USB CRO

Latest Altronics "cattle dog" March 2007 - July 2008 page

125 PC Multi function CRO/analyser Adapter.

What do you guys think of it? Is it a gimmick/toy or does it actually work?

Cheers TT

Reply to
TT
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Most crap one I've seen in a long time.

200KHz sample rate (albeit 10bit), 8MHz logic analyser.

There are a dozen or more USB DSO's on the market for a similar price, this one isn't even in the running.

Try this one instead for starters, and there are many others around:

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Mags like Circuit Cellar have tons of ads for competing units.

Dave :)

Reply to
David L. Jones

Do you know any good ones with around 100 Ms/sec ? I'm looking to replace my ageing Philips PM3350A, and sample rates less than this are only just barely acceptable.

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Regards,

Adrian Jansen           adrianjansen at internode dot on dot net
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Reply to
Adrian Jansen

**It'll work, but it is still a toy. For 300 Bucks, you can pick up a nice, used (analogue) Tektronix CRO (ca. 100MHz BW). For that, you get an instrument which will last many decades (my oldest Tek CRO dates to 1964 and still works fine) and will provide serious measurement capability. The only real drawback is the lack of importation into Windows documents. A digicam will do that for you.
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Trevor Wilson
www.rageaudio.com.au
Reply to
Trevor Wilson

Yep, the CleverScope is probably the pick of the bunch in the 100MS/s range.

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Not cheap though, but it's not a toy like many of the cheaper ones.

The local rep is:

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Although for this sort of money you can buy a real bench DSO. Check this current thread out for more info on that:

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Dave :)

Reply to
David L. Jones

You forgot the major drawback with an analog CRO, and that is that you can't capture single shot events, that's what DSO's (PC based and proper bench ones) are for.

Any good bench needs both.

Dave :)

Reply to
David L. Jones

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The Cleverscope looks like the best of the lot. I just browsed through about 6 others, and none match that.

Thanks for the pointer.

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Regards,

Adrian Jansen           adrianjansen at internode dot on dot net
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Reply to
Adrian Jansen

**Indeed. I have a proper DSO (A Tek, of course). I very rarely require it (once a year, maybe). The analogue CRO gets a workout every single day. But that's me. YMMV.
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Trevor Wilson
www.rageaudio.com.au
Reply to
Trevor Wilson

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Did you check out Bitscope?

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Reply to
dmm

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Yes. Bitscope 310 is close, but only 40 Ms/sec. It does have better input sensitivity though.

I also looked at:

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( PCI bus )
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And a cheapie from eBay:
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Overall I liked the cleverscope the best, but only based on the advertising specs.

Getting the right balance between input voltage range, sample rate, memory depth and good software is not easy !

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Regards,

Adrian Jansen           adrianjansen at internode dot on dot net
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Reply to
Adrian Jansen

My mileage varies. I have had a Philips PM3350A for years now. It has both digital and true analog capability. I use the analog maybe once a year, the digital functions all the time. But then I do digital designs all the time.

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Regards,

Adrian Jansen           adrianjansen at internode dot on dot net
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Reply to
Adrian Jansen

)

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eBay:

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Interestingly the Cleverscope software is written in Labview, and it can do some pretty unusual and flexible math stuff like being able to define your own expression. Almost too clever for it's own good.

Why the move from a bench scope to a PC based scope?

Dave :)

Reply to
David L. Jones

Well guys that certainly got some excellent feedback. I never realised there was that many of these things out there. I will have to ponder this a bit more and no doubt the prices will come down as well ;-)

Cheers TT

Reply to
TT

Mostly because it means I can have a bigger display, better for old eyes. And customisable as to what you want to display, the flexibility of having a screen with whatever you want on it is pretty nice. I would probably dedicate a PC just to measurement stuff, rather than pile it all onto the development machine, but PCs are so cheap now that that is not an issue.

The math processing stuff in Cleverscope certainly looks interesting, although I rather doubt I would use it much. I am well used to feeding serial data from whatever I am testing through into a PC and using Excel to process it.

What is attractive is the ability to trigger from the analog and up to 8 channel digital signals, for both the analog and digital analyser sections.

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Regards,

Adrian Jansen           adrianjansen at internode dot on dot net
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Reply to
Adrian Jansen

However you choose to process it, there is certainly a benefit in having the data already in the computer IMO.

MrT.

Reply to
Mr.T

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