Products > Test Equipment
Rigol Rubbish DG800 - An expensive piece of Junk
Martin72:
--- Quote from: KungFuJosh on May 13, 2024, 01:11:07 pm ---The incessant need to call junk "cheap Chinese products" is unnecessary bigotry. China makes great products, and shite products. China itself doesn't determine the quality of the product, and pretending the source of manufacture has an effect on that is ignorant. Pay for something good, get something good. Pay for shite, get shite.
--- End quote ---
Or in short, the Chinese can't do magic either.
But this is a very interesting phenomenon of our time and applies to all products:
People don't want to spend money, then buy cheap things and are sorely disappointed when the quality isn't right....
The Amazon reviews are full of such tirades.
You can only say, buy something better.
If you can't afford it, then save up for it.
If you don't want that, then buy something good second-hand.
If you don't, then it's your own fault and stop complaining.
Aldo22:
--- Quote from: Martin72 on May 13, 2024, 05:04:29 pm ---If you don't, then it's your own fault and stop complaining.
--- End quote ---
Almost. I would only rephrase the last sentence:
"If you don't, then it's your own decision."
Buying something cheap is a decision (see KungFuJosh's TC3) and not necessarily a fault.
It's only a fault if you expect your $50 thing to be as good as a $500 product.
Martin72:
Yes, a true word.
DaneLaw:
Its worth noting that Rigol do have a newer line of waveform-generators with the loaded label "PRO" with significantly better specs across the plate.
Datasheet specifications are posted below between the 2018 entry-line DG800 versus this new 2023/24 DG800PRO-line, which also is an entry/budget-series
Took the plunge on one back in November 2023 (DG821PRO) under the Singles-day-sale after a non-official Chinese Fluke/Rigol seller on Aliexpress to my surprise was willing to make up a new listing for one, though under the promise I extended the shipping-time to a handful of weeks, as it wasn't released yet in China, but it was only a matter of days.
It arrived in mid/late-December, quite an early unit 0000013, the final price was a tad under 300 euros (incl. both 25%EUVAT & delivery)
That specific seller (Fluke & Rigol store) all his listings' became invalid after 1-1-2024 with a sitemessage, "saying not available to your region".. it seems to be down to Aliexpress implementing new regional restrictions for EU from 1_1 2024 for certain brands.
Went for this unit, as I tried to speculate on the fact that there wouldn't be any actual hardware differences between the cheapest DG800PRO and the higher-end line of DG900PRO, and that the community down the line would be able to liberate this new line, as it wouldn't be a bad deal' if these specs were up for grabs for under 300 bucks [ 1.25GSa/s - 200MHz - 32M - 16-bits ] in a modern signal gen.
My biggest complaint so far, are the anoying fan.. it's a temp-regulated fan, that got a will of its own, and will cycle with minute differences up and down' that are far from pleasant,.. it can likely be optimised in firmware updates down the line, but then again, Rigol certainly dont have a curriculum that inspires any confidence for optimizing products after the fact.
It's more or less constantly on after around a +5-minute use-case and stays on... Looks like its the same noisy-fan as in Rigols DHO800/900-scope line, so in that regard the older series DG800 / DG900 and DG2000 do have an advantage, as they were all fan-less, if I recall correct, but also a lot slower. 125MSa/250MSa vs 625MSa/1.25GSa
Does get quite hot https://i.imgur.com/Cr5RSoD.mp4
Two things I do value a lot on Rigol's DGXXXPRO signal-gens, are the big high-res screen (7" 1024x600) that makes it way more enjoyable to explore & adjust features [UI https://tinyurl.com/2z87bkzy ]
Also, appreciate the ability to run it from power banks, and the mobility it gives.
The specs & tolerances DG800PRO (out of the box) versus the previous DG800 datasheet.
Quite a jump across the plate.
bateau020:
Yes, the UI can be improved, Yes, the sync does not work reliably (and sometimes not at all), but I have the impression that the OP does not have the latest FW, nor has opened up the device to the max of its capabilities:
* make sure you have the latest FW (from 2021), as the original firmware was really bad.
* please know that "liberating" it to a DG992 is possible. That will at least get you up to 2MHz on the ramp, and 100MHz on sine wave (although, if you do not get it recalibrated, the amplitude will start to drop off at the higher frequencies. But hey, what do you expect?)
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