New Siglent SDS1202X-E oscilloscope based on Xilinx Zynq-7000 SoC architecture

[EEVblog]

[GeorgeOfTheJungle]

115K2 is hardly fast. I'd expect any decent serial decode to go to at least 4Mbaud, ideally more

Of course the moar the better, but at low sweep speeds (100 ms/div) that's not possible, you'd need ~76MB mem depth/channel to decode @ 4Mbaud

there would be 40k characters per horizontal division. a scope is probably not the correct tool at this point

You do know the SDS1kX series decode while in Zoom mode, of course you do you just forgot. 

@JPortici: That ^^^^^^ and there might be as well just a few tens of bytes (marks) scattered here and there (my use case):

"The other channel is sensing the current into the DUT, the code spits bytes at certain points to correlate execution with power input, the DUT is sleeping most of the time, only awakes every now and then and for less than ~2 seconds."

[EEVblog]

I'm told there's a fresh off the production line 200 MHz unit on the way to Dave right now. 

It's in the Fedex system somewhere

[GeorgeOfTheJungle]

Thank you Dave. Where the X (not X-E) errs is when you do that at SLOW SWEEPS (10ms/div, 20ms/div or 50ms/div (*)) and then zoom in to see the data: you get mostly garbage at anything above 38.4Kbaud.

All about the bug is in this thread: https://www.eevblog.com/forum/testgear/siglent-sds1102x-serial-decoder-not-decoding-properly/

(*)In the latest fw updates they shut down the decoder @ 50ms/div or higher.

[GeorgeOfTheJungle]

you only need 3x clock to recover 100% good data from a clean stream.
Most UARTs have an option to do 8x to get higher baudrates, some have 4x.

Good to know, that would be great, but the SDS1000X seems to need not even 16 but hundreds to do it right, go figure.

[GeorgeOfTheJungle]

The red boxes in the video are decode errors

[maginnovision]

The red boxes in the video are decode errors

They were there on purpose.

[rf-loop]

you only need 3x clock to recover 100% good data from a clean stream.
Most UARTs have an option to do 8x to get higher baudrates, some have 4x.

Good to know, that would be great, but the SDS1000X seems to need not even 16 but hundreds to do it right, go figure.

Siglent officer told me that serial decoding, specially with some  low timebases is "broken" and this repair/improve  work is in "to-do list"
 
(This work is perhaps scheduled for "things to do" box. So, next coming FW update perhaps do not include this.) 

[tautech]

Thank you Dave. Where the X (not X-E) errs is when you do that at SLOW SWEEPS (10ms/div, 20ms/div or 50ms/div (*)) and then zoom in to see the data: you get mostly garbage at anything above 38.4Kbaud.

All about the bug is in this thread: https://www.eevblog.com/forum/testgear/siglent-sds1102x-serial-decoder-not-decoding-properly/

(*)In the latest fw updates they shut down the decoder @ 50ms/div or higher.

George, in another thread I replied that the engineers are looking at the issues you raised.

While you are at it pass them this one too with a footnote: "SDS1102X can't decode, thank you very much"

Initial feedback from the factory is at timebases slower than 10ms there is a problem that the engineers are looking at.

[pascal_sweden]

The software that Dave got is only a preview version from engineering, and hopefully the production software includes a proper implementation of hardware decoding. So I think we should not give up our hope already. We should not forget the reason why Siglent selected the Zynq-7000 SoC in the first place

In addition future software updates could also include support for the external trigger. Maybe Siglent just overlooked the external trigger capability. This is clearly a limitation in software for now, and not a hardware limitation.

Let's keep our fingers crossed on future software updates that include a proper implementation of hardware decoding and support for the external trigger! Good work so far Siglent!

[MrW0lf]

Hm, all I can see in the video is that only 140k is used? (10us/ * 14 @ 1GSa/s). What is this, stroking a newborn kitten? That is not torture test even remotely. Crank up to 14M + serial trigger + show table + calculate wfm/s. Then it's testing. Cannot get it to crash - no dumpster diving for a week for you

[pascal_sweden]

Dave: Could you check if this scope also supports 9-bit data decoding?
I need this for a specific project that I am working on.

[nctnico]

Some remarks:
I don't think this scope is doing hardware decoding because that would require a serious amount of extra FPGA work while most of the software for decoding is already there (albeit needing fixes given the problems found in the SDS1000X).

The delay before the decoding apears has nothing to do with reading the memory because the memory depth is 140kpts and not 14Mpts. The delay is there to wait for a stable signal so the waveform update rate doesn't suffer from interruption by the decoding cycles.

It would be nice to force the scope to always use full memory depth (is that possible?), capture some frames and then look in the lister while zoomed in on one frame. If all frames are listed then it is actually doing full memory decoding.

BTW: are the decoding errors really on purpose? I can't find that in the video.

[GeorgeOfTheJungle]

BTW: are the decoding errors really on purpose? I can't find that in the video.

Smells very much like some sort of April 1st prank me thinks

[madires]

Sorry for nitpicking, but please use the term "bps" (bits per second) when you're talking about the data rate. Seeing "Baud" on the scope's screen is . Baud is the symbol rate. A symbol can be the equivalent of muliple bits. Take QAM64 for example, a single symbol of QAM64 transports 6 bits. So a symbol rate of 1kbaud is a data rate of 6kbps.

[ElectronicCat]

So is the SDS1202X-E going to be similar to the current 1202X but priced similarly (or cheaper than) the SDS1102X. Currently trying to decide between the Rigol DS1054Z, Keysight EDUX1002A and either the unreleased Siglent SDS1202X-E or SDS1102X. Serial decoding would definitely be nice so I'm tempted by the Rigol or Siglents (though the lack of an extra channel might be a pain), but I suppose I could always get a cheap logic analyser as well. The Rigol still looks like the best bang for the buck but the software and hardware on the Keysights and Siglents look to be slightly better.

[nctnico]

So is the SDS1202X-E going to be similar to the current 1202X but priced similarly (or cheaper than) the SDS1102X. Currently trying to decide between the Rigol DS1054Z, Keysight EDUX1002A and either the unreleased Siglent SDS1202X-E or SDS1102X. Serial decoding would definitely be nice so I'm tempted by the Rigol or Siglents (though the lack of an extra channel might be a pain), but I suppose I could always get a cheap logic analyser as well. The Rigol still looks like the best bang for the buck but the software and hardware on the Keysights and Siglents look to be slightly better.

If Siglent lives up to their reputation the SDS1202X-E will be riddled with bugs for the next 2 years so your best bet is the Rigol DS1000Z if you want decoding. I'd go for a 4 channel scope anyway because that is way more usefull than a 2 channel scope.

[mikeselectricstuff]

Sorry for nitpicking, but please use the term "bps" (bits per second) when you're talking about the data rate. Seeing "Baud" on the scope's screen is . Baud is the symbol rate. A symbol can be the equivalent of muliple bits. Take QAM64 for example, a single symbol of QAM64 transports 6 bits. So a symbol rate of 1kbaud is a data rate of 6kbps.

In the context of UART data. Everyone uses baud. To use anything else would be confusing

[coppice]

Sorry for nitpicking, but please use the term "bps" (bits per second) when you're talking about the data rate. Seeing "Baud" on the scope's screen is . Baud is the symbol rate. A symbol can be the equivalent of muliple bits. Take QAM64 for example, a single symbol of QAM64 transports 6 bits. So a symbol rate of 1kbaud is a data rate of 6kbps.

In the context of UART data. Everyone uses baud. To use anything else would be confusing

I think most of us use the proper term, bps, even though dumb software developers keep inappropriately using baud in configuration windows. I agree with madires. Its really annoying when people use words at random.

[ebastler]

The software that Dave got is only a preview version from engineering, and hopefully the production software includes a proper implementation of hardware decoding. So I think we should not give up our hope already. We should not forget the reason why Siglent selected the Zynq-7000 SoC in the first place

In addition future software updates could also include support for the external trigger. Maybe Siglent just overlooked the external trigger capability. This is clearly a limitation in software for now, and not a hardware limitation.

I admire your optimisim. 
Seems that Siglent haven't even come around to fixing serial decoding in the previous product:

[...] the SDS1000X seems to need not even 16 but hundreds to do it right, go figure.

Siglent officer told me that serial decoding, specially with some  low timebases is "broken" and this repair/improve  work is in "to-do list"
(This work is perhaps scheduled for "things to do" box. So, next coming FW update perhaps do not include this.)

And no, I don't think that Siglent chose the Zynq chip primarily with hardware serial decoding in mind.
The Zynq is a cool chip, by the way, but I don't think it justifies developing a fixation... 

[maginnovision]

BTW: are the decoding errors really on purpose? I can't find that in the video.

Yes, it's the same uart demo that comes with the RTB2000.

[tautech]

So is the SDS1202X-E going to be similar to the current 1202X but priced similarly (or cheaper than) the SDS1102X.

Yes.
X-E will have some features that are better than X models, but there will be some small differences too.
I see some small differences in the UI in Dave's vid.

Currently trying to decide between the Rigol DS1054Z, Keysight EDUX1002A and either the unreleased Siglent SDS1202X-E or SDS1102X. Serial decoding would definitely be nice so I'm tempted by the Rigol or Siglents (though the lack of an extra channel might be a pain), but I suppose I could always get a cheap logic analyser as well. The Rigol still looks like the best bang for the buck but the software and hardware on the Keysights and Siglents look to be slightly better.

X or X-E is the only choice if you want full BW 500uV inputs.
I don't know why Dave did the decoding at minimum memory depth, maybe just to show that it could. 

As the UI is very similar to existing models I would expect that bug count when released should be quite small.
A question to Tech support indicated they have some units at their beta testers and feedback is seeing a just few bugs reported. So we would expect a new FW release very soon after release addressing them as has happened with some of Siglent's other recent releases.

The software that Dave got is only a preview version from engineering, and hopefully the production software includes a proper implementation of hardware decoding. So I think we should not give up our hope already. We should not forget the reason why Siglent selected the Zynq-7000 SoC in the first place

In addition future software updates could also include support for the external trigger. Maybe Siglent just overlooked the external trigger capability. This is clearly a limitation in software for now, and not a hardware limitation.

I admire your optimisim. 
Seems that Siglent haven't even come around to fixing serial decoding in the previous product:

[...] the SDS1000X seems to need not even 16 but hundreds to do it right, go figure.

Siglent officer told me that serial decoding, specially with some  low timebases is "broken" and this repair/improve  work is in "to-do list"
(This work is perhaps scheduled for "things to do" box. So, next coming FW update perhaps do not include this.)

And no, I don't think that Siglent chose the Zynq chip primarily with hardware serial decoding in mind.
The Zynq is a cool chip, by the way, but I don't think it justifies developing a fixation... 

Correct, but the Zynq chip offers some more grunt to implement some existing features better and possibly include more that can use the additional grunt.

[kcbrown]

If Siglent lives up to their reputation the SDS1202X-E will be riddled with bugs for the next 2 years so your best bet is the Rigol DS1000Z if you want decoding. I'd go for a 4 channel scope anyway because that is way more usefull than a 2 channel scope.

Um, no.  That would be making a decision based on speculation, and it's premature to do so.   No, his best bet is to wait for this new unit to come out and to see how well it actually holds up, and then make the decision.

Maybe it'll be riddled with bugs and maybe it won't be.  Siglent's history with longstanding bugs is mainly with respect to the SDS2000 series (not the 2000X or 1000X).  Put another way, it appears you're basing your criticism on how Siglent handled one model line, rather than multiple lines.   Which other lines had the same issue with longstanding bugs?  I know of none, but that doesn't mean they don't exist.  It's on you to point them out and to provide supporting evidence, since it's your claim that Siglent has a reputation for this.

[nctnico]

If Siglent lives up to their reputation the SDS1202X-E will be riddled with bugs for the next 2 years so your best bet is the Rigol DS1000Z if you want decoding. I'd go for a 4 channel scope anyway because that is way more usefull than a 2 channel scope.

Um, no.  That would be making a decision based on speculation, and it's premature to do so.   No, his best bet is to wait for this new unit to come out and to see how well it actually holds up, and then make the decision.

Maybe it'll be riddled with bugs and maybe it won't be.  Siglent's history with longstanding bugs is mainly with respect to the SDS2000 series (not the 2000X or 1000X).  Put another way, it appears you're basing your criticism on how Siglent handled one model line, rather than multiple lines.   Which other lines had the same issue with longstanding bugs?  I know of none, but that doesn't mean they don't exist.  It's on you to point them out and to provide supporting evidence, since it's your claim that Siglent has a reputation for this.

Are you kidding? Look at the history of every product Siglent has released and you'll see it takes at least two years to iron out the serious bugs. Just look in the threads about Siglent power supplies, DMMs, signal generators or oscilloscopes and you can see for yourself. Maybe the SDS2000 is a low point in your mind but initially the SDG1000 series wasn't very useable with the original firmware (I ran the Lecroy firmware on mine for a long time) and it has a hardware issue as well, their new spectrum analyser had some issues with the tracking generator (current firmware sweeps much slower than before) and more recent someone found a serious problem in the UART decoding of the SDS1000X series scopes.

[tautech]

If Siglent lives up to their reputation the SDS1202X-E will be riddled with bugs for the next 2 years so your best bet is the Rigol DS1000Z if you want decoding. I'd go for a 4 channel scope anyway because that is way more usefull than a 2 channel scope.

Um, no.  That would be making a decision based on speculation, and it's premature to do so.   No, his best bet is to wait for this new unit to come out and to see how well it actually holds up, and then make the decision.

Maybe it'll be riddled with bugs and maybe it won't be.  Siglent's history with longstanding bugs is mainly with respect to the SDS2000 series (not the 2000X or 1000X).  Put another way, it appears you're basing your criticism on how Siglent handled one model line, rather than multiple lines.   Which other lines had the same issue with longstanding bugs?  I know of none, but that doesn't mean they don't exist.  It's on you to point them out and to provide supporting evidence, since it's your claim that Siglent has a reputation for this.

Yep, we've had problems....historical, things are different now, certainly no worse than other products released and discussed on this forum in the last few weeks.
Siglent's technical feedback network and beta tester structure is more advanced than it's ever been.

The member you have quoted is well known for his criticism and they were valid at one time. That he still apparently has his SDG1k is some testament to its longevity and it might seem he even runs the current Siglent FW in it now.

One wonders if he is again attempting to create hostility in this thread and start another slanging match that will only attract the attention of the moderators ?