Year 2013 Oscilloscope Choices...

[Nermash]

Since he was working with transients and he was happy with the scope its definitely faster
than 2000wfms/s.

I wouldn't bet on it. IMHO this guy on the video is not that high of an authority on dsos.
I would however bet that the update rate is on par with DS1052E and SDS7102.

[hgg]

Just an assumption.
He specifically mentioned that he needed a fast sampling scope.
If he was looking for signal glitches and was able to see them live maybe that's why he was satisfied.

[marmad]

Just an assumption.
He specifically mentioned that he needed a fast sampling scope.
If he was looking for signal glitches and was able to see them live maybe that's why he was satisfied.

Well, the problem is that if your DSO doesn't 'see' glitches you won't see them either - so you wouldn't know if you were missing information unless you had something to compare against. And of course, the duration and repetition of a glitch plays a major factor in if/how quickly a DSO will see it at a given time base and update rate..

I studied the video carefully (especially the close-ups of the Uni-T display at different time base settings) and I couldn't see any indications of a fast waveform update rate. I realize this is not conclusive of course - but if you watched the exact same video being performed with any of the > 50k wfrm/s DSOs currently on the market - you would notice the speed more obviously.

[hgg]

What indication were you looking for?   
Screen refresh?    Maybe it will not show always on screen, but it will be captured in memory.
I've seen some very fast random spikes on the video.

[marmad]

What indication were you looking for? Screen refresh?    Maybe it will not show always on screen, but it will be captured in memory.

This is not necessarily true. Anyway, I'm on a train with bad WiFi at the moment, so access to materials is limited - but I suggest you watch videos of actual fast waveform update DSOs and compare.

From Dave's video, here is an image of the Rigol doing ~347 waveforms per second and the Instek doing ~7900 waveforms per second.

[hgg]

Hi,

I contacted Russ, the person in  the two previous videos were he was using
the UNI-T oscilloscope and ask him if he can give us some information on the scope.

Below is his reply:

Hello,


Let me see what I can do. I read some of the comments. " fake unboxing" lol that made me laugh.


That video was Definitely not an in boxing video but more or less just showing what was I had.


I am comparing this scope to the old scope that I had which ran off of a computer ( i think it was a dso2500) and was always troublesome versus this one which is why much more satisfied with this style of bench scope


I had all sorts of shorting problems because it was grounded to the PC


I also went through the why to buy and after reading all the bad's I thought I would give this one a go. I do like it.


The one major downside to the scope is that the grounds are not isolated from each other which makes it difficult to measure certain things depending on what you plan on doing with it.


I have used this scope around extremely nasty RF/high-voltage/EMP pulses and other really nasty Signals so luckily the oscilloscope has shut itself down instead of just blowing up which has been extremely helpful this lets me know I'm over its input/ other and it did not damage the scope turned on just fine.


On the demonstration that you guys are referring to the particular settings to get the fast waveforms are not active. The main reason I wanted this oscilloscope is so that I could see transients which you cannot usually see with digital oscilloscopes


So far I haven't really gotten into the detailed measuring the transients That I originally intended to use this for. But I have experimented and played with it. It's interesting.


I do not feel qualified to do a full-blown demonstration of this oscilloscope but I will try to show the test that you are asking me to do


I will say that this oscilloscope comes with a PC program that allows you to control it through the computer but when you do this it slows everything down but then again none of the other oscilloscopes even had this option so it's kind of nice.


Also, yes the menu is always up on the screen. But the screen also is bigger than than most so it's all good.


The bad so far. You can change the color them but you can't change the color of the trace. It's Annoying but you learn to live with it. The data logging and screen shots on this works well. Te interface is a lot better than most I read about.


For the price range and  Comparison of the others. I'm glad I got this scope. It had not failed me yet and it had taken all the nasty signals I have thrown at it.

This week had been crazy so give me a bit and I'll see if I can do the tests.
Anything else you want To see in the video?

Thanks,

~Russ Gries
www.RWGresearch.com

[iloveelectronics]

Hi,

I contacted Russ, the person in  the two previous videos were he was using
the UNI-T oscilloscope and ask him if he can give us some information on the scope.

Below is his reply:

I posted a short video clip here in another thread in case you haven't read it: https://www.eevblog.com/forum/testgear/uni-t-utd2102cm-waveform-capture-rate/

[ChildOfVision]

Hi, sorry to jump into thread, but I didn't know where to put my question !

I have two days to decide between Voltcraft 3062D (=Hantek DSO5062B = Tekway DST1062B) or SIGLENT SDS1072CML. I have read as much as I could about these scopes, I'm not an expert, know something about 3062D, but, frankly, I never heard about Siglents!

Voltcraft is from here:
Voltcraft DSO-1062D
and Siglent is from amazon.de:
Siglent SDS1072CML

As far as I see, Siglent has lower bw (70MHz) compared to Voltcraft (100MHz), but everything else speaks in favour of Siglent: 2Mpoints memory, more "auto-measure" options, 2 USB and RS-232. BUT, as I said - never heard about Siglent until now, so I need your quick opinion/recommendation PLEEEEEASE !

Volcraft = 330€ (~440USD) in Conrad, and Siglent is 299€ (~400USD) from amazon.de. There is also 100MHz Siglent SDS1102CNL (CNL = "only" 40Mpts mem.depth) on amazon but I already breached 300€ budget !

Btw. I can't find data about refresh rate - so, simple said, can Voltcraft or Siglent show "oscillofun demo" (e.g. Rigol 1052 can't)? Can Siglent be hacked to higher bw?

Thank you all in advance, and sorry for my poor English!
ChildOfVision

[nctnico]

I'd go for the Siglent. If its says Voltcraft you know its crappy.

[ChildOfVision]

Thanks nctnico!

As I explore more about those scopes - I'm going closer and closer to Siglent SDS1072CML ! I wonder if somebody has that exact o'scope - his/her opinion would be great!?

Is it worth to pay extra 50€ for 100MHz version (1072CML is 70MHz with 2Mpoints long memory)? Can 1072 be hacked (harmlessly) to higher BW?

ANY opinion/suggestion highly appreciated!

[Hydrawerk]

I'd go for the Siglent. If its says Voltcraft you know its crappy.

I would not say that Voltcraft is crappy... They just sell rebranded instruments from Asian manufacturers... Like Metex, GW Instek, CEM or Unitrend...
And for those who never heard about Siglent. Siglent produces scopes for Atten, BK precision and LeCroy. Compare pictures of that scope. They should be OK for the price.
LeCroy Waveace 112 ATTEN ADS1102CM
In fact, there is a little difference inside the scopes.

[Hydrawerk]

I have two days to decide between Voltcraft 3062D (=Hantek DSO5062B = Tekway DST1062B)

Have you seen this video??

[ChildOfVision]

Well, actually I heard about that brand some time ago but forgot with time...

Siglent produces scopes for Atten, BK precision and LeCroy.

Yes, I just found that under McVoice's LeCroy's "skin" is often Siglent's heart !

I'm 90% sure: will take Siglent! The question remains: can it be hacked like Voltcraft?

[Hydrawerk]

I don't know, I have other scope.

[ChildOfVision]

Thank you VERY MUCH, Hydrawerk,  for videos!
No I didn't see them before!

If I understood correctly, from the first video - those are some other scopes (not "my" SDS1072CML) but manufactured clearly by Siglent! OK.

Second video: I suppose you wanted to show me how "crappy Chinese child toy" that "Voltcraft" or whatever "brand" from Conrad is? OK, I got a clue - at least I (finally) saw that scope from the back! But I also saw great WF refresh rate - if only somebody knows does Siglent 1072CML has such a fast refreshing!?

[EEVblog]

I have two days to decide between Voltcraft 3062D (=Hantek DSO5062B = Tekway DST1062B)

I just shot a first impressions video of the Tekway/Hantek and I wasn't all that impressed.
Bit slower than the old Rigol 1052E, had a bunch of firmware issues and lockups, and the pulse response of the input seemed pretty terrible (compared to 3 other scopes).

[Lightages]

I am impressed by the high recommendations the Rigol DS1052E is getting. I find it hard to believe that it is still the best buy in a scope in 2013. Perhaps it is still a good by in the bottom of the range of scopes. To me the Hanteks must be better but I have no experience with them so it is only speculation. I would bet that the survey results reflect more how many people have each of these scopes than the actual experience of these scopes.

[ChildOfVision]

I just shot a first impressions video of the Tekway/Hantek and I wasn't all that impressed.

Maybe you didn't fully understand - my English ...
After watching videos, and after consultation here on forum, I almost 100% decided to take Siglent SDS1072CML. I didn't choose between Voltcraft 3062D, Hantek DSO5062B or Tekway DST1062B, which are, of course, the same, but between  3062D and Siglent 1072CML!

Now, if somebody can tell me (I know I'm a bit off-topic, sorry) about WF "refresh rate" and "hack" possibility. Siglent 1072CML is pretty cheap (300€ from amazon.de, abt. 400USD) here, for example: Rigol 1052E in Conrad is 475€ or 635 USD believe or not! Over e-stores is much cheaper.

Anyway, I found Siglent 1072CML as a best choice for my (tiny) budget, and to be honest, I was amazed two years ago with Rigol 1052, we all know "everything" about its internal organs  (thanks to Dave's no-mercy-teardown ), but now, just like Lightages, I don't understand why is still sooooo popular and "best-buy" scope in 2013?

Hope somebody knows more about Siglent's things posted above!

[EEVblog]

I am impressed by the high recommendations the Rigol DS1052E is getting.

Well, it's probably because it's the most refined of the budget scopes, and it has a dependable reputation. It does exactly what it claims, no more, no less.
Apart form that it's bang-per-buck is not as good as many others, and also it's feature set is limited compared to more modern scopes.
It's kinda like the Fluke 87 of the budget scope world.

[EEVblog]

Now, if somebody can tell me (I know I'm a bit off-topic, sorry) about WF "refresh rate" and "hack" possibility. Siglent 1072CML is pretty cheap (300€ from amazon.de, abt. 400USD) here, for example: Rigol 1052E in Conrad is 475€ or 635 USD believe or not! Over e-stores is much cheaper.

The Rigol 1052E in most parts of the world is very cheap.
Even here in Australia (notorious for high test gear prices), it's only AU$329+GST, or  233€+10%

[Hydrawerk]

Well, Rigol is a company that produces many series of scopes. (DS1000, DS2000, DS4000, DS6000...)
Tekway produces only one series... Well, in 2010 it was a good scope! At that time there was no Agilent DSOX2000, no Owon SDS7102, no Rigol DS2000.

[bjoernx]

@ChildOfVision
I am currently looking out for the available low-budget options too.

In germany, the best price I could find for the Rigol-DS1052E is € 284,41 from batronix:
http://www.batronix.com/versand/oszilloskope/Rigol-DS1052E.html
I wouldn't buy any expensive gear from Conrad, they are generally very expensive

Siglents are available here:
http://www.futu-tech.de/produkt/siglent-sds1072cml-digital-oscilloscopeoszilloskope/
289,00 € for the 70MHz CML scope (349€ for 100, 425€ for 150).
Same seller as on amazon, free shipping plus 3 years warranty, for what it's worth. Shop looks like a chinaware importer trying to do more serious business than competitors, real tech-support an so on. Looks fine by me.

For Siglent, also check out their website: http://www.siglent.com/en/product/detail.aspx?id=100000005058775&nodecode=119008001 After signing up they give access to manuals and firmware updates. It is even possible to flash firmware on these things from the identical re-branded stuff (Atten, Xytron, Lecroy Waveace), but I would not recommend.

The Conard DSO-1062D is also available from Voelkner here (the have most Conrad gear):
http://www.voelkner.de/products/376954/VOLTCRAFT-Vorteilsset-DSO-1062D-2-Kanal-Oszilloskop-Digitales-Speicheroszilloskop-Bandbreite-60-MH.html
Beware: There have been some negative reports for the 200Mhz-Hack with this one (on mikrocontroller.net AFAIR). Also, a HW-Redesign is said to be due sometime this year (because the main-processor from Samsung is EOL).

My favourite one as of now is the Siglent CML, same here.
I would also very much like to know, wether they are identical in HW or what the difference may be... The mainboard I assume will be identical, but I haven't seen any serious teardowns yet with details on the front-end side (that is where the bandwidth comes from, as I understand the mysteries of these machines so far).
I might accompany that with the Openbench Logic Sniffer soon, will try to hook that LA up to the Pass/Fail Output. This idea (dunno wether it's doable at all or makes any practical sense, but what the heck...) took me away from the Hantek/Conrad 1062-D, because it has no such output on the back. The Rigol was second choice until I stumbled upon the Siglents just recently. Then, the Hantek has Linux on it (luv it! Incessant fun to be had...) and a huge screen, but the Rigol seems the most solid of the pack, so... tough decisions to be made by us newbies here, folks! 

[ChildOfVision]

Thanks bjoernx for additional info!

The Siglent scope I'm interested is exactly the same as from your "Futu-Tech's" link, I'm just watching it "over" amazon.de (299€ with VAT and shipping + 3yrs warranty)!

I contacted Futu-Tech (over amazon) and asked for info about HW and FW version of SDS1072CML they sell. Surprisingly, I got the answer in less than 24 hours! Here it is:
"The HW and FW of SDS1072CML are 11-66-3.3 and 5.01.02.13.
     Vielen Danke!
     MfG
     Futu Tech GmbH"

So, those should be the latest versions?

Another question (except waveform refresh rate) is: Voltcraft's scope has "800x480" pixel diisplay, while Siglent has "only" 480x234 pix. for the same 7" size of display!? I suspect, Voltcraft just cheating (like some el-chipo UNI-T's) compressing 2x2 pixels into one pixel so it turns out the same thing!? But, maybe I'm wrong?

If you are wonder what's inside Siglent, see this YT video (it is for 1102CML version, but 1072 should not differ much)!

Teardown starts at 2:05  !

And, yes, Hantek/Volcraft has Linux on it, that's the best thing on this scope by my opinion !

My favourite one as of now is the Siglent CML, same here.

Yes, me too . We will see...

PS: I forgot, I heard somewhere (maybe on this forum) that Siglents have (in general) somewhat poorer Power Supply, but the rest is OK. Allegedly.

[tinhead]

Another question (except waveform refresh rate) is: Voltcraft's scope has "800x480" pixel diisplay, while Siglent has "only" 480x234 pix. for the same 7" size of display!? I suspect, Voltcraft just cheating (like some el-chipo UNI-T's) compressing 2x2 pixels into one pixel so it turns out the same thing!? But, maybe I'm wrong?

as Tekway started with the production there was no such (chinese) DSO, i mean none with such high resolution.
As a reaction UNI-T decied to "design" similar gear, but of course they did nothing except this 2x2 trick, that was of course crap.
Today, as far i know, UNI-T fixed this crap in their latest models and implemented properly resolution vs pixel per datapoint.

Anyway, regards the resolution. Siglent is using 480x234. For waveview area (rest is menu etc.) there are 8 DIV,
each DIV is 25pix high, each pixel represent one LSB. There are of course 2.24 DIV reamining (as these DSO using
10.24DIV for 8bit resolution), they are there to not allow waveform clipping on top and bottom side of waveform.

Tekway (so as well Hantek/Voltcraft) is using 800x480. For wavevie area there are 8DIV, each DIV is 50pix high,
each two vertical pixel represents one LSB. But this is not 2x1 nor 2x2, when in RUN mode the DPO-like
shading and persistency are using half LSB as well. Looking on DC line you will see therefore two vertical dots per
one LSB, but when looking on "noisy data" you will see hald LSB as well.

Hameg is using very similar technique, however they used nice trick to make the "two dot vertical" thiner,
the top line is simply bit darker so human eye see it thiner as it is. I've requested this to be added on Tekway fw,
but well, we will see if this can be implemented (as it need some extra resources).

Agilent and Rigol (on DS2k) they using as well two pixel per LSB (however they using as well 1/2 LSB on their
nice intensity grading, so the waveform looks more detailed).

On the other side Tektronix is using on DPO2k the 480x234 resolution, like Siglent.

In principle there is no physical difference between 800x480 and 480x234, both display areas are
using the same physical space, so the resulting line is exact that thin/thick (depending on manufacturer,
model type, sample rate, depth, DSO technology, etc) as on the other.

So the only benefit of these 2 vertical pixels per LSB is the fact that they can be used for high res,
grading/shading, persistency, etc.

And, yes, Hantek/Volcraft has Linux on it, that's the best thing on this scope by my opinion !

nope, Tekway is the best

the others are only "clones" (it is not that Hantek is only producing them, they as well designed extras/addons,
Tekway is only the IP owner on the DSO platform, so nevermind).

[tinhead]

btw, i saw these comments that "Siglent loos like Rigol DS1000E".

Well, that's not exact the truth, sure on first look you they very similar, but actually all cars are using 4 wheels
and most of them looks very similar.

Siglent however changed things in that design, not only the LCD controller, hehe. They fixed the vertical drift
on cold DSO (different opamps), tuned tv trigger, sure replaced FPGA by newer model but that not a real improvement
as they "missed" to use big enough FPGA to have dedicated clock out to clock ADC, but yeah, savings are everywhere.

There are as well models with no long memory populated, they really interessting. It seems that Siglent used on them
what Tekway did - 4 (dual) ADCs with 125MHz clock instead of 5 (dual) ADC with 100MHz. There is nothing against that
solution, and 5USD per device are lot of money.

There is only one thing which i don't like on Rigol DS1000E, ATTEN, UNI-T, Siglent .. where is the shilding for PSU?
Before DS1000E Rigol was producing other models with very similar models (DS1000CD), there was shielding on the
left PCB side, from power connector over to ADCs, so all the analog part was shielded. The worst solution ever is on
UNI-T (and dont quote me on that if fixed in meantime), the distance between high voltage side and main PCB is
already a joke, shelding as well. On the other side Tekway/Hantek is using nice shielding for main pcb, but PSU is not
shielded (anymore, hehe, in previous models there was tons of shielding inside), so not that good solution from EMI
point of view as well.