PC-based Oscilloscope

od ones you can recommend under $150?

believe)?

You ought to be able to make this for about $15, including a printer port card.

Dan

ones you can recommend under $150?

believe)?

See the thread "Oscilloscope donation for a beginner - request" (7/14). There were a number of PC-based recommendations.

ones you can recommend under $150?

believe)?

Don't get a single channel 'scope, you'll regret it - you need to be able to compare things.

Cheers

I'm a relative newbie to analog/digital electronics and I purchased a DSO Quad recently from a seemingly clueful local retailer. It has two analog channels and, two digital channels, and a signal generator. I've only recently started using it, and so I cannot vouch for it's quality as compared to other offerings. However, it seems to be a decent instrument. It retailed for $250 CDN, although it goes for $200 USD if bought from its online distributor:

I also purchased a Bus Pirate, available from the same place, which has the ability to program AVR-series microcontrollers. With a dedicated firmware load it emulates one of the Atmel AVR programmers.

Regards,

Uncle Steve

ones you can recommend under $150?

believe)?

You would be better off in your case, to get a cheap hand held scope DMM meter.. Most of them will connect to a PC if you so desire..

If you are at the stage were you really want a scope, then I wouldn't waste money on little trinkets that cost more than they're worth. In the end, you'll eventually end up getting a much better one and costing you a lot more getting there along the way.

Check this out, this has a lot for the money..

Jamie

I dunno... For that kind of money, you could have bought a used Tek scope.

But the Tek 'scope does not fit in your pocket.

;-)

ones you can recommend under $150?

believe)?

A typical problem with test equipment connected to LPT (or USB) ports on table top computers, is that the measurement signal ground is more or less directly referenced to the PC chassis ground.

The PC power supply and the mains filter will pollute the mains ground wire, adding the noise directly to the signal to be measured.

Some ways to avoid this is to use a laptop on battery power or use some differential amplifier at the ADC input.

In general, there are several methods to add some scope functionality to a PC.

• Use the sound card, but this limits the bandwidths below 100 kHz (even with 192 khz sampling rate).

• For repetitive waveforms, put a fast sample/hold circuit driven by a variable frequency oscillator in front of the sound card. This will effectively create a sampling oscilloscope, capable of displaying repetitive waveforms at hundreds of MHz or even above.

• For one shot or repetitive waveforms, a very fast ADC followed by a very fast 1-16 KiB buffer on an add on system is required, with a trigger circuit. After capturing a single trace into the fast buffer, it can then be transferred to the PC at a lower speed using ethernet, USB or serial connection

od ones you can recommend under $150?

Do you own an iPad or iPhone?

Can you up your budget a little?

This company

makes widgets that turn an i-device into a 5 MHz 5(?) channel o- scope, 100 MHz 16 channel logic analyzer, 2.4 GHz WiFi spectrum analyzer/power meter... for ~$300.00, $400.00, and $200.00 respectively.

IANaffiliated, hold no stock, no hands-on, close cover before striking, etc.

Mark L. Fergerson

I'd rather have something that's more useful.