Should I buy a Rigol MSO5000?

[dietert1]

Yes, certainly a huge system like this forum needs sponsors. And like the first two pages at Google are advertising, here we see many threads about buying Rigol or Siglent. So let's not mention LeCroy anymore in a thread about buying Rigol scopes.

Are you using any of your scopes with active probes?

Regards, Dieter

[rsjsouza]

Dieter, excellent data captures.

He almost made me get a Waverunner LT LeCroy as well back in 2015...

[tautech]

For those who don't know LeCroy i prepared an example measurement from a USB2 audio transmission. Then two zooms into two packets. Then two gated frequency measurements in the sync fields of the two packets (0101.. sequence gives 240 MHz). One measurement was taken with the 9354A i mentioned before.
The other one is with an 11 year old WR 64Xi which currently sells at a similar price as the 350 MHz version of the Rigol 5000.
Maybe someone can try to do it with a Rigol 5000.

Regards, Dieter

Be careful, the last guy who talked a lot about Lecroy has been banned   

Yes, just because he spoke his mind based on extensive experience and some members did not like that. 

W went to the all about circuits forum and still today that was a loss for EEVblog..........but even Dave could not see the value of contributions made vs the protests from members.

[Fungus]

It is also funny how Rigols and Siglents are held up to a higher standards than A-brand scopes costing 20x more.

It's mostly Rigols being held to different standards by the Siglent dealers here.

[petemate]

W went to the all about circuits forum and still today that was a loss for EEVblog..........but even Dave could not see the value of contributions made vs the protests from members.

Is there a juicy story hiding here?

[tautech]

W went to the all about circuits forum and still today that was a loss for EEVblog..........but even Dave could not see the value of contributions made vs the protests from members.

Is there a juicy story hiding here?

Not really, just Wuerstchenhund is involved in profession equipment supply so has extensive experience and knowledge that he also shared here and with some passion and forthrightness.
Unfortunately as he was banned the Members search won't find his profile to look through his posts but the main content Search will to find some of his contributions.
There's a few members that still have contact with him like I do. 

[maginnovision]

Yeah, some of the professional equipment suppliers here are over zealous. Passion is best in moderation.

[dietert1]

We may loose a lot when marketing needs hinder free speech. What remains is "alternative truth" and airplanes start falling down in plain sunshine, just one example. I don't know how to expect anything smart from an environment like China.

Regards, Dieter

[2N3055]

We may loose a lot when marketing needs hinder free speech. What remains is "alternative truth" and airplanes start falling down in plain sunshine, just one example. I don't know how to expect anything smart from an environment like China.

Regards, Dieter

Let me see if I understood correctly:
because Chinese are stupid, American companies are cheating and don't know or don't care how to  make good products so their airplanes are falling out of the sky and people are dying....
Is that what you saying ?
 

[timber23]

For those who don't know LeCroy i prepared an example measurement from a USB2 audio transmission. Then two zooms into two packets. Then two gated frequency measurements in the sync fields of the two packets (0101.. sequence gives 240 MHz). One measurement was taken with the 9354A i mentioned before.
The other one is with an 11 year old WR 64Xi which currently sells at a similar price as the 350 MHz version of the Rigol 5000.
Maybe someone can try to do it with a Rigol 5000.

Regards, Dieter

Hello Dieter,

I tryed to repeat your measurement, but my USB audio device seems to communicate much solwer:


For testing, I bought a cheap USB Audio adapter of eBay. The ID of the device is 8086:0808
I am using differential probes (Micsig) on D+ and D- at the USB connector.

Best regards
Andreas

[dietert1]

Great, that appears to be 12 MBits/second (2x 6,06 MHz) in comparison to the 480 MBits/second in the measurement i made on a CM6631A audio interface. You used cursors to determine the bit rate using two bit intervals, while i set a measurement gate to let the scope determine the frequency within that gate. And i could extract two different zooms, each one with its own gate and measurement.
It appears those scopes serve to derive the bit rates and the Rigol is good for full speed USB, while the Lecroy WR64Xi does USB2. This example is a bit silly anyway, since none of both scopes decodes the data. Don't know whether Lecroy offered this for the WR64Xi. We have a Lecroy SDA 6020 6 GHz scope that does it and puts the results into a table.

Risetime in your Rigol measurement seems to be about 80 nsec. Is this real or is that a bandwidth limit of the scope or the differential probe you are using? What is the input capacitance of that probe?

Regards, Dieter

PS: I guess it is real, because the differential logic amplitude is about 6 or 7 V, so it's an unterminated transmission line with the risetime determined by cable capacitance.

[timber23]

The differential probe DP10013 has a rise time of 3.5ns and an impedance of 10M ohm/ 1pf.

The scopes rise/fall time is 750ps.

Following your argumentation, the cable is the reason for the slow slopes.

Best regards
Andreas

Gesendet von meinem MI 9 mit Tapatalk

[Anding]

There are many MSO5000 treads but this one has the title that asks my question!

Three years and several firmware updates later, and the Rigol is on sale now with the extra functions bundled so no need to hack if 100MHZ is enough.

Is this still a scope to consider?  Beaten hands-down by a newer rival?  Shipping with a brighter LCD?  Most bugs fixed?

Thanks in advance for any comments...

[Fungus]

Three years and ... is this still a scope to consider?

The answer is still the same: "What sort of things would you normally use it for?"

[Anding]

On paper thie MSO5000 exactly right for me - a cost effective mixed signal oscilloscope for a hobby use on small FPGA and embedded analogue/digital circuits.  Most of the discussion, and all of the online reviews, including EEV blog"s date from 2019.  I"d like to know

1. Have the firmware updates fixed the worst of the bugs which it was being criticised for?

2. Is it shipping with a better LCD these days?

3. Any new scope out in the last 3 years in the same price bracket that strongly rivals or supersedes it?

[Martin72]

Hi,

1. Nobody knows all the bugs by numbers and if they were solved, you have to look for yourself.
In general, Bugs means not that the scope isn´t usable.
2. What means "better" ? Display was a little bit dim, this was solved by hardware modification, for example, my former MSO5000 I´ve send to rigol service and they modify it.
Newer models got this fix implemented.It´s got an effect, no question, but it´s not the brightest on the market...But trust me, you will see everything on it. 
3. No, what it´s starting price concerns there is no alternative.

[Fungus]

...hobby use on small FPGA and embedded analogue/digital circuits

Sounds like a good match.

Have the firmware updates fixed the worst of the bugs which it was being criticised for?

Yes. They've also added new features like a hires mode to reduce noise.

Is it shipping with a better LCD these days?

Yes.

3. Any new scope out in the last 3 years in the same price bracket that strongly rivals or supersedes it?

No.

[Anding]

Order placed - it's on the way!

[ubata]

Read and weep....Dozens of bugs with basic functions ...
It was officially released March 2017.

Dozens? Where? The known issues from the latest release notes only lists two:
https://scdn.rohde-schwarz.com/ur/pws/dl_downloads/dl_firmware/pdf_3/RTB2000_ReleaseNotes_v02.202.pdf

Dozens from release. Two (that I mentioned) are what they officially admit knowing about but didn't fix yet. One of those is from initial release 1.0.0

Other dozens are list of "improvements" (fixed bugs)
On release it had more bugs than MSO5000. Just read release document.

But they are R&S and they and they own their mistakes and fix them eventually. And everybody think it is Ok to be understanding towards them and their bugs are Ok.

In two  years (March 2021) we'll reconvene  here and see if Rigol fixed their errors.  That is fair, that is level field, that  is not xenophobia, sinophobia or whatever crap is this smearing campaign here.

If they didn't I will apologize to you and agree you were right.

In meantime, you have nor right nor reason to categorically state  "they will never fix it", unless you are clairvoyant and can see future..

Today marks almost three years since the official announcement of the MSO5000 and it's a good time to get back together here and see if Rigol has fixed their buggs/errors?!
I am very curious to see the results of Rigol's efforts.

[Martin72]

Have a look at their firmware release history and then compare it with the reported bugs in the rigol MSO5000 bug thread.

[Anding]

Quick report of my first impressions with the 4-channel 100MHz MSO5000 with feature bundle and digital probe kit which arrived just before the weekend:

The screen is good: the default brightness setting is 30%, which is ok but not especially bright.  I adjusted that to 80% and would not want it any brighter.  I find the GUI to be responsive and user-friendly.  First experiments were all a success and a lot of fun!  I did not try out the hires mode or any advanced features yet and I'm not qualified to comment anyway.  The firmware has been updated several times since the first reviews and I have no concerns.

It's a big step up over what I was using before: a PC 'scope and a handheld Hantek.  It's still first impressions but it certainly feels that I have a quality instrument in my hands that I'm probably never going to find the limit of.  I am happy and would recommend it to someone in a similar position to myself.  I didn't much look at the Sigilent options as the styling of the Rigol really appealed to me, but that is entirely personal.

It's interesting that Dave just released a blog post about whether a $1,000 scope is overkill for the hobbyist.  To me it's not really about the circuits your are going to build or the testing you'll need to do.  The hobby is about acquiring knowledge, skills and experience.  Learning how to use and get the best out of a decent, full-function 'scope is an opportunity in itself.  Yes, this is more than I exactly need for now, but I'm looking forward to the journey of getting to know it and discovering more and more in the years to come.

[balnazzar]

It's a big step up over what I was using before: a PC 'scope and a handheld Hantek.  It's still first impressions but it certainly feels that I have a quality instrument in my hands that I'm probably never going to find the limit of.

Which PC scope?

Also, I don't want to curb your enthusiasm, but read along the tail of the other thread. If you want to find its limits, it will suffice that you do stuff below (say) 50 mV.

Tell me one more thing: how do you evaluate the acoustical noise produced by the fan? Is the fan temperature controlled, or it's always driven at maximum speed?

[Anding]

It's a big step up over what I was using before: a PC 'scope and a handheld Hantek.  It's still first impressions but it certainly feels that I have a quality instrument in my hands that I'm probably never going to find the limit of.

Which PC scope?

Also, I don't want to curb your enthusiasm, but read along the tail of the other thread. If you want to find its limits, it will suffice that you do stuff below (say) 50 mV.

Tell me one more thing: how do you evaluate the acoustical noise produced by the fan? Is the fan temperature controlled, or it's always driven at maximum speed?

Possibly not fair to the maker of the PC 'scope to say here that I don't prefer it over a bench model but it's a "typical" $300 unit. PM me if you must know.

I am very sensitive to noise.  All my PC's are fanless models.  I call the Rigol pretty quiet so far (first impressions running it for just a few hours).  The fan speed did not vary that I could tell in that time.

It's a shame about the limit of noise below 50mV which I don't doubt if you point it out.  Is it possible to build or buy a low noise amplifier or something when the need arises?  How is that problem solved in other contexts?

[Fungus]

Is it possible to build or buy a low noise amplifier or something when the need arises?

Why build one when you can get one for $5 on Aliexpress?

Example from other thread showing a 2mV sine wave on the MSO5000:



Pink trace - raw MSO5000 at 2mV/div with no noise reducing features enabled (ie. no hires or averaging).

Yellow trace - exact same signal but with a $5 Aliexpress amplifier. Now you can view the signal at 50mV/div and the Rigol's ADC noise is irrelevant.

Amplifier: https://www.aliexpress.com/item/4000723079878.html

PS: Even without the amplifier you can enable waveform averaging and you'll see this:



Whether or not it's a problem depends on how often you need to look at this sort of signal...

nb. Siglents don't go down to microvolts either. If low very level signals are what you do all day long then you're going to need the amplifier no matter what 'scope you own. 

[dietert1]

For me the aliexpress link results in an error page "Leider ist dieser Artikel an Ihrem Standort derzeit nicht verfügbar. Entdecken Sie weitere Gruppenkaufangebote."
Would you write down a sentence what you mean, like bandwidth, gain, supply options?

Regards, Dieter