Reasons for hacking DSOs

[Fungus]

How can this be any clearer?

There's a whole thread here to correct your mistaken view. Feel free to read it.

[nctnico]

I really should have become a writer of books and/or lyrics. I do some work once and me and my offspring earn money from it until eternity. I'd rather not be a baker who needs to work everyday to make new products to sell.

[Lightages]

How can this be any clearer?

There's a whole thread here to correct your mistaken view. Feel free to read it.

That is a rather ambiguous and back handed insult. What specific point of view are you referring to? How can you assert that I am mistaken? You are the arbiter of truth and justice?

[Zero999]

How can this be any clearer?

There's a whole thread here to correct your mistaken view. Feel free to read it.

That is a rather ambiguous and back handed insult. What specific point of view are you referring to? How can you assert that I am mistaken? You are the arbiter of truth and justice?

Yes, there are some highly arrogant people around here, who believe they are the only ones with a valid point of view. In my opinion, all sides of the debate have been expressed quite well in this thread. I'd go far as even suggesting it should be made a sticky so people can refer to it.

If anyone here really thinks hacking an oscilloscope is that bad, then perhaps they should go elsewhere, to some other site, where the webmaster doesn't gain advertising revenue from showing people how to hack oscilloscopes?

I really should have become a writer of books and/or lyrics. I do some work once and me and my offspring earn money from it until eternity. I'd rather not be a baker who needs to work everyday to make new products to sell.

Even if that isn't strictly true: copyright does expire, after a certain period of time, depending on the jurisdiction, I feel you do have a valid point there. I'm not saying there shouldn't be any copyright laws. People who create books, music, software etc. do need some kind of legal mechanism to ensure they get paid. However, I believe it's gone too far. The idea that someone can write one very good song, which shoots to number 1 or is used in a popular film or advert and they not longer have to earn an income is absurd. It doesn't benefit the market at all. Short copyright terms would help the market a lot, especially for things such as computer software, which become outdated very quickly.

[KL27x]

The difference is how the cost reduces vs the number of units produced: as the number of units rises towards infinity

Some software may cost 10 million pounds to develop, but if there're 10 million users, the cost per user of developing the software is only £1.

Take the situation above for a piece of hardware, which doesn't contain any software at all: the cost of providing it to each user will be £1 + the cost to make it.

... Plus the customer support. Plus the tech support. Plus the website and advertising. (And Rigol does advertise, because I get adverts for Rigol all the time. ) Now take the hardware; there's also an NRE to design the hardware to begin with. Then also to setup manufacturing. And to run the assembly. I.e., making two different versions with only minor differences will cost way more than just including everything and using firmware to differentiate.

But besides all that, how many scopes of a particular model is any given company going to sell by the time it's obsolete/superceeded/undercut by the competition? They have a very limited market/demand, and a competitive life cycle of around 6-8 years, maybe, plus or minus a couple. There will be no "approaching infinity." Not even close.

And besides even that, why the hell would someone invest $10 million dollars in software, project the demand of 10 million units (over the entire lifetime of the product), and then aim to break even, eventually? There is NO breaking even at those volumes. You win or you lose. When a company has a winner, they should collect. They will have losers, too! By the time you're ready to ship product, you can find out that someone else also had the same idea. But they executed it better. And now you are just going eat dirt for the next 6 years.

I thought of a curious example of firmware vs software in a product: Picaxe chips. They cost 3-4x as much as a PIC. Same hardware. What a rip, amirite!? I can't believe PIC doesn't include Picaxe firmware on every chip they make, since at inifinity, it would be completely free!

[Zero999]

The difference is how the cost reduces vs the number of units produced: as the number of units rises towards infinity

Some software may cost 10 million pounds to develop, but if there're 10 million users, the cost per user of developing the software is only £1.

Take the situation above for a piece of hardware, which doesn't contain any software at all: the cost of providing it to each user will be £1 + the cost to make it.

... Plus the customer support. Plus the tech support.

Well only licensed users/those who don't hack get that.

Plus the website and advertising. (And Rigol does advertise, because I get adverts for Rigol all the time. ) Now take the hardware; there's also an NRE to design the hardware to begin with. Then also to setup manufacturing. And to run the assembly. I.e., making two different versions with only minor differences will cost way more than just including everything and using firmware to differentiate.

But besides all that, how many scopes of a particular model is any given company going to sell by the time it's obsolete/superceeded/undercut by the competition? They have a very limited market/demand, and a competitive life cycle of around 6-8 years, maybe, plus or minus a couple. There will be no "approaching infinity." Not even close.

And besides even that, why the hell would someone invest $10 million dollars in software, project the demand of 10 million units (over the entire lifetime of the product), and then aim to break even, eventually? There is NO breaking even at those volumes. You win or you lose. When a company has a winner, they should collect. They will have losers, too! By the time you're ready to ship product, you can find out that someone else also had the same idea. But they executed it better. And now you are just going eat dirt for the next 6 years.

Oh, I agree with you. There are costs for software and hardware. It's how they scale that differs. Also note how everything is moving towards the direction of microcontrollers and FPGAs? Because it's cheaper easier to just produce one piece of hardware and do most of the detailed design in software.

I thought of a curious example of firmware vs software in a product: Picaxe chips. They cost 3-4x as much as a PIC. Same hardware. What a rip, amirite!? I can't believe PIC doesn't include Picaxe firmware on every chip they make, since at inifinity, it would be completely free!

I've never seen the point with Picaxe. It's always seemed expensive to me and pretty pointless.

[Lightages]

I don't understand how this gets so complicated for people. If I buy something, it is mine.

I agree.
If you have bought a machine (including an enormous finite state machine) that shows you up to 50MHz, then it is yours.
If you have bought a machine (including an enormous finite state machine) that shows you up to 100MHz, then it is yours.
If you have not bought a machine (including an enormous finite state machine) that shows you up to 100MHz, then it is not yours.

I believe this to be a false analogy. If I buy something, I am being promised a certain specification. The specification asserts what the machine is able to do, not what I can do or not do to alter it. It comes in beige, there I can never paint it another color?

I purchase a car and I want to change the tires to another size to suit what I want. I am not allowed to do this because it was not part of the original specification?

I buy a multimeter and I want to have a higher current measurement capacity. I install a higher rated fuse and take my chances. Not legal?

I buy a computer, but can't change the hard drive size because it wasn't part of the specification when I purchased the computer?

I buy an oscilloscope and the bandwidth is rated to be 50MHz. I can change the bandwidth by changing a couple of small parts. I must break a warranty seal to do this but I am willing to void my warranty. You are literally saying that I am not allowed to do this because the manufacturer did not specify any other bandwidth and that is not what I purchased?

You have never altered anything that you own from its original specification?

[tggzzz]

I don't understand how this gets so complicated for people. If I buy something, it is mine.

I agree.
If you have bought a machine (including an enormous finite state machine) that shows you up to 50MHz, then it is yours.
If you have bought a machine (including an enormous finite state machine) that shows you up to 100MHz, then it is yours.
If you have not bought a machine (including an enormous finite state machine) that shows you up to 100MHz, then it is not yours.

I believe this to be a false analogy.

It is not an analogy. It is a precise description.

Your predicate to your points ("If I buy something, it is mine.") does not represent the case under discussion, as I explained above.

[kcbrown]

In what jurisdictions is the generation or acquisition and use of these codes illegal?  It certainly isn't in the United States.  The DMCA doesn't apply to this, as I've already described previously.

IANAL, so I would be foolish to presume. As for the DMCA, read the news reports and comp.risks for many many examples of where it had been invoked - and it seems that it is regularly invoked and causes heartache even when it does not apply.

People in the U.S. can sue anyone for anything, whether or not they actually have cause to do so.

The courts are the ultimate arbiters of the law.  They decide what the law means, how it applies, etc.  And as I've already pointed out, case law clearly shows that the DMCA's protection of access controls applies to expression, not function.  In fact, this point was so compellingly made by the appellate court in Lexmark v Static Controls that Lexmark didn't even bother to appeal that decision.  When a large corporation like Lexmark has been litigating a case under a specific legal theory up to the appellate level, and decides not to even bother appealing a decision against that theory to the Supreme Court, it logically means that the legal team believed they would not prevail with that legal theory.  They would at least have appealed the case otherwise.

If a large company like Lexmark is unwilling to challenge the court's decision that the DMCA's protections do not extend to protecting function, and are willing to concede the case as a result of that unwillingness and to deal with the clear implications to their business of that court decision, then it means that the court's reasoning is very likely to prevail at the Supreme Court level.  Other courts will take notice of that.  While circuit court decisions are "persuasive" precedent to other circuit courts, and not "binding", I've seen nothing that suggests that the circuit court's decision here would not have a lot of weight in any further litigation.


So yes, there is always risk when it comes to this stuff, but based on the above, it appears that risk is pretty minimal.

It will be interesting to see what the TTP and TTIP mean for the future, as and when the results escaped from smoke-filled back rooms far from the glare of publicity.

Ain't that the truth.  Backroom dealings like that are rarely good for liberty. 

[KL27x]

I buy an oscilloscope and the bandwidth is rated to be 50MHz. I can change the bandwidth by changing a couple of small parts. I must break a warranty seal to do this but I am willing to void my warranty. You are literally saying that I am not allowed to do this because the manufacturer did not specify any other bandwidth and that is not what I purchased?

You have never altered anything that you own from its original specification?

Yes, I agree you can do this and the police aren't going to come and get you. You can sleep fine.

The debate I am seeing is between
1. The manufacturer should not be able to charge extra for different features if the hardware is the same, because that's being greedy and unilateral and it's going to screw up the world and blur the lines between real and imaginary. I am entitled to get the best performance out of my property; but by that I don't mean to write/improve upon the firmware myself, I mean to use the manufacturer's own firmware (for a different model) thru w/e backdoor or other means necessary to unlock it, because what they did was wrong in the first place.

vs

2. I can do it because the manufacturer left the backdoor open. Yea! Thanks, manufacturer!

I've never seen the point with Picaxe. It's always seemed expensive to me and pretty pointless.

I would say the same thing between a 100MHz scope and a 50MHz scope. I am still waiting to hear how someone benefited in practice from their scope hack.  I'm genuinely curious. I have seen a hack thread for my own scope to raise the bandwidth from 70MHz to 200MHz, and I never even clicked on it. I don't have anything to look at in that frequency range, so it doesn't concern me.

[Lightages]

I don't understand how this gets so complicated for people. If I buy something, it is mine.

I agree.
If you have bought a machine (including an enormous finite state machine) that shows you up to 50MHz, then it is yours.
If you have bought a machine (including an enormous finite state machine) that shows you up to 100MHz, then it is yours.
If you have not bought a machine (including an enormous finite state machine) that shows you up to 100MHz, then it is not yours.

I believe this to be a false analogy.

It is not an analogy. It is a precise description.

Your predicate to your points ("If I buy something, it is mine.") does not represent the case under discussion, as I explained above.

Yes I stand corrected, it is not an analogy. I should have it is false logic. If I buy something, it is mine. How that something is defined is unimportant once it is mine. I can define it any way I want. And if you want to be consistent with your arguments, you should not be so selective in your quoting of other people. I seem to remember someone else saying that actually:

Perhaps you would understand if you hadn't snipped the context in which I made the remaining.

That type of misdirection is a typical tactic employed by trolls that want heat and don't want light.

[kcbrown]

I don't understand how this gets so complicated for people. If I buy something, it is mine.

I agree.
If you have bought a machine (including an enormous finite state machine) that shows you up to 50MHz, then it is yours.
If you have bought a machine (including an enormous finite state machine) that shows you up to 100MHz, then it is yours.
If you have not bought a machine (including an enormous finite state machine) that shows you up to 100MHz, then it is not yours.

I believe this to be a false analogy.

It is not an analogy. It is a precise description.

Your predicate to your points ("If I buy something, it is mine.") does not represent the case under discussion, as I explained above.

You seem to be under the impression that what you own is what the manufacturer wants you to own.   But what you own is actually the totality of whatever you've actually been handed, whether or not that is what the manufacturer wants you to own and whether or not the manufacturer is comfortable with you making changes to what you have been handed.

What you have been handed isn't a bunch of specifications.  Those are relevant only with respect to whether or not what you've been handed is at least as capable as what the manufacturer advertises it to be.

What you've been handed is hardware and firmware that has whatever capabilities it actually has.   That includes any capability of being modified.  As applied here, the base capabilities are initially determined by the configuration of the unit as you received it.  That configuration can be changed.  Because the configuration can be changed, so can the capabilities.  Because changing the configuration is itself a capability that is present in what you have purchased, it follows that what you own includes the ability to change the capabilities of the unit.   This is true whether or not the manufacturer prefers that you change the configuration.  It is true whether the change of capability occurs through a change of firmware configuration or a change of hardware configuration, or both.

Because we're talking about what you own, and what you own is everything that is in your possession after the transaction, and because what you possess includes all of the above, it follows that you can make the unit more capable within the limits of the hardware and firmware that you possess, and there is nothing external stopping you as long as how you do so is not in violation of the law.  Obviously, the relevant law is that which is in your geographic location.


Because you did not enter into a contract with the manufacturer that imposes conditions with respect to changing the capabilities of the unit you purchased, the law you operate under is the only thing that matters as regards what you're free to do.  For people in the United States, that law doesn't apply to the situation we're talking about, and therefore it is legal for them to modify their units to improve their capabilities by applying the magic codes that result in changes to the firmware and hardware configuration.

[kcbrown]

The debate I am seeing is between
1. The manufacturer should not be able to charge extra for different features if the hardware is the same, because that's being greedy and unilateral and it's going to screw up the world and blur the lines between real and imaginary. I am entitled to get the best performance out of my property; but by that I don't mean to write/improve upon the firmware myself, I mean to use the manufacturer's own firmware (for a different model) thru w/e backdoor or other means necessary to unlock it, because what they did was wrong in the first place.

vs

2. I can do it because the manufacturer left the backdoor open. Yea! Thanks, manufacturer!

I can't speak for others, only for myself.

I have no problem with the manufacturer attempting to use the same hardware and firmware as the basis for a line of instruments with different capabilities.  That's on them.

They can even attempt, through technological means, to keep people from changing what they purchased so as to give it capabilities that it didn't originally come configured for.

But just as manufacturers have every right to do all of the above, so too do customers have every right to attempt to change what they purchased to give it the capabilities that other instruments in the line have without the authorization of the manufacturer.  The manufacturer has the right to void the warranty in the event such an attempt succeeds, because the warranty can be predicated on the instrument retaining its original configuration.  The purchaser is free to attempt to change the capabilities or not, as he sees fit.


It is incorrect to insist that the purchaser does not have the above right.  You don't seem to be insisting such, but others are.

I've never seen the point with Picaxe. It's always seemed expensive to me and pretty pointless.

I would say the same thing between a 100MHz scope and a 50MHz scope. I am still waiting to hear how someone benefited in practice from their scope hack. 

I thought I'd already addressed this.  The frequency characteristics of the waveform are not strictly that of the base frequency.  The shape of the waveform determines the frequency components within it.  The scope's bandwidth limits the highest component frequency that is visible to the user.  Anytime you see a waveform that is composed of frequencies higher than 50 MHz, you will benefit from the 100 MHz scope hack, because the resulting waveform shape will be clearer than before.

Now, that may or may not make any difference.  But you have to know in advance what the waveform looks like in order to know in advance whether or not the extra bandwidth will make a difference.  One of the reasons you have a scope in the first place is to view waveforms whose characteristics you do not know in advance, so you won't know whether or not you'll benefit from the 100 MHz bandwidth until you see the waveform.  I'd argue that having the extra capability is a benefit if only because you can see what you otherwise might not.

I'm genuinely curious. I have seen a hack thread for my own scope to raise the bandwidth from 70MHz to 200MHz, and I never even clicked on it. I don't have anything to look at in that frequency range, so it doesn't concern me.

You never look at square waves higher than 7 MHz or so?

[KL27x]

You never look at square waves higher than 7 MHz or so?

Me? Not that I can recall, other than testing a signal generator, lol. If ever, certainly not where the 5th harmonic resonant wave matters. Just to see it's there or not. Well, once I had a problem with some 12MHz resonators going tits up from too much heat during assembly. But all I had at the time was a 25MHz scope, and I don't recall having any problem debugging the issue. I don't remember if I even needed a scope. And FWIW, I use a lot of 50MHz microcontrollers.

What about software defined radio?  Or radio in general?   What about microcontrollers running with 50 MHz crystal oscillators as their timebase?

Well, a 50MHz clock micro can practically produce a max signal frequency of... what? I mean with the most basic of ISR's and code, you are still looking at a max frequency of 10ish MHz. Practically speaking, probably much less. You can still see this with a 50MHz scope. So unless you are debugging a problem with your crystal which requires more than seeing if it's oscillating... ??

Keep in mind, the bandwidth of a scope defines the maximum visible frequency in a waveform.  But waveforms are generally composed of a conglomerate of frequencies.  That square wave will have (as a practical matter) Fourier components at least an order of magnitude higher than its base frequency.

Still not seeing where this particular band is of any significant interest to myself or most hobbyists other than hams. Other than parts of the lower VHFish band or some really exotic high speed switching supplies?

Again, I can look up theory on google. I'm sure there's an application. I'm wondering how broadly useful is this application. I am curious when someone will say 'Today I ran into [insert problem], and my 50MHz scope couldn't resolve it. So I hacked it to 100MHz, and woohoo, bob's my uncle." Or, "my 50MHz scope wasn't cutting it, so I upgraded specifically to a <=100MHz scope (not a 400+MHZ scope)."

If I overclock my computer, it runs all my programs faster. If I have better optic in my microscope, I can see everything better. If I increase the bandwidth of a scope so that there's less signal attenuation in a narrow part of the VHF bandwidth that might never concern me... I have improved my ability to tune a low frequency VHF radio transmitter or an exotic power supply, just in case? Again, I'm curious for practical examples. It seems to me if I double my bandwidth, in this case, I'm not doubling my utility. It's useful for me if I happen to have a very specific application/project. (And in that case, I, personally, will be more than happy to buy the proper tool for that job, at that time. Excuse to buy a new scope? Yes, please.)

[Fungus]

How can this be any clearer?

There's a whole thread here to correct your mistaken view. Feel free to read it.

How can you assert that I am mistaken?

There's 500-odd posts on the subject just in this thread. That proves it isn't "clear".

You are the arbiter of truth and justice?

Did I claim to know the truth? All I said was: Your point of view is provably wrong (ie. it isn't clear).

Clue: There's "legal" and "moral" in the world.

Just because there's no written law against something doesn't automatically make it "right" (and just because there's a written law against something doesn't automatically make it "wrong" either).

[Zero999]

How can this be any clearer?

There's a whole thread here to correct your mistaken view. Feel free to read it.

How can you assert that I am mistaken?

There's 500-odd posts on the subject just in this thread. That proves it isn't "clear".

Although there was no poll conducted, going from the responses, it seems as though there are just as many people who think it's moral to hack an oscilloscope as not. Of course it's not so black and white as that: there are those who believe it's 100% fine, some say it's OK as long as you're not a business, then there are others to think the manufactures are acting unethically by crippling the 'scope in the first place and it's there to be totally hacked and owned, not mentioning all the shades of grey in between.

You are the arbiter of truth and justice?

Did I claim to know the truth? All I said was: Your point of view is provably wrong (ie. it isn't clear).

Clue: There's "legal" and "moral" in the world.

Just because there's no written law against something doesn't automatically make it "right" (and just because there's a written law against something doesn't automatically make it "wrong" either).

Sigh. What's moral or not varies from person to person, country to country, culture to culture etc. As I said many posts ago: arguing about morals on the Internet is pointless.

[Fungus]

What's moral or not varies from person to person, country to country, culture to culture etc.

Yep, so somebody coming in here claiming "it's clear" is mistaken.

If you want a very clear example of something you're not allowed to do with your 'property': You're not allowed to put a "DS1104Z" sticker on it and sell it for a markup.

[tggzzz]

I've never seen the point with Picaxe. It's always seemed expensive to me and pretty pointless.

I would say the same thing between a 100MHz scope and a 50MHz scope. I am still waiting to hear how someone benefited in practice from their scope hack.  I'm genuinely curious. I have seen a hack thread for my own scope to raise the bandwidth from 70MHz to 200MHz, and I never even clicked on it. I don't have anything to look at in that frequency range, so it doesn't concern me.

So you've never used it to check a digital logic signal is behaving properly (i.e. signal integrity) from any logic family since the late 70s? You have unusually limited requirements.

[tggzzz]

I don't understand how this gets so complicated for people. If I buy something, it is mine.

I agree.
If you have bought a machine (including an enormous finite state machine) that shows you up to 50MHz, then it is yours.
If you have bought a machine (including an enormous finite state machine) that shows you up to 100MHz, then it is yours.
If you have not bought a machine (including an enormous finite state machine) that shows you up to 100MHz, then it is not yours.

I believe this to be a false analogy.

It is not an analogy. It is a precise description.

Your predicate to your points ("If I buy something, it is mine.") does not represent the case under discussion, as I explained above.

You seem to be under the impression that what you own is what the manufacturer wants you to own.   But what you own is actually the totality of whatever you've actually been handed, whether or not that is what the manufacturer wants you to own and whether or not the manufacturer is comfortable with you making changes to what you have been handed.

Correct. You entered into a contract to purchase one FSM+, the manufacturer gave you that FSM+, that is what you "were handed", that is what "you own". Contract satiisfied.

Not a different FSM+ that you could have contracted to buy at a higher price - but chose not to because you didn't like the price.

[Fungus]

You never look at square waves higher than 7 MHz or so?

What does frequency have to do with it? All square waves are infinite.

[Lightages]

How can this be any clearer?

There's a whole thread here to correct your mistaken view. Feel free to read it.

How can you assert that I am mistaken?

There's 500-odd posts on the subject just in this thread. That proves it isn't "clear".

You are the arbiter of truth and justice?

Did I claim to know the truth? All I said was: Your point of view is provably wrong (ie. it isn't clear).

Clue: There's "legal" and "moral" in the world.

Just because there's no written law against something doesn't automatically make it "right" (and just because there's a written law against something doesn't automatically make it "wrong" either).

OK, it is clear now what you were trying to say. Yes, I agree that the issue isn't clear and the arguments made by many are not even to the direct point of the issue, ie. false logic and analogies. Sorry, your post was rather vague as to what you were referring to.

To me it is rather interesting, and frustrating, to see the huge disparity in logic and consistent thinking over this issue.

[G0HZU]

I don't claim to be a legal expert, my knowledge of the law is only average but I tried to think of an example of illegal hacking and legal? hacking on a consumer item.

In this case, I haven't chosen test equipment as an example of the consumer equipment. Also, I'm in the UK and maybe things are different elsewhere.

But... if someone bought a pay per view TV box and hacked it such that they could watch subscription TV for free then I think this is illegal in the UK because they are illegally downloading/decrypting/watching programme material such as films and music etc.

However, I don't think it's illegal to take the box apart and reverse engineer it and modify it. But the act of using it in this state and obtaining the programmes with it 'is' illegal. So you could be in trouble with the law if you attempted this.

However, what if the pay per view TV box came in two flavours?

The deluxe £300 box with extra menus and bigger storage space on the HDD.

The standard £200 box with the same hardware inside but crippled by a keycode or jumper link to restrict the HDD space and enhanced menu features.

I would consider it extremely unlikely that it is illegal to modify the standard box (at home) to become the deluxe box. I would draw a parallel here with a 50MHz/100MHz scope that has a similar keycode or jumper link system. It would only be illegal if it was actually illegal for a consumer to 'own' a 100MHz scope in the UK.

[kcbrown]

Correct. You entered into a contract to purchase one FSM+, the manufacturer gave you that FSM+, that is what you "were handed", that is what "you own". Contract satiisfied.

This is not quite correct.

Yes, you entered into an implied contract to exchange a certain amount of money for a device with certain specific characteristics.  What you were handed was a device that, as configured, has those specific characteristics.  The implied contract covers the exchange only.  It does not cover anything beyond that.

But as regards the scopes we're talking about, what you were actually handed has the built-in potential to be more than what the manufacturer specified.  Since you own what you actually were handed, including all of the built-in potential for greater capability (whether or not you are capable of configuring the device so that it reaches its potential is a different question), it follows that what you own, in fact, has the potential to be better than what the manufacturer stated.  This represents a possibly greater value than what you can rightly expect based on the implied contract.

Note that what you receive does not necessarily include everything you need in order to get the device to reach its potential.  And in the case we're talking about here, that is indeed the case: you're not given the codes necessary to configure the device to its maximum potential.  But the potential itself is still there.

In this case, you have to take some additional steps in order to configure the device so that it can achieve its full potential.  But because that additional potential exists within what you were handed, we're now talking about whether or not you have access to whatever is necessary (which can include hardware, software, skills, or whatever) in order to make the device realize its full potential.

Not a different FSM+ that you could have contracted to buy at a higher price - but chose not to because you didn't like the price.

What you received at the time is something that was configured to have the advertised characteristics, but nothing prevents the manufacturer from giving you something with greater potential than that.  And in this case, the manufacturer handed you something with greater potential than what you implicitly contracted for.

The manufacturer is perfectly within its rights to give you something that can't be reconfigured for greater capability (i.e. that has no greater potential than what it is capable of at the time of sale) but that still meets the original specifications.  Whether the manufacturer chooses to do that or chooses to give you something with greater potential capability than what the implied contract specifies is up to the manufacturer.

Now, if you went into the transaction with the expectation that what you'd be getting is something with greater potential than what your implied contract specifies, then the error would be yours.  So if, for instance, Rigol implements a hardware change in the DS1054Z that causes the front end to be limited to 50 MHz, with the end result being that an attempt to use a magic code to bring the unit to 100 MHz fails, then there is no foul there -- you're still getting a 50 MHz scope, just as the implied contract specifies, and thus you'd have no cause to complain even if your original desire was to configure it for 100 MHz operation.

But if what you receive does, in fact, have greater potential than what the implied contract states you're getting, then you are entirely within your rights to attempt to reconfigure the device to reach that potential.  Nothing says that you have a right to succeed in that attempt, obviously, but you are entirely within your rights to try (this assumes, of course, that the attempt isn't forbidden by the laws you operate under).


What of the above do you disagree with, and on what basis?

[kcbrown]

I don't claim to be a legal expert, my knowledge of the law is only average but I tried to think of an example of illegal hacking and legal? hacking on a consumer item.

In this case, I haven't chosen test equipment as an example of the consumer equipment. Also, I'm in the UK and maybe things are different elsewhere.

But... if someone bought a pay per view TV box and hacked it such that they could watch subscription TV for free then I think this is illegal in the UK because they are illegally downloading/decrypting/watching programme material such as films and music etc.

However, I don't think it's illegal to take the box apart and reverse engineer it and modify it. But the act of using it in this state and obtaining the programmes with it 'is' illegal. So you could be in trouble with the law if you attempted this.

That's because the programs in question are copyrighted material, and the modifications you're making are bypassing an access control mechanism that protects access to copyrighted material.  This is very different from the situation with the oscilloscope, where the access control mechanism protects access to functionality, not copyrighted material.

However, what if the pay per view TV box came in two flavours?

The deluxe £300 box with extra menus and bigger storage space on the HDD.

The standard £200 box with the same hardware inside but crippled by a keycode or jumper link to restrict the HDD space and enhanced menu features.

I would consider it extremely unlikely that it is illegal to modify the standard box (at home) to become the deluxe box. I would draw a parallel here with a 50MHz/100MHz scope that has a similar keycode or jumper link system. It would only be illegal if it was actually illegal for a consumer to 'own' a 100MHz scope in the UK.

Exactly.  And this is all because you're not violating any laws, particularly copyright laws.  There is no copyrightable content that you'd be accessing that you didn't have rightful access to before. 

[kcbrown]

You never look at square waves higher than 7 MHz or so?

What does frequency have to do with it? All square waves are infinite.

Square waves are infinite but the ability of your oscilloscope to display them is not.  That limitation is due not just to the frontend bandwidth, but also to things like the display itself.

The factor of 10 thing is a somewhat arbitrary cutoff.  It may be that you actually want to examine irregularities in the square wave that have a frequency characteristic greater than 10x of the primary frequency.  10x is just an easy frequency to still see in a square wave when you're viewing a few cycles of the wave on the scope, whilst 100x probably isn't (even if the scope has the bandwidth and sampling rate for that, the display's resolution probably prevents you from seeing frequencies that high as anything more than vertical lines until you zoom into the waveform).

The slower the base frequency of the wave, the more component frequencies you'll be able to see on the screen before you run into bandwidth limits.  Of course, you might run into display resolution limits first.