Oscilloscope Help - what to use/buy

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Davidelvig

Davidelvig

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I have been making good progress with my Teensy 3 and Audio board project.
I'd like to resurrect my oscilloscope skills, barely honed 8-9 years ago with a Bitscope (BS-325) DSO Logic Analyzer.
I'm intrigued by the $145 Bitscope Micro, and using an existing Raspberry Pi as the host. i have one sitting around doing nothing, and with a reasonable HDMI display (also sitting around).

I don't want to spend a lot of time getting up to speed, and I don't want to using my main PC as the Oscilloscope host.

Anyone have experience with the newer Bitscope models?
Would anyone steer me board a dedicated oscilloscope?

I believe my needs are simple.

Thanks for any input.
Dave
 
I have a Hantek DSO2090 USB 'scope. I like that it's small and lower cost due to using the PC's screen for display and control.
Much higher frequency and sophistication than Bitscope Micro.

Hantek makes many different models. The DSO2090 is $125-150 on the 'net. The DSO2090 is not in the class of the Rigol and Tek scopes that are hundreds or thousands of bux.
http://www.ebay.com/itm/like/221349736514?ul_noapp=true&chn=ps&lpid=82
http://www.hantek.com/en/Product.html

I also like the PC based display as I can have the 'scope and code on the same 24" LCD monitor(s) and cut/paste displays in a second.
 
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Thanks, stevech!
I checked out the models you suggested... which lead me to peruse a buyers guide, and a oscilloscope tutorial... which made me see how many choices I have... and that I should think this over before buying.
I then downloaded the newest BistScope software (free) and plugged in my older Bitscope - out of the box for the first time in 8 years... and low and behold... it works... better now that I've had the tutorial.
Funny how the hardware improves as the user learns!
Thanks again... I hope to be scoping and logic analyzing shortly.
 
Tek and other quality scopes need not come so costly! I am glad your Bitscope is doing the job, but in case you want to get your hands on used oscilloscopes, websites like TRS RenTelco offer used digital oscilloscopes in good conditions for prices as low as 50% the original cost. If you want to try out oscilloscopes without purchasing one, they also have trustworthy rentals with Return policies.
 
Does any cheap PC-based oscilloscope have 5000+ waveform/sec capture and intensity graded display? (for interactive performance on par with the oldest analog scopes) So far, I've never seen any USB-interfaced scope even spec the number of waveforms/sec it can capture, nor specifically mention intensity grading.

For example, if you buy a $400 Rigol DS1054Z (today reputed to be the most bang-for-buck), you get an acquisition system that can capture 30000 waveforms/sec and render in 64 level intensity.
 
I'm really happy with my rigol DS1074Z, it has 4 channels 30,000 wf/sec, 70Mhz from the factory and you can hack it to 100Mhz with all the bells and whisles (SPI, UART decode, etc, etc) fairly easy, pretty much a DS11047Z now. The rigol scopes are great for hobbiest and even though the price is 400+ it is really useful and well worth the money. I'm pretty sure the DS1054Z is hackable to.
 
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