new design lab in London - equipment to choose

sbee.com/

My only suggestion is don't - but maybe you have to.

NT

.usbee.com/

You have a point but the reason it is being set up in London is that the other designers are based near London, and easier to attract other people in the future if London based. London would not be my choice. For me 4 hour commute on the train London to Cambridge is not ideal, I prefer to use Skype video for my remote clients. Lyn

Tidy desks and empty minds go together. ;)

One of those Agilent 3000 series mixed-signal scopes with AWG would be a good start.

Cheers

Phil Hobbs

That is very different when one works on more sensitive stuff. Clean desks, metal drawers, there's some requirements that go with such projects. The HW stuff for today is done so the lab bench is clean right now. The office desk has several files out that I need to work on this afternoon. By tonight there will be nothing on the office desk. Except for the phone, a hole punch, a stapler, stuff like that.

Since I work for several clients simultaneously this came natural to me, after each project phase there is a clean desk. While in the middle of things then of course it can be messy at times.

You can also save money and buy Asian gear. I recently bought an ARB generator for under $400 after my Wavetek blew. Works fine, has a PC interface in addition to a normal front panel, and so on.

Lyndsay, yes, PC-operated gear does slow one down. At least me. Also, if this is for a university where the lab is supposed to have an educational function it is almost imperative that students use real gear and not something that is almost virtual. Last but not least PC-only operated gear is often inferior in performance.

PC gear equals driver hassles. Ugh.

I've noticed quite a few people on the list use those big arse Tek 11k series scopes. I got mine for pocket change and a sore back, but you do have to consider if they break, you toss them (sell on ebay for parts). I saw a repair bill on one of those beast go into a few kilobucks.

Wavetek versus Asian schlock. Actually, that is a tough choice. Wavetek build quality is just awful, but when the stuff works, it is OK. I've used SRS, but based on complaints on the list (lack of support), SRS too has to be considered a throw away. SRS function generator have the 10MHz phase lock. A really essential feature in my opinion.

I've been looking at the Rigol for portable use. I sure hate to buy Chinese, but it seems if I buy low end Agilent, I am buying Chinese anyway.

sbee.com/

Dont! Engineering and arty farty subjects don't mix too well.

But that is how it is supposed to be!

This is what you should aspire to:

:)

John, I love that lab, fab picture ! Mine is not quite as messy,

I don't want this mess in London however. Lyn

y.

I bought a Rigol digital scope a few years, very pleased with it. It cost about 1/3 the price the UK distributor (Farnell) were selling it at. OK a gamble, I bought it of eBay from China, but served me well.

I don't like heavy weight equipment, a scope weighting a couple is kg suits me. Lyn

Lyn

Have to go along with Phil Hobbs on this - tidy desk == empty mind !

More seriously don't buy anything until you need it ! Don't get too carried away with programmable analogue on a chip - it's very vanilla analogue and for someone who buys OA91 diodes for some esoteric purpose it might not be that clever. PC instruments are very variable - the USBeeRX looks interesting but won't have the feel and performance of a good digital scope. If possible try one. I see it decodes several serial protocols without additional payment which makes it look very attractive compared with the way all the mainstream scope people charge massive amounts extra for this (eg Tek £700+ per protocol). Other possibilities are scopes from Pico (including 12 bit ones) and logic analysers from ZeroPlus. I think I would want my signal generator to be in a separate box.

Michael Kellett

I wouldn't do that. Most stuff isn't very stable because of the USB. And you'll have problems with ground loops.

Get a Rigol mixed signal oscilloscope.

If it's done right, no. There are some rather ubiquitous USB drivers and if they stick to those it's ok. When I installed some of the lab gear SW it often resulted a message that the driver is already installed and sometimes with a question whether or not I wanted to replace it with the newer version.

I've got numerous boat anchors here just like Phil does. And I am very pleased with those. The only thing that occasionally acts up is the power supply of the 7704 scope. But in a critical moment where there is no time to repair it's like the old Diesel. You crank it again and again and after a long time it rumbles to life. Usually.

Not necessarily. Their stuff often gets very hot which isn't conducive to a long life for many parts. Seems the EPROM on mine partially croaked because I found it lets off some wrong commands. Happened during an allnighter marathon test.

I was mighty disappointed after a SRS spectrum analyzer (one that goes to I believe 100kHz) was unable to find noise at a client and then my laptop with a lowly 18bit sound card showed it prominently on screen. That dropped some jaws.

Yes, but it's a difference whether something is produced for a foreign company or not. Some of my designs come off production lines in Shenzhen and it's top quality. With the 100% Chinese generator I bought, different thing. The first one had notorious problems. The manufacturer has no (!) web presence and searches turn up zilch. Finally they agreed to swap it. The new one works ok except the beeper sounds like a dying bird but that doesn't matter to me because I always turn that off. And they screwed up the amplitude range switching, attention to detail didn't seem to be their strength. However, aside from the price this thing has some very useful features rarely found in other generators. Also, the software and all that was free, no extra charge for a "PC control option". IOW, in the hands of someone with experience it does the job.

Good points. I already have a Rigol scope and thank you for reminding me about USB timing. My designs now are for research and proof of concept. The PSOC is basic but fun to play with, a 20 bit ADC is quite useful for low level signals. I spend many years with PIC, moved to Arduino recently so Cypress PSOC looks suitable for simple projects. Recent stuff was research with accelerometers and epilepsy. Lyn

That is right, the way nature intended.

Are those things really any good?

A 60-100 MHz digital scope, with real knobs and decent triggering, isn't big or expensive these days. And you can use it in the field (ie, at home or wherever) easily.

You don't need a lot of space for a "real" workbench.

John

My regular scope is the Rigol 60 MHz thing, under $400, and it's very nice, frankly better than the Tek equivalent, only a third the price.

B&K has some nice function generators and device programmers.

The little Lascar power supplies are nice.

I'd like a decent universal counter, but haven't found one. The Agilent is about $2K, and they want another grans for a TCXO timebase!

Of course, I have a Tek 11801 20 GHz sampling scope on my bench, which weighs about five times all the other gear combined.

A good Fluke benchtop DVM is worth it, plus a couple of cheap handhelds for local measurements.

The AADE L-C meter is wonderful for about $120.

Oh, everyone MUST have a Highland P400 digital delay generator. Seriously, a DDG is a fabulous tool for anybody doing timing-related stuff.

John

My wife would have a hissy fit. But with Jim Williams' kind of desk she'd seek a divorce.

Usually that's only a matter of time :-)

It's also the fact that there is often a ground path. One minor mishap with the scope's ground clip ... tzzt ... *BAM* ... and the PC might be gone along with your USB connected product plus maybe some others that were connected to USB.

Good USB lab gear has isolated USB. You can also add that as a module but this adds cost. EMI can be muffled via ferrites and such.

Regarding timing and speed, my scope offers streaming USB images which is very nice for people like me who need 3x glasses for SMT work.

SRS does provide schematics in their manuals, which is interesting. Some of their stuff is OK, some is weird. We do have their 2 GHz clock generator with the PRBS option, and it's very handy to have around.

Most Tek scopes are made in China. Agilent is offshoring all sorts of production, even scientific instrument production.

John

Which part has a 20bit ADC? When I was looking at the PSoC it couldn't even come close to 16bit x 8K. IIRC the best they would guarantee was 11 bits. I was looking at the PSoC-3 and PSoC-5 a couple of years ago.