New Tektronix TBS2000 oscilloscopes

[Hydrawerk]

I saw this TBS2000 at a trade fair one month ago and I was not impressed. This scope just looks weird and crap. No video trigger. A strange way to choose channels for cursor measurements.

[nctnico]

Why would you need video trigger nowadays? Analog video has been obsolete for a while now.

[Hydrawerk]

The scope has quite good connectivity, but there is probably no fine vertical or horizontal setting. No cursors in XY mode.  The waveform gets obscured by automatic measurements, well, I can forgive this.

[Hydrawerk]

Why would you need video trigger nowadays? Analog video has been obsolete for a while now.

Yes, but I think that almost all other scopes have a video trigger. And TBS2000 is a school scope. There should be a video trigger.
And these buttons still have no functions. Maybe they will be supported in a new firmware in future. 

[Hydrawerk]

Well, Keysight DSOX2000 was designed as a school scope back in 2011 and it stays competitive till nowadays. Yes, it has a small 1Mpoints memory, but at school it is OK.

[David Hess]

Why would you need video trigger nowadays? Analog video has been obsolete for a while now.

Video triggers also work with analog RGB like from VGA but I agree, it seems odd that oscilloscopes still include them.

[mikeselectricstuff]

Why would you need video trigger nowadays? Analog video has been obsolete for a while now.

Video triggers also work with analog RGB like from VGA but I agree, it seems odd that oscilloscopes still include them.

i was surprised to see dedicated video-trigger hardware in the DSOX1000 -an LM1881 sync seperator.

[serggio]

Well, Keysight DSOX2000 was designed as a school scope back in 2011 and it stays competitive till nowadays. Yes, it har a small 1Mpoints memory, but at school it is OK.

U really need more acquisition memory? U really use more memory day from day in measurement? For what? 
As for Tek TBS2000, I not understand Tek  marketing, I not understand targeting this device.. price starting from 1200 USD, 1 GS/s Sample Rate and TekVPI™ probe interface  Probe from Tek with this interface type cost more that couple of this scopes... For what this interface was added in this scope?

[ErnestoFB]

Folks,
I simply loved every detail of my TBS2104! And you can adjust the brightness for sure!

[Hydrawerk]

Well, as a basic entry level scope it is quite OK.

[David Hess]

U really need more acquisition memory? U really use more memory day from day in measurement? For what?

Large acquisition memory is a modern low end DSO's version of marketing's Blue Crystals with some economic justification in that a large acquisition memory is *cheaper* than implementing the alternatives.

As for Tek TBS2000, I not understand Tek  marketing, I not understand targeting this device.. price starting from 1200 USD, 1 GS/s Sample Rate and TekVPI™ probe interface  Probe from Tek with this interface type cost more that couple of this scopes... For what this interface was added in this scope?

The probe interface is basically free compared to the cost of the probe which uses it and even a full set of stock passive probes are not inexpensive.

The alternatives were to leave the probe interface off or implement *another* custom incompatible probe interface which ends up costing just as much.

[ErnestoFB]

For me it will be very useful because I will be able to use active probes not needing to buy a more expensive oscilloscope and having the same results up to the frequency of 100MHz, which perfectly covers the signals of 99% of my projects.

[ErnestoFB]

Well, Keysight DSOX2000 was designed as a school scope back in 2011 and it stays competitive till nowadays. Yes, it har a small 1Mpoints memory, but at school it is OK.

U really need more acquisition memory? U really use more memory day from day in measurement? For what? 
As for Tek TBS2000, I not understand Tek  marketing, I not understand targeting this device.. price starting from 1200 USD, 1 GS/s Sample Rate and TekVPI™ probe interface  Probe from Tek with this interface type cost more that couple of this scopes... For what this interface was added in this scope?

Compared with my old oscilloscope, a Tektronix TDS1012C-EDU with only 2.5k points of record length, it only accelerated a thousand times my debug work in I2C and SPI buses because I can capture all the communication in the bus, turn off the circuit and analyze calmly if the obtained signals correspond what should happen.
My main motivation for buying the TBS2104 was its affordable price, the 20M of record length, the four analog channels and the superb 9" display.

[blacksheeplogic]

As for Tek TBS2000, I not understand Tek  marketing, I not understand targeting this device.. price starting from 1200 USD, 1 GS/s Sample Rate and TekVPI™ probe interface  Probe from Tek with this interface type cost more that couple of this scopes... For what this interface was added in this scope?

Even on much more expensive scopes, an active probe can cost the same or more than the scope. I fail therefore to see why the inclusion of the TekVPI probe interface detracts in anyway from this scope. Also for the target market it makes sense, a teaching facility may well have access to these probes and it may make these scopes more flexibility as teaching tools across courses.

With Keysight, active probe support requires stepping up to a 3T  and even then they only permit 2 on the 3T. How is this a good thing?

[JPortici]

Well, Keysight DSOX2000 was designed as a school scope back in 2011 and it stays competitive till nowadays. Yes, it har a small 1Mpoints memory, but at school it is OK.

U really need more acquisition memory? U really use more memory day from day in measurement? For what? 
As for Tek TBS2000, I not understand Tek  marketing, I not understand targeting this device.. price starting from 1200 USD, 1 GS/s Sample Rate and TekVPI™ probe interface  Probe from Tek with this interface type cost more that couple of this scopes... For what this interface was added in this scope?

Compared with my old oscilloscope, a Tektronix TDS1012C-EDU with only 2.5k points of record length, it only accelerated a thousand times my debug work in I2C and SPI buses because I can capture all the communication in the bus, turn off the circuit and analyze calmly if the obtained signals correspond what should happen.
My main motivation for buying the TBS2104 was its affordable price, the 20M of record length, the four analog channels and the superb 9" display.

... if you can only buy tektronix. i'll give you that. i heard that buying these things is a bit tricky in brazil

[MrW0lf]

My main motivation for buying the TBS2104 was its affordable price, the 20M of record length, the four analog channels and the superb 9" display.

BTW this is on all channels, but not shared. So total 80M. Just to clarify so people do not think it has less than budget scopes

[Hydrawerk]

Compared with my old oscilloscope, a Tektronix TDS1012C-EDU with only 2.5k points of record length, it only accelerated a thousand times my debug work in I2C and SPI buses because I can capture all the communication in the bus, turn off the circuit and analyze calmly if the obtained signals correspond what should happen.
My main motivation for buying the TBS2104 was its affordable price, the 20M of record length, the four analog channels and the superb 9" display.

I think that TBS2104 has no I2C or SPI decoding... :-(

[David Hess]

Compared with my old oscilloscope, a Tektronix TDS1012C-EDU with only 2.5k points of record length, it only accelerated a thousand times my debug work in I2C and SPI buses because I can capture all the communication in the bus, turn off the circuit and analyze calmly if the obtained signals correspond what should happen.

There are certainly applications where a long record length is required but they are in the minority.  In the past, this would have been done with a logic analyser or protocol decoder and those are still better instruments for this.

[nctnico]

Compared with my old oscilloscope, a Tektronix TDS1012C-EDU with only 2.5k points of record length, it only accelerated a thousand times my debug work in I2C and SPI buses because I can capture all the communication in the bus, turn off the circuit and analyze calmly if the obtained signals correspond what should happen.

There are certainly applications where a long record length is required but they are in the minority.  In the past, this would have been done with a logic analyser or protocol decoder and those are still better instruments for this.

Not if you want to look at both signal waveform and decoding. From my own experience having an oscilloscope with deep memory AND decoding is definitely better (=more productive). Think about situations where a signal gets distorted every now and then. Deep memory (segmented mode) allows to capture many messages without knowing exactly what is wrong with the signal and when the message with the problem is found you can also check the waveform.

[ErnestoFB]

Compared with my old oscilloscope, a Tektronix TDS1012C-EDU with only 2.5k points of record length, it only accelerated a thousand times my debug work in I2C and SPI buses because I can capture all the communication in the bus, turn off the circuit and analyze calmly if the obtained signals correspond what should happen.
My main motivation for buying the TBS2104 was its affordable price, the 20M of record length, the four analog channels and the superb 9" display.

I think that TBS2104 has no I2C or SPI decoding... :-(

Yes, it doesn't have data decoder. But I see this image and quickly understand the content of every data packet and any data or signal errors or unwanted noises, simultaneously. In this image, I have in channel four the slave select signal, which was used as trigger source too. In channel three, the serial clock and in channel one, MOSI (microcontroller output slave input) signal with data 0x20, 0x0F, 0x26, 0x26, 0x24, that I can interpret in seconds.
The data decoder really increases the analysis speed, but I have no money to buy a better scope here in Brazil and the TBS2104 worked great until now.

[ErnestoFB]

... if you can only buy tektronix. i'll give you that. i heard that buying these things is a bit tricky in brazil

The Brazil is a hell for who like Science or Electronics. I hate this country and I will left from here as soon as possible.
  

[Wuerstchenhund]

Compared with my old oscilloscope, a Tektronix TDS1012C-EDU with only 2.5k points of record length, it only accelerated a thousand times my debug work in I2C and SPI buses because I can capture all the communication in the bus, turn off the circuit and analyze calmly if the obtained signals correspond what should happen.

There are certainly applications where a long record length is required but they are in the minority.

Not really. For example, just watch how quickly the sample rate (and thereby the useable BW) drops on scopes with small sample memories when you extend the timebase. A scope with deep memory can sustain a high sample rate even at long timebase settings.

[David Hess]

There are certainly applications where a long record length is required but they are in the minority.

Not really.  For example, just watch how quickly the sample rate (and thereby the useable BW) drops on scopes with small sample memories when you extend the timebase.  A scope with deep memory can sustain a high sample rate even at long timebase settings.

But not long delay settings as we discovered with the Rigol DS1000Z.  (1) In that case, long record lengths are great as long as what you want to see what lies within them and if it does not, the sample rate has to be decreases anyway.  Oscilloscopes with short acquisition memories use features like peak detection and delayed acquisition (sweep) to apply their maximum sample rate exactly where the user wants.

More processing power was also required to allow deep acquisition memories but both were the result of increases integration and processing power has fallen behind making very deep acquisition memories *less* useful in a general sense.  Maybe high end DSOs avoid this problem but my experience with the DSO/MDSO5000 series is that they do not; using high record lengths results in waiting for processing of each record which is fine for single shot applications where long record lengths are especially useful but it is aggravatingly slow otherwise.

This processing power problem with long record lengths is not new.  The ancient Tektronix 2230/2232 DSOs support 1k and 4k record lengths which seems laughably short by today's standards but why did they support a 1k record length at all?  Why wasn't more acquisition memory included?  It would have been trivial to do and only moderately expensive.  I suspect it was because the limited processing power available at the time could handle 1k records significantly faster so for a *better user experience*, a selectable 1k record length was made available.

(1) The Rigol DS1000Z series brings up another question.  Exactly what is the record length of a DS1000Z?  Measurements are only made upon the display record which is 600 or 1200 points long yet the specifications say 3 Mpoints/channel.  Shouldn't they say something like 600 or 1200 points operating in real time and 3 Mpoints/channel when stopped?  How many other DSOs which make measurements on the display record are like this?

If only 600 or 1200 points are displayed, what happened to the others?  What exactly is the sample rate of a Rigol DS1000Z when all of the samples do not fit into the display record?  Do they all contribute something to the display or are they thrown out?  This may explain some odd looking displays on modern DSOs.

[nctnico]

More processing power was also required to allow deep acquisition memories but both were the result of increases integration and processing power has fallen behind making very deep acquisition memories *less* useful in a general sense.  Maybe high end DSOs avoid this problem but my experience with the DSO/MDSO5000 series is that they do not; using high record lengths results in waiting for processing of each record which is fine for single shot applications where long record lengths are especially useful but it is aggravatingly slow otherwise.

This is kind of a typical Tektronix problem which cannot be extrapolated to oscilloscopes in general. Besides that there are several affordable scopes on the market which have enough processing power to deal with tens of Mpts quickly.

[David Hess]

More processing power was also required to allow deep acquisition memories but both were the result of increases integration and processing power has fallen behind making very deep acquisition memories *less* useful in a general sense.  Maybe high end DSOs avoid this problem but my experience with the DSO/MDSO5000 series is that they do not; using high record lengths results in waiting for processing of each record which is fine for single shot applications where long record lengths are especially useful but it is aggravatingly slow otherwise.

This is kind of a typical Tektronix problem which cannot be extrapolated to oscilloscopes in general. Besides that there are several affordable scopes on the market which have enough processing power to deal with tens of Mpts quickly.

I have played with other DSOs and I have yet to fine *one* where "quickly" was quick enough.  See above about display record length.