First oscilloscope

Hi all,

I do pic programming, Ir circuits, analogue circuits and use 433MHz AM
TX/RX.

I want to get an oscilloscope to analyse the circuits I build and,
currently, to analyse the output from IR remote controls. However, I
know nothing about them!!

Can someone tell me what I need to look for in an oscilloscope and
make recommendations on what would be suitable?

Thanks

Gareth

 

[David L. Jones]

On Mar 23, 1:47 am, garethrichardad...@hotmail.com wrote:

Hi all,

I do pic programming, Ir circuits, analogue circuits and use 433MHz AM
TX/RX.

I want to get an oscilloscope to analyse the circuits I build and,
currently, to analyse the output from IR remote controls. However, I
know nothing about them!!

Can someone tell me what I need to look for in an oscilloscope and
make recommendations on what would be suitable?

Thanks

Gareth

How much money do you have to spend?

Ideally you want two of them. A good traditional analog oscilloscope,
and a digital storage oscilloscope.
To analyse the output from IR remote controls requires you to capture
and display the signal, this requires a digital storage oscilloscope.
However the requirements of this are very simple and could be covered
with a cheap USB PC oscilloscope.

With both types you pay more for more *analog* bandwidth.
60-100MHz is a good starting point these days.
With digital oscilloscopes you pay more for *sample memory* and sample
rate. The more sample memory the better. Ensure that the sample rate
is at least 10 times the analog bandwidth. e.g. a 100MHz bandwidth
digital scope should have a 1GS/s sample rate. A good size sample
memory starts at say 8K and goes upwards.
You get much better value-for-money with a second hand oscilloscope
from Ebay or a surplus dealer, especially for analog types. e.g. you'd
be a bit foolish to buy a brand new 100MHz analog oscilloscope, they
are expensive.
But brand new 20MHz dual channel analog scopes are fairly cheap these
days, that is a decent starting point.
With eBay you take your chances somewhat, but buying from a reputable
dealer who has extensively tested (and possible calibrated) the unit
can be a good way to go.
Digital scopes are fairly expensive, and the second hand market is not
big, but if you have the money then get a good one over a USB based PC
oscilloscope. You need to buy a very expensive digital scope to get
good "analog like" performance, that's why I recommend getting a good
analog scopes too.

Dave.

 

[Yukio YANO]

garethrichardadams@hotmail.com wrote:

Hi all,

I do pic programming, Ir circuits, analogue circuits and use 433MHz AM
TX/RX.

I want to get an oscilloscope to analyse the circuits I build and,
currently, to analyse the output from IR remote controls. However, I
know nothing about them!!

Can someone tell me what I need to look for in an oscilloscope and
make recommendations on what would be suitable?

Thanks

Gareth

A sound card based PC Scope would be ideal. The P/H to buy a even the
cheapest Hardware Scope would exceed the cost of the software for a PC scope

The IR remote runs around 15 KC so using a 100Mhz Scope would be like
using a 4 engined Water-Bomber to water the Lawn. Effective, just not
cost effective. Digital would be nice, but again it's like using a
Micrometer to measure cut firewood !

The 433Mhz PIC is just a Red Herring !
Yukio YANO

 

[Michael A. Terrell]

Yukio YANO wrote:

garethrichardadams@hotmail.com wrote:
Hi all,

I do pic programming, Ir circuits, analogue circuits and use 433MHz AM
TX/RX.

I want to get an oscilloscope to analyse the circuits I build and,
currently, to analyse the output from IR remote controls. However, I
know nothing about them!!

Can someone tell me what I need to look for in an oscilloscope and
make recommendations on what would be suitable?

Thanks

Gareth

A sound card based PC Scope would be ideal. The P/H to buy a even the
cheapest Hardware Scope would exceed the cost of the software for a PC scope

The IR remote runs around 15 KC so using a 100Mhz Scope would be like
using a 4 engined Water-Bomber to water the Lawn. Effective, just not
cost effective. Digital would be nice, but again it's like using a
Micrometer to measure cut firewood !

The 433Mhz PIC is just a Red Herring !
Yukio YANO

How do you know that? 433 MHz is used for remote controls, and
garage door openers.


--
aioe.org is home to cowards and terrorists

Add this line to your news proxy nfilter.dat file
* drop Path:*aioe.org!not-for-mail to drop all aioe.org traffic.

http://improve-usenet.org/index.html

 

[Eeyore]

garethrichardadams@hotmail.com wrote:

Hi all,

I do pic programming, Ir circuits, analogue circuits and use 433MHz AM
TX/RX.

I want to get an oscilloscope to analyse the circuits I build and,
currently, to analyse the output from IR remote controls. However, I
know nothing about them!!

Can someone tell me what I need to look for in an oscilloscope and
make recommendations on what would be suitable?

Get any decent secondhand Tektronix.

You can't go wrong with a Tek, much as the same way you can't go wrong
with a Fluke DMM.

Graham

 

[David L. Jones]

On Mar 23, 11:26 am, Yukio YANO <y...@shaw.ca> wrote:

garethrichardad...@hotmail.com wrote:
Hi all,

I do pic programming, Ir circuits, analogue circuits and use 433MHz AM
TX/RX.

I want to get an oscilloscope to analyse the circuits I build and,
currently, to analyse the output from IR remote controls. However, I
know nothing about them!!

Can someone tell me what I need to look for in an oscilloscope and
make recommendations on what would be suitable?

Thanks

Gareth

A sound card based PC Scope would be ideal.

Rubbish, it would be the worst possible solution.
You at least need a proper front end amp/attenuator for such a thing,
and even then you are limited to audio bandwidth only.
Unless the OP's "analog circuits" are all audio bandwidth and line
level type signals, forget it.

The P/H to buy a even the
cheapest Hardware Scope would exceed the cost of the software for a PC scope

Hardware scopes can be had for FREE if you look hard enough.
People (including myself) have given away scopes for free before on
this and other groups.
Beginners can ask and they often get a lucky donation.

The IR remote runs around 15 KC

Wrong. They are around 38KHz.

so using a 100Mhz Scope would be like
using a 4 engined Water-Bomber to water the Lawn.

That's not the point. The point is having a general purpose tool that
can do all sorts of jobs.
100MHz is not overkill for a general purpose scope. Want to measure a
basic 20MHz digital signal for instance, 100MHz comes in handy.

Effective, just not
cost effective. Digital would be nice, but again it's like using a
Micrometer to measure cut firewood !

Digital is essential jobs like capturing IR data packets.
A logic analyser is often handy for this too.

The 433Mhz PIC is just a Red Herring !

Ah, 433MHz is used for all sorts of stuff.

Dave.

 

<-snip->

Hi all,

Thanks for the informative replies - lots to think about!

Unless there is a kind person out there who wants to hand me a
hardware scope I think the best option would be a USB PC scope. It'll
allow me to do IR analysis which is what I really want to look at for
now and should allow me to analyse more basic circuits. If I reach
it's limitations I can look into a more expensive (digital) solution.

Which brings me onto my next question - what USB scopes are out there
and which make(s) are worth considering??

I'm still a bit unsure on the bandwidth issue....if IR runs at 38Khz
then a 25Mhz scope should be able to see the signal very clearly
shouldn't it? Also, the maximum speed I run PICs at is 20Mhz but
that's divided by 4 to give a real speed of 5MHz. If the output
signals actually ran at this speed (unlikely because it wouldn't give
the PIC time to do anything else, would a 25MHz scope be able to
display them?

Thanks

Gareth

 

[David L. Jones]

On Mar 23, 10:21 pm, garethrichardad...@hotmail.com wrote:

-snip-

Hi all,

Thanks for the informative replies - lots to think about!

Unless there is a kind person out there who wants to hand me a
hardware scope I think the best option would be a USB PC scope. It'll
allow me to do IR analysis which is what I really want to look at for
now and should allow me to analyse more basic circuits. If I reach
it's limitations I can look into a more expensive (digital) solution.

Not a bad idea.

Which brings me onto my next question - what USB scopes are out there
and which make(s) are worth considering??

The question is still how much would you be looking to spend?

To analyse IR data packets you might need a reasonable amount of
sample memory. 8K is probably the minimum you'd want to look at, but
the more the better.
Some USB scopes might sample in real time to the PC, so they could
effectively have have unlimited sample memory (at lower sample rates)

I'm still a bit unsure on the bandwidth issue....if IR runs at 38Khz
then a 25Mhz scope should be able to see the signal very clearly
shouldn't it?

Yes, it's plenty.

Also, the maximum speed I run PICs at is 20Mhz but
that's divided by 4 to give a real speed of 5MHz. If the output
signals actually ran at this speed (unlikely because it wouldn't give
the PIC time to do anything else, would a 25MHz scope be able to
display them?

25MHz bandwidth - yes
25MHz sample rate - that's starting to push it.

Dave.

 

[Jamie]

garethrichardadams@hotmail.com wrote:

-snip-

Hi all,

Thanks for the informative replies - lots to think about!

Unless there is a kind person out there who wants to hand me a
hardware scope I think the best option would be a USB PC scope. It'll
allow me to do IR analysis which is what I really want to look at for
now and should allow me to analyse more basic circuits. If I reach
it's limitations I can look into a more expensive (digital) solution.

Which brings me onto my next question - what USB scopes are out there
and which make(s) are worth considering??

I'm still a bit unsure on the bandwidth issue....if IR runs at 38Khz
then a 25Mhz scope should be able to see the signal very clearly
shouldn't it? Also, the maximum speed I run PICs at is 20Mhz but
that's divided by 4 to give a real speed of 5MHz. If the output
signals actually ran at this speed (unlikely because it wouldn't give
the PIC time to do anything else, would a 25MHz scope be able to
display them?

Thanks

Gareth
A 25 Mhz is just fine. try to get a stand alone bench or hand held that

has the PC connection and software..
I my self bought a OWEN hand held for my toss around tool box scope,
that's a 20 Mhz and It just happens to have a DMM also along with
isolated inputs between all inputs.. $499, is what I paid for it and I
find that for the price and what it does, it's great for moderate work
and for most maybe even over kill.

P.S.
they make a 60 Mhz version of the same unit.

For anything high in freq, I keep a Tek Analog
350 Mhz scope around for that.


http://webpages.charter.net/jamie_5"

 

[Bob Masta]

On Sat, 22 Mar 2008 07:47:04 -0700 (PDT),
garethrichardadams@hotmail.com wrote:

Hi all,

I do pic programming, Ir circuits, analogue circuits and use 433MHz AM
TX/RX.

I want to get an oscilloscope to analyse the circuits I build and,
currently, to analyse the output from IR remote controls. However, I
know nothing about them!!

Can someone tell me what I need to look for in an oscilloscope and
make recommendations on what would be suitable?

Thanks

Gareth

You may want to consider having both a (used) hardware scope along
with a PC soundcard program. (OK, I might be a tad biased since I am
the author of one such program!) I have a 100 MHz "real" scope plus
a sound card system on my bench, and they both have their virtues.

The hardware scope is best for all general purpose work. The sound
card system suffers from being AC coupled, and limited to audio-range
signals. But if you are working in the audio range, there are some
powerful advantages: It does spectrum analysis and color
spectrograms, as well as all sorts of tricks like histograms, and
synchronous waveform averaging to extract signals buried in noise.

If you are working on something where you need to monitor distortion,
a conventional scope's waveform display is *not* the way to go:
Depending on the type of distortion, you might miss several percent
distortion on a sine wave display, whereas on a spectrum display you
can easily see a tiny fraction of a percent. Not only that, you can
see exactly which harmonics are causing the trouble (which can be
a clue to the source of the distortion).

As an example, if you build a triangle-to-sine shaper using an
overdriven differential pair, there are a couple of interacting
adjustments that can be really confusing to adjust by just looking at
the waveform (or by ear). But they are a snap if you can watch the
relative harmonics go up and down on a spectrum display.

And sound card systems can be dirt cheap, especially with the easy
availability of old computers these days.

And if that isn't enough to convince you, there's the fact that sound
cards can also *generate* sound... with lower distortion than
most benchtop audio generators, and *much* lower distortion than
function generators. But they can provide much more control than any
function generator, not only in offering many types of waveforms,
including different kinds of noise, but also in types of modulation
like bursts, AM, FM, PWM or PM, or sweeps.

(Product plug: The Daqarta signal generator is FREE, even if you
never buy the system. Oh, yeah: Daqarta also includes a big-screen
DMM with true RMS, peak, and dB options, plus a frequency counter
that can resolve to milliHertz in a few cycles, even at low audio
frequencies.)

Best regards,




Bob Masta

DAQARTA v3.50
Data AcQuisition And Real-Time Analysis
www.daqarta.com
Scope, Spectrum, Spectrogram, FREE Signal Generator
Science with your sound card!

 

On 3ÔÂ22ČŐ, ĎÂÎç10Ęą47ˇÖ, garethrichardad...@hotmail..com wrote:

Hi all,

I do pic programming, Ir circuits, analogue circuits and use 433MHz AM
TX/RX.

I want to get an oscilloscope to analyse the circuits I build and,
currently, to analyse the output from IR remote controls. However, I
know nothing about them!!

Can someone tell me what I need to look for in an oscilloscope and
make recommendations on what would be suitable?

Thanks

Gareth

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[Jon Slaughter]

<garethrichardadams@hotmail.com> wrote in message
news:68f23fad-391a-466a-bfe4-4d323052027a@h11g2000prf.googlegroups.com...

Hi all,

I do pic programming, Ir circuits, analogue circuits and use 433MHz AM
TX/RX.

I want to get an oscilloscope to analyse the circuits I build and,
currently, to analyse the output from IR remote controls. However, I
know nothing about them!!

Can someone tell me what I need to look for in an oscilloscope and
make recommendations on what would be suitable?

Thanks

You can get you a vellman PC500 scope for about 300 bucks wich is suppose to
be 50mhz(which is 50MSPS and I don't see how it sends all that through the
parallel port which runs at most a few mhz or so).

The only reason I recommend this scope now is because they finally
implemented a history function. When I first brought it I thought it would
have this feature but didn't. I complained on the msg board and was told
that it was impossible and I didn't understand how a DSO worked(by the
company). So I gave up and 2 years later I tried again and somehow got
through to the guy that maintained the software and he was able to implement
it. The software is definitely not the best though but works.

So the point is that with that scope you can use it both as a oscilloscope
and a logic analyzer(although a bit crude it does work). This is really the
only benefit it has is that its cheap and can do the two most important
things needed for most apps. It is definitely not the best though but you
get what you pay for. If you have more money then I'm sure there are other
products that would be better. (in fact you can get cheap dedicated logic
analyzers too now that use the pc)


I would have to say that the real issue with the scope is mainly the
software though. But you can get used to it and maybe in the future they
will release the protocol used so people can write there own software. (they
do have something like it but not full featured)

 

On 3ÔÂ22ČŐ, ĎÂÎç10Ęą47ˇÖ, garethrichardad...@hotmail..com wrote:

Hi all,

I do pic programming, Ir circuits, analogue circuits and use 433MHz AM
TX/RX.

I want to get an oscilloscope to analyse the circuits I build and,
currently, to analyse the output from IR remote controls. However, I
know nothing about them!!

Can someone tell me what I need to look for in an oscilloscope and
make recommendations on what would be suitable?

Thanks

Gareth

Do you want access to China's massive pool of electronic
manufacturers... but lack the time to contact suppliers, negotiate
contracts, arrange shipping or monitor product quality? Don't worry -
Let seriouswholesale deal with all that for you.

*Check out the huge range of Gadgets, MP3 / MP4 Players, Car DVD /
Audio, and Computer Accessories now by visiting the online wholesale
catalog at seriouswholesale. com You'll have peace of mind thanks to
the seriouswholesale Quality Control, 12-month Warranty on all
products, and easy secure payment by credit card through Paypal.

Selling on eBay or your own online store? Send products direct from
our warehouse to your customers using our unique drop-shipping
service. You can profit by selling hundreds of different products,
without holding any of your own inventory! Any questions you have will
be answered by the seriouswholesale English-speaking customer support
team... Their aim is to make your China electronics importing business
easier to run than ever before.

Welcome to http://www.seriouswholesale.com.

seriouswholesale - Buy from the source, profit without the hassle.

- 12 Months Warranty - No minimum order restrictions - Drop-shipping
with no additional fee - Pay by safely by PayPal seriouswholesale
Wholesale Co., Ltd.: Chinas original and best online electronics
wholesaler & drop-shipper: seriouswholesale. com

 

Hi,

Does anyone have any experience of any of the following:

http://www.picotech.com/picoscope2000.html

http://www.maplin.co.uk/Module.aspx?ModuleNo=32611&&source=14&doy=25m3

I'm looking to spend less than Ł200 so it's kind of limited my
choices. I'm thinking that 2MHz would be enough for the basic circuits
I do.

Thanks

Gareth

 

[PinkFloyd43]

garethrichardadams@hotmail.com wrote:

Hi,

Does anyone have any experience of any of the following:

http://www.picotech.com/picoscope2000.html

http://www.maplin.co.uk/Module.aspx?ModuleNo=32611&&source=14&doy=25m3

I'm looking to spend less than Ł200 so it's kind of limited my
choices. I'm thinking that 2MHz would be enough for the basic circuits
I do.

Thanks

Gareth
What type of stuff will you be doing, I would think that for a little

more you should get up into the 30MHZ range?