superb.
--- End quote ---
that's all done with software zoom. it has only two real hardware ranges, 500mv/ and 5v/
--- End quote ---
Maybe, in case it could help others, we should mention that these are 14-bit resolution scopes. 500mv/ for 10 divisions would imply 500x10/2^14 = 305uV steps. This is perhaps what they meant to say in their specs.
Attila from Digilent has a post on this:
https://forum.digilent.com/topic/21043-low-voltage-accuracy-for-analog-discovery-2/?do=findComment&comment=60181
David Aurora:
--- Quote from: Anthocyanina on April 10, 2024, 02:37:03 pm ---yes! i don't know of any other company that is so receptive to user feedback and suggestions. i also wish they made an analog discovery with at least a 100 or 200mV/ range, but yeah, their customer support is absolutely unmatched
--- End quote ---
It's just insane how helpful they are. Less than 24 hours ago I asked about a feature, this morning there's a screenshot in the thread of the feature in action and a comment saying it'll be in the next release. And that's far from the first time I've had that experience. Blows my mind.
I think one of the models has a 200mV range (unless I read wrong)- https://digilent.com/reference/test-and-measurement/analog-discovery-pro-3x50/start
The front end limitations (not just the low range stuff but also maximum input range) has been a bit of a dampener for me as far as buying more hardware and using it as general purpose test gear (my AD2 is permanently wired up with some interfacing circuitry as a digitiser for my curve tracer so it's not an issue there), but I still haven't ruled it out completely because the software is just so damn nice to use. I've tried a couple of different digital setups over the years and always hated it compared to my analog gear, but I could absolutely see myself using Waveforms on a day to day basis. It's just a bit tricky with the signal levels/voltages I work with to make it work with the AD hardware.
Anthocyanina:
--- Quote from: rpro on April 10, 2024, 11:51:46 pm ---Maybe, in case it could help others, we should mention that these are 14-bit resolution scopes. 500mv/ for 10 divisions would imply 500x10/2^14 = 305uV steps. This is perhaps what they meant to say in their specs.
Attila from Digilent has a post on this:
https://forum.digilent.com/topic/21043-low-voltage-accuracy-for-analog-discovery-2/?do=findComment&comment=60181
--- End quote ---
yeah, but at vertical settings below 200mV/ you don't get the full 14 bits vertical resolution, you still get the same absolute ~300uV resolution, of course, but that becomes a larger percentage of the entire vertical range the further down you go in mV/, and since the noise floor is the same against the 500mV/ full scale when you zoom in further, you'll get a lower signal to noise ratio when using the zoomed in ranges. it's still quite usable thanks to it being 14 bits, but one extra range at the higher sensitivity settings would be great.
--- Quote from: David Aurora on April 11, 2024, 12:10:23 am ---
--- Quote from: Anthocyanina on April 10, 2024, 02:37:03 pm ---yes! i don't know of any other company that is so receptive to user feedback and suggestions. i also wish they made an analog discovery with at least a 100 or 200mV/ range, but yeah, their customer support is absolutely unmatched
--- End quote ---
It's just insane how helpful they are. Less than 24 hours ago I asked about a feature, this morning there's a screenshot in the thread of the feature in action and a comment saying it'll be in the next release. And that's far from the first time I've had that experience. Blows my mind.
I think one of the models has a 200mV range (unless I read wrong)- https://digilent.com/reference/test-and-measurement/analog-discovery-pro-3x50/start
The front end limitations (not just the low range stuff but also maximum input range) has been a bit of a dampener for me as far as buying more hardware and using it as general purpose test gear (my AD2 is permanently wired up with some interfacing circuitry as a digitiser for my curve tracer so it's not an issue there), but I still haven't ruled it out completely because the software is just so damn nice to use. I've tried a couple of different digital setups over the years and always hated it compared to my analog gear, but I could absolutely see myself using Waveforms on a day to day basis. It's just a bit tricky with the signal levels/voltages I work with to make it work with the AD hardware.
--- End quote ---
i've made a few suggestions over the past couple of years, and they've implemented most of them, and for some they have not, they have tried to or at least looked into it!
i didn't know that about the ADP3000, that's cool, sadly it still only has two ranges, but i would take the 200mV/ over the 500mV/ only having those two options. ideally they should keep the 500mV/ range and add the 200mV/ range for 3 hardware ranges. they had a poll thread a while back asking for features you'd like to see in new products, i suggested that, but so far it seems that's not a priority for them, with the AD3 and ADP2230 having only 2 ranges too.
i still use my AD2 for most of what i do that is within its specifications, the software is so good i have a better experience using it than the bech scope. i only use my bench scope when what i'm doing is outside the AD2's capabilities, or when using a bench scope would seem more professional ( there are tons of people who don't take the AD2 seriously, even if it would basically show the same as a bench scope!)
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