Got Rigol Scope input?

Anybody using a Rigol scope? I have been a LeCroy fan since undergrad. A friend suggested me to look at Rigol.

How is display?

Is math package good?

Any other input?

Thank you.

Regards, Bob N9NEO

Reply to
Yzordderrex
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My bench scope is a Rigol DS4034. 4 channels, nominally 300 MHz, but you can usually get it upgraded to 500 for free. Nice scope, great display, menus are OK, seen lots worse.

Step response is pretty good, for a digital scope.

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I haven't done a lot of math, but the measurements are good. Makes accurate RMS jitter measurements.

I like the Rigol scopes.

We have a high-end 6 GHz LeCroy, but I haven't figured out how to use it.

--
John Larkin         Highland Technology, Inc 
picosecond timing   precision measurement  
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Reply to
John Larkin

Thanks John. I'll compare the two. My sales engineer for LeCroy is in my Ham radio club so maybe I can bargain with him. If not I will go with the Rigol. Thanks for the positive review.

Reply to
Yzordderrex

A friend suggested me to look at Rigol.

I have a Rigol DS2072A. For the money, I don't think you can beat it. Of course, it's not particularly fast or multi-channel, so may not work for you intended applications. (?)

It does offer a lot of features crammed into the user interface and menus, but it's not too bad once you get past the learning curve. One feature I r eally like is the serial decoding options (I2C, etc..) That extended capab ility, and other "easter egg" type "upgrades" usually come "free" with the scope purchase. They just email you a software key.

I say "upgrades", because I think Rigol purposely does this to appeal to th e hacker-types out there. You know.. The latest generation of engineers w ho grew up believing you'd have to be an idiot to pay for something you cou ld otherwise get for free on the Internet. (No obligation to compensate th e content owner or creator whatsoever.) Music, movies, books, whatever. F ree is "free". So, maybe Rigol just caters to this mindset. They seem to charge what they want. (So now, I guess it would be stupid NOT to "upgrade ".)

I actually can appreciate the marketing angle. Genius really! :) People are going to hack it anyway.

Reply to
mpm

I have a Rigol DS1102E 100MHz. My opinion on it is it's just okay, there are some things I can do with it easily that I could never do with an analog scope and there are sometimes I really wish for an analog scope instead. Sampling memory is meh, takes a long time to acquire, i like the immediacy of an analog scope on low-frequency signals.

To some the UI will feel hi-tek and fancypants but to someone like me who basically never knew a world without the PC or Internet it feels pretty dated and clunky, like it would've been amazing in 1995 or so. Everything is legible and easy to read for me at least, but gosh what is that 640x480? My cell phone has four times the resolution it cost 50 bux

But for under $300 it was a steal for what it does the only thing I'd change is probably spring for a unit that could do i2c bus decoding and had more memory.

Reply to
bitrex

It's just economy of scale. Low-end PC processors are sometimes just reject high-end variants that didn't make the cut on some performance parameter so they sell it with e.g. two active cores instead of four running at a lower clock speed.

It would be more expensive to design build a "cheap" and "expensive" variant of a similar product than to just make one kind and cripple it for the budget market price point. Only a minority of customers will take the time to hack it into the upgraded model so no great loss.

Reply to
bitrex

Piracy rates are actually declining now that content distributors got with the program and made getting the legit content relatively inexpensive and easy to obtain via legal channels.

Like I could download a movie or song illegally but why bother I can watch tons of movies for "free" via Amazon Prime for $99 a year and access a good fraction of every popular song recorded in the past 50 years on Spotify instantly for 10 bucks a month it's hardly worth the trouble of even doing the work of finding non-legitimate content.

High budget video game titles will always be pricey but copy protection on that stuff has gotten a lot more difficult than it was even 10 years ago, to the point that many recent titles have never been successfully "cracked."

Reply to
bitrex

I went with the LeCroy-The devil I know. I got the 500MHz refurbished with the Warranty off of their Ebay site. I think a good price.

Reply to
Yzordderrex

. A friend suggested me to look at Rigol.

for you intended applications. (?)

us, but it's not too bad once you get past the learning curve. One feature I really like is the serial decoding options (I2C, etc..) That extended c apability, and other "easter egg" type "upgrades" usually come "free" with the scope purchase. They just email you a software key.

o the hacker-types out there. You know.. The latest generation of enginee rs who grew up believing you'd have to be an idiot to pay for something you could otherwise get for free on the Internet. (No obligation to compensat e the content owner or creator whatsoever.) Music, movies, books, whatever . Free is "free". So, maybe Rigol just caters to this mindset. They seem to charge what they want. (So now, I guess it would be stupid NOT to "upg rade".)

Reply to
Yzordderrex

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