Test Equipment Anonymous (TEA) group therapy thread

[25 CPS]

and  a more thoughtful use of colours.

I particularly hate teh blue colours that seems to be adored by many scopes manufacturers for their menu buttons and what not. Even worse sometiems even a gradient of blue, not a solid blue. IT irritates me as umch as freaking blue LEDs in every consumer products under the sun.

At least in my old TDS scope the colours are heavily customizable if you feel the need to change them, but somehow I fear this is not possible on modern scopes... hopefully I man wrong.

This has been turning into a complaint for me too but for different reasons.  Consider the three portable scopes I use regularly all have full colour displays:

Agilent/Keysight U1602B
Agilent/Keysight  U1620A
Fluke 190-204 II

The two channels on the U1602B are hardcoded red and blue.  If there is anywhere to change it in the system menus, I haven't noticed it but I haven't looked too hard since red and blue work fine for me and everyone else that's had to use it.

Inexplicably, Agilent ditched that and went to some kind of combination of bright green/orange/yellow colours for the two channels on the U1620B.  There's a slight difference in brightness in the printing on the top panel with the connectors but it's almost indistinguishable on the screen so every time I use this machine, I check around the settings to see if I can change the colours to something that works far better to identify the two channels at a glance like the red and blue on the U1602B but if there is a way to do it, I haven't found it yet.  Granted, I avoid this scope for this reason so I don't use it unless the others aren't available.

The Fluke breaks out the channels into red, blue, green, grey which is fine for the most part.  The tricky combination there for me is the green and grey being very close.  That combination can be avoided easily by only using one of those two channels for the most part except for when I end up in a situation where I need all four channels at the same time and then it can't be avoided.  I looked around quite a bit and the Fluke doesn't appear to allow you to change trace colours either.  In an ideal world, I'd take the green and turn the brightness up on it so it looks more like a yellow than a grey to break that conflict.

I wish Fluke and Keysight would do a firmware update that adds some system menu settings to make the channel trace colours user modifiable so that they can be arbitrarily changed to fit what the person using the scope needs them to be to make it useful to them.  Instead, it's a throwback to using monochrome CRT scopes and turning channels on and off or grabbing the horizontal position controls and seeing which trace changes to identify which one belongs to which input channel.  Unfortunately, doing that to identify traces doesn't work on the SAA-2-N nano VNA which makes it a royal pain at times.

[AVGresponding]

If anyone wants this go go go go. 500Mhz scope plus Agilent PSU £180. I can’t take it due to delivery constraints.

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/165551587078

That sold before I even saw your post earlier, otherwise I'd have jumped on it myself!

Yep was considering it myself but I’m all over the place for the next two weeks. I’d have kept the power supply and sold the scope though 

And vice-versa for me!   

[Vince]

This has been turning into a complaint for me too but for different reasons.  Consider the three portable scopes I use regularly all have full colour displays:

Agilent/Keysight U1602B
Agilent/Keysight  U1620A
Fluke 190-204 II

[..]

The Fluke breaks out the channels into red, blue, green, grey which is fine for the most part.  The tricky combination there for me is the green and grey being very close.  That combination can be avoided easily by only using one of those two channels for the most part except for when I end up in a situation where I need all four channels at the same time and then it can't be avoided.  I looked around quite a bit and the Fluke doesn't appear to allow you to change trace colours either.  In an ideal world, I'd take the green and turn the brightness up on it so it looks more like a yellow than a grey to break that conflict.

I wish Fluke and Keysight would do a firmware update that adds some system menu settings to make the channel trace colours user modifiable so that they can be arbitrarily changed to fit what the person using the scope needs them to be to make it useful to them.  Instead, it's a throwback to using monochrome CRT scopes and turning channels on and off or grabbing the horizontal position controls and seeing which trace changes to identify which one belongs to which input channel.  Unfortunately, doing that to identify traces doesn't work on the SAA-2-N nano VNA which makes it a royal pain at times.

If just for colour blind people, it's beyond me why every colour scope doesn't let you specify custom colours for the various elements of the user interface, really 

[bd139]

Because they match the port colours. If you change them the whole system makes no sense.

[Vince]

It should be the user's choice not the manufacturers....
Adding the possibility for the people who want or require it for XYZ reason doesn't take anything away from other users. It's just an option, an option.....

Hell, just put RGB LEDs next to the ports...

[25 CPS]

Because they match the port colours. If you change them the whole system makes no sense.

Being able to move it off the defaults, if you need to, to make it legible makes more sense than arbitrarily tying it to the port colours which are already academic anyways since the ports are also numbered.

I can work with one / two / three / four on that Fluke, for example, and modify three so everyone would be able to tell it apart from four including me makes far more sense than one / two / can't tell / can't tell.

I can't speak for Europe or UK with any recent experience but here, we love throwing huge amounts of money at the latest social media social justice cause but legitimate need?  Oh, no, can't do that...

[med6753]

All this fussing.  I have green, and only green, and I like it just like that. If I forget which trace is which I have the "Identify" button. 

[ch_scr]

All this fussing.  I have green, and only green, and I like it just like that. If I forget which trace is which I have the "Identify" button. 

Just wiggle the vertical adjust?!

[dl6lr]

So I printed the PH-163 casing. Fit's perfectly and seems relatively safe to use, but the creator neglected to mention which terminals he used. Has anyone an idea what terminals would fit the PH-163 pins? Or what terminals these are in his picture? https://3dmixers.com/m/268285-ph-163-connector-hp-oval-

McBryce.

I remember the one from Thingiverse https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:4862134 and it mentions TE model 633381-1.

[bd139]

It should be the user's choice not the manufacturers....
Adding the possibility for the people who want or require it for XYZ reason doesn't take anything away from other users. It's just an option, an option.....

Hell, just put RGB LEDs next to the ports...

Doesn’t work like that. You can buy it not. If you buy it you have to drink whatever excrement the manufacturer served.

As for RGB LEDs that’s fine until you have the probe tips ringed and need an LED at that end too…

[Kosmic]

This has been turning into a complaint for me too but for different reasons.  Consider the three portable scopes I use regularly all have full colour displays:

Agilent/Keysight U1602B
Agilent/Keysight  U1620A
Fluke 190-204 II

[..]

The Fluke breaks out the channels into red, blue, green, grey which is fine for the most part.  The tricky combination there for me is the green and grey being very close.  That combination can be avoided easily by only using one of those two channels for the most part except for when I end up in a situation where I need all four channels at the same time and then it can't be avoided.  I looked around quite a bit and the Fluke doesn't appear to allow you to change trace colours either.  In an ideal world, I'd take the green and turn the brightness up on it so it looks more like a yellow than a grey to break that conflict.

I wish Fluke and Keysight would do a firmware update that adds some system menu settings to make the channel trace colours user modifiable so that they can be arbitrarily changed to fit what the person using the scope needs them to be to make it useful to them.  Instead, it's a throwback to using monochrome CRT scopes and turning channels on and off or grabbing the horizontal position controls and seeing which trace changes to identify which one belongs to which input channel.  Unfortunately, doing that to identify traces doesn't work on the SAA-2-N nano VNA which makes it a royal pain at times.

If just for colour blind people, it's beyond me why every colour scope doesn't let you specify custom colours for the various elements of the user interface, really 

Lecroy scopes let you change the color scheme. Not sure for the later version with XStream, but the older OS on VXworks let you customize everything.

[bd139]

All this fussing.  I have green, and only green, and I like it just like that. If I forget which trace is which I have the "Identify" button. 

Just wiggle the vertical adjust?!

That is the correct solution.

Or know what the fuck you’re measuring and where you put it.

[med6753]

All this fussing.  I have green, and only green, and I like it just like that. If I forget which trace is which I have the "Identify" button. 

Just wiggle the vertical adjust?!

That is the correct solution.

Or know what the fuck you’re measuring and where you put it.

In the case of 400 series and 500 series which don't have an "identify" button that works a treat too. 

[Vince]

It should be the user's choice not the manufacturers....
Adding the possibility for the people who want or require it for XYZ reason doesn't take anything away from other users. It's just an option, an option.....

Hell, just put RGB LEDs next to the ports...

Doesn’t work like that. You can buy it not. If you buy it you have to drink whatever excrement the manufacturer served.

As for RGB LEDs that’s fine until you have the probe tips ringed and need an LED at that end too…

Probes already come with coloured rings to let you use the colour you want... they just need to supply you with more rings that's all.
If they don't, I am sure some Chinese Ebay seller will be more than pleased to sell you a thousand colour rings of every imaginable colour under the sun, for a few cents delivered.
Or the probes just need to come with rings that tell you the channel number as well.
Or as you said just put an RGB LED on the probe as well. Probes already have an extra pin to identify them, they can just use that pin to also power and configure the LED as well.

Simpler is just just let the user teak the UI colours as he wishes and he can do whatever he pleases with the probes, that's his business not the mfg's one.

I don't use coloured probes yet I am very pleased that I can change the colours on my old TDS 544A. Probes and screen are two different things, there is no need to invent problems where there is none.
Again if one wants to colour his probes, he has many DIY solutions to do it as he pleases, there is no need to wait for the manufacturer to do it for us, we aren't stupid.

How many sales did Tek lose in the '90s because the colours on his TDS 500/600/700 were configurable ? Did the market boycott their scopes because oh my God they gave you the OPTION somewhere in some menu to... do what you want, should you want it ?  Was there a scandal about this that almost caused Tek to go out of business ?......

[bd139]

New keysight multimeter probes. Now available in the following combinations:

1. Brown and brown.
2. Yellow and white
3. Blue and green.
4. Striped black and yellow and striped yellow and black.

When colour scopes came out no one noticed. We didn’t even put the rings on the probes anyway 

As for the customer insisting they’re not stupid, that’s a fairly large assumption.

[duckduck]

New acquisition: [(hp)] 34401A 6 1/2 digit bench multimeter

Also part of the same Craigslist buy. I couldn't get it to read an AC measurement or a frequency measurement but I didn't bring anything and I had limited equipment/time available to test with. I should really buy one of these small multimeter calibrators. I could bring it on shopping trips with my Fluke 87V DMM and it would probably pay for itself after a few Craigslist buys.

The Bad:
* Does not make measurements when in AC or Frequency modes.
* Fails self-test with the following errors:
     620 - AC rms zero failed
     621 - AC rms full scale failed
     622 - Frequency counter failed
* No folding bale
* VFD is dim

<SNIP>

The 34401A is spreading like rabbits. Do not worry about the failure, they are such a fun to fix...
Congrats!

Zucca, you called it. That was about the dumbest fix of all time. Monkey look at PCB, monkey see two burned-up-looking components, monkey order replacement components from Digi-Key, monkey replace components. I think a NASA soldering inspector would just shake his head, but at the end of the day I'm happy. Not too bad for USD66 plus USD12 in components (I bought extras in case I sneezed).

[Vince]

When colour scopes came out no one noticed. We didn’t even put the rings on the probes anyway 

As for the customer insisting they’re not stupid, that’s a fairly large assumption.

That's the point I just made... probe colours has nothing to do with the screen. Being able to change the screen colours is useful in its own right, has nothing to do with freaking probes, hence why it was implemented in the old TDS scopes where they recognized that basic, obvious fact.

Soon car makers will offer their cars in only one colour, the colour of your house, so that the two match. What if the owner wants a different colour ? No, your house is white, I will only sell you your car in white. Model T tried that with black IIRC, but somehow, go figure, over time people really wanted other colours, strange...

I am trying to decide if I should keep my BC307 and BC368 trannystors...

[bd139]

When colour scopes came out no one noticed. We didn’t even put the rings on the probes anyway 

As for the customer insisting they’re not stupid, that’s a fairly large assumption.

That's the point I just made... probe colours has nothing to do with the screen. Being able to change the screen colours is useful in its own right, has nothing to do with freaking probes, hence why it was implemented in the old TDS scopes where they recognized that basic, obvious fact.

Soon car makers will offer their cars in only one colour, the colour of your house, so that the two match. What if the owner wants a different colour ? No, your house is white, I will only sell you your car in white. Model T tried that with black IIRC, but somehow, go figure, over time people really wanted other colours, strange...

I am trying to decide if I should keep my BC307 and BC368 trannystors...

I'll have any colour as long as it's black 



As for the BC307 and BC368, best to think about it in this way:

TUN and TUP. Transistor Universal NPN and Transistor Universal PNP:

https://www.mikroe.com/ebooks/components-of-electronic-devices/tun-and-tup

Or just do what I did which was throw them all away by accident and just buy a shit ton of 2n3904, 2n3906, pn2222a, bd139 and bd140 and be done with it (that's 90% coverage of all normal electronics requirements)

[Neomys Sapiens]

https://www.eevblog.com/forum/dodgy-technology/the-non-linear-plasma-reactor/msg4265899/#msg4265899

Is this hairy-brained guy by any chance related to the notorious Ivor Catt? His persistence strikes me as very similar!

[Cerebus]

So I printed the PH-163 casing. Fit's perfectly and seems relatively safe to use, but the creator neglected to mention which terminals he used. Has anyone an idea what terminals would fit the PH-163 pins? Or what terminals these are in his picture? https://3dmixers.com/m/268285-ph-163-connector-hp-oval-

McBryce.

Did you print it in PLA? It's hygroscopic. I wouldn't put mains near it.

My approach on these in the future are going to be making a blanking plate with a cable strain relief and either a dangling IEC socket or a captive mains lead.

Although I managed to avoid that at the weekend with the 400E as it had an IEC already

PLA may be hygroscopic, but so's nylon, and that's used as an insulator.

For the record, volume resistivity of PLA is 49-55 x 10¹⁶ \$\Omega\$m (depends on which crystal form). By comparison XLPE* (widely used for high voltage insulation) is 46 x 10¹⁶  \$\Omega\$m.

*Crosslinked Polyethylene

[mnementh]

You don't have to apologize in here, brutha! We just wanna wish you good luck! 


In Related News:      Ifni save me...

I put in a offer... the guy "countered" by reducing listing to a price that split the difference. Bastard has played this game before... 

But... it came in under a c-note all told; so I just hope his positive feedback reflects well-packed merch.

Oh, and Vince...       "Agilent - Yuckyputz!" my scaly dwagon arse!

mnem
  

Wow, congratulations Dragon !   

At that price it's basically free, amazing how the seller was dumb enough to price it this low, never mind accept an offer on it ?! 
So that means I was wrong... Ebay is not 100% filled with "professionals" trying to  screw you. Even on Ebay, even in 2022...you can still find crazy good deals !
Hmmm.... that means I must now start checking Ebay every day rather than just my local leboncoin.fr website.... OK OK....


Good deal on that one indeed. Had a quick look on Ebay US and these Agilent MSOs cost hundreds even in bad shape with broken bits and ugly yellowed plastics.

Yours looks like it's brand new, nothing missing or broken or yellowed... looks quite nice, I admit ! 
Plus the good thing is, the knobs are so ugly that 3D printed ones would actually look BETTER than the originals !
So you would be forgiven for 3DP-ing a new set of knobs ! ...

Has a cool floppy drive as well ! 

Can't wait for the unboxing and tear down....  will it come with a module at the back, which one, and if none... are your older HP modules compatible with this more modern incarnation of the scope.

Need to find a cable and grabbers for the LA now...

I notice on all the pics I see of these Agilent face-lifted HP scopes, that the CRT looks like it uses a different phosphor ? They always look a lighter shade of green I find, or it's just me ?! 


There is a trend here.... who's next going to buy on of these old MSO's ?!

LOL... no, he didn't take an offer; I made an offer on the scope at its regular price and rather than counteroffer, he changed the BIN price to a point halfway between my offer and his original price. Like I said; guy's played this game before. Very shrewd.

This one came in just under a c-note all-included; the one you passed on would've been equivalent to ~USD$60, and was working and complete. This one is missing the handle and doesn't work. So... yeah. I'd have still taken that one first, even if it were a little ugly.

Expansion module on the back is not compatible; but this model has all the maths functions, RS-232 and Parallel Printer port built-in. The only optional module for these appears to be GPIB. Looking at the manual real quick, 54621D comes with built-in triggering on:

Edge (slope)
Pulse width (glitch)
Pattern
Duration
CAN
I²C
Local Interconnect Network
Sequence
SPI
TV
USB

But from what I'm reading, this is not nearly as sophisticated as the "decode" software we've become accustomed to with modern boxes, even that in my Hantek 6022BE and 1054Zed. There is another expansion module, which comes as a special set of PODs... this allows rudimentary "Decode" functionality, but only for CAN data type.

Floppy disk is pretty much a "meh" to me, as I'd probably plug into the RS-232 to transfer files. 

Looking at the Service Manual, while it does appear to be generally the same modular construction as my older 546xxx family, the PSU is different and the display has 32-shade greyscale, which I don't believe the monitor in those older models has. So where the 54600A is full of spares for my existing scope, this 54621D is a completely new animal. I can probably use the handle and cord off the 54600A and that's all.

Point being... even at a $97 buy, I still see it as a worthwhile gamble. Plus lots of tinkery fun.

mnem

[Vince]

When colour scopes came out no one noticed. We didn’t even put the rings on the probes anyway 

As for the customer insisting they’re not stupid, that’s a fairly large assumption.

That's the point I just made... probe colours has nothing to do with the screen. Being able to change the screen colours is useful in its own right, has nothing to do with freaking probes, hence why it was implemented in the old TDS scopes where they recognized that basic, obvious fact.

Soon car makers will offer their cars in only one colour, the colour of your house, so that the two match. What if the owner wants a different colour ? No, your house is white, I will only sell you your car in white. Model T tried that with black IIRC, but somehow, go figure, over time people really wanted other colours, strange...

I am trying to decide if I should keep my BC307 and BC368 trannystors...

I'll have any colour as long as it's black 



As for the BC307 and BC368, best to think about it in this way:

TUN and TUP. Transistor Universal NPN and Transistor Universal PNP:

https://www.mikroe.com/ebooks/components-of-electronic-devices/tun-and-tup

Or just do what I did which was throw them all away by accident and just buy a shit ton of 2n3904, 2n3906, pn2222a, bd139 and bd140 and be done with it (that's 90% coverage of all normal electronics requirements)

Yeah I knew you would say that ! 

I am leaning towards an intermediary solution... all these transistors I did not pay for, they are just there, so it's a bit of a waste to throw hundreds of them.

So what I am doing now is throw away those that I have just one or two or three of, because rearranging my drawers is a lot work just to insert a couple transistors. So i am going to endure the pain and take the time, I am not, anymore, going to do it for each and every tiny transistor I have... waste of precious drawers and real estate.

So ouf othe hundreds of TO92 transistors I sorted today from that bag I posted last night.... I am keeping only those that

- I already had in stock hence I can just add to an existing drawers, zero work involved
- There are many of, and their spec is something I don't have yet.

But those with inferior specs than what I have, or similar specs but too few of them... I scrapped them.

Doing that, I now have only 3 new transistors to add to my inventory, instead of 2 dozens..... that's much more manageable.

The thing is too, is that I do like to keep some old models since I seem to like older TE, and it's just cool when I need to replace an old transistor and look in my drawer and... YEAH, I have the exact same one !!     Like just the other day when I fixed that Matra Missile 400HZ 3 phase inverter and I needed to replace a 2N1711 NPN, and I happened to have some in stock ! 

Longer term, I think my compromise will evolve one step further. For example I think that to make best use of my drawers, I will keep only a very few TUN TUP and keep my older and more numerous transistors, but simply put them in small plastic zip bags and stuff them all in a box. This way I can still find them if I ever need them for an old TE, but they take very little space and don't waste precious drawer real estate. 
Sounds like the best compromise in my particular case.

Unlike you I just can't get myself to throw stuff away, never mind TE ! 

[Cerebus]

If anyone wants this go go go go. 500Mhz scope plus Agilent PSU £180. I can’t take it due to delivery constraints.

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/165551587078

That sold before I even saw your post earlier, otherwise I'd have jumped on it myself!

Yep was considering it myself but I’m all over the place for the next two weeks. I’d have kept the power supply and sold the scope though 

If it crops up again you can use me as poste restante if you want to. It's not too bad a drive from yours to mine as long as you do it during relatively quiet times.

[bd139]

When colour scopes came out no one noticed. We didn’t even put the rings on the probes anyway 

As for the customer insisting they’re not stupid, that’s a fairly large assumption.

That's the point I just made... probe colours has nothing to do with the screen. Being able to change the screen colours is useful in its own right, has nothing to do with freaking probes, hence why it was implemented in the old TDS scopes where they recognized that basic, obvious fact.

Soon car makers will offer their cars in only one colour, the colour of your house, so that the two match. What if the owner wants a different colour ? No, your house is white, I will only sell you your car in white. Model T tried that with black IIRC, but somehow, go figure, over time people really wanted other colours, strange...

I am trying to decide if I should keep my BC307 and BC368 trannystors...

I'll have any colour as long as it's black 



As for the BC307 and BC368, best to think about it in this way:

TUN and TUP. Transistor Universal NPN and Transistor Universal PNP:

https://www.mikroe.com/ebooks/components-of-electronic-devices/tun-and-tup

Or just do what I did which was throw them all away by accident and just buy a shit ton of 2n3904, 2n3906, pn2222a, bd139 and bd140 and be done with it (that's 90% coverage of all normal electronics requirements)

Yeah I knew you would say that ! 

I am leaning towards an intermediary solution... all these transistors I did not pay for, they are just there, so it's a bit of a waste to throw hundreds of them.

So what I am doing now is throw away those that I have just one or two or three of, because rearranging my drawers is a lot work just to insert a couple transistors. So i am going to endure the pain and take the time, I am not, anymore, going to do it for each and every tiny transistor I have... waste of precious drawers and real estate.

So ouf othe hundreds of TO92 transistors I sorted today from that bag I posted last night.... I am keeping only those that

- I already had in stock hence I can just add to an existing drawers, zero work involved
- There are many of, and their spec is something I don't have yet.

But those with inferior specs than what I have, or similar specs but too few of them... I scrapped them.

Doing that, I now have only 3 new transistors to add to my inventory, instead of 2 dozens..... that's much more manageable.

The thing is too, is that I do like to keep some old models since I seem to like older TE, and it's just cool when I need to replace an old transistor and look in my drawer and... YEAH, I have the exact same one !!     Like just the other day when I fixed that Matra Missile 400HZ 3 phase inverter and I needed to replace a 2N1711 NPN, and I happened to have some in stock ! 

Longer term, I think my compromise will evolve one step further. For example I think that to make best use of my drawers, I will keep only a very few TUN TUP and keep my older and more numerous transistors, but simply put them in small plastic zip bags and stuff them all in a box. This way I can still find them if I ever need them for an old TE, but they take very little space and don't waste precious drawer real estate. 
Sounds like the best compromise in my particular case.

Unlike you I just can't get myself to throw stuff away, never mind TE ! 

I wouldn't throw them out if I had them. The throwing out was accidental but refreshing. I had about 10,000 transistors at one point but sold most of them on ebay and turned them into curry and then into poop 

Best thing is split them into application categories and just chuck them in a drawer together. Most of the characteristics are close enough that they are interchangeable.

- TUN
- TUP
- mid power NPN
- mid power PNP
- high power NPN
- high power PNP
- RF
- high voltage
- everything else out of line, bag it up by part number.

If you note in the picture provided below, as an example, all my electrolytic capacitors are just chucked in a tub and I will pick close enough ones out and be done with it. There are so few close tolerance parts or exact values required 

[bd139]

If anyone wants this go go go go. 500Mhz scope plus Agilent PSU £180. I can’t take it due to delivery constraints.

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/165551587078

That sold before I even saw your post earlier, otherwise I'd have jumped on it myself!

Yep was considering it myself but I’m all over the place for the next two weeks. I’d have kept the power supply and sold the scope though 

If it crops up again you can use me as poste restante if you want to. It's not too bad a drive from yours to mine as long as you do it during relatively quiet times.

Appreciated 

Hopefully a relatively smooth transition although I have to admit that letting agents are absolute sacks of shit at the moment so this is difficult. Argh