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From: Cursitor Doom <cd@notformail.com>
Newsgroups: sci.electronics.design,sci.electronics.repair
Subject: Re: Favourite Test Equipment
Date: Sat, 06 Apr 2024 21:39:25 +0100
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On Fri, 05 Apr 2024 19:37:27 -0700, John Larkin <jl@997PotHill.com>
wrote:

>On Sat, 6 Apr 2024 00:35:46 +0200, Klaus Vestergaard Kragelund
><klauskvik@hotmail.com> wrote:
>
>>On 05-04-2024 23:22, john larkin wrote:
>>> On Fri, 5 Apr 2024 16:26:49 -0400, bitrex <user@example.net> wrote:
>>> 
>>>> On 4/5/2024 3:49 AM, Jan Panteltje wrote:
>>>>> On a sunny day (Thu, 4 Apr 2024 12:20:19 -0400) it happened bitrex
>>>>> <user@example.net> wrote in <660ed343$0$1258343$882e4bbb@reader.netnews.com>:
>>>>>
>>>>>> My most useful old machine dollar for dollar is my 8012B pulse generator!
>>>>>>
>>>>>> <https://imgur.com/a/2GaSZVq>
>>>>>
>>>>> Nice, real components...
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>> $50 "not working." It was just a burned-out pilot lamp and dirty controls.
>>>>>
>>>>> mm 50 dollars,
>>>>> even today with people using dollars for wallpaper,
>>>>> buys you a nice pulse generator on ebay..
>>>>
>>>> It cost $1700 USD in the 1987 catalog, about $4500 equivalent today!
>>>>
>>>>> 555 timer works fine too
>>>>> Or use sox in Linux for all sort of audio, including sweeps:
>>>>>    https://www.audiosciencereview.com/forum/index.php?threads/howto-sox-audio-tool-as-a-signal-generator.4242/
>>>>> or just use a Raspberry Pi as signal generator:
>>>>>    https://panteltje.nl/panteltje/newsflex/download.html#freq_pi
>>> 
>>> Our DDG is about $4K, addmittedly over the top for a home lab.
>>> 
>>>     http://highlandtechnology.com/DSS/P500DS.shtml
>>> 
>>> I love my beat-up old unit on my bench.  Timing and levels are
>>> brutally quantitative.
>>> 
>>I bought a Siglent DDS SDG6022X for 1300USD, 200MHz thingie. I knew 
>>forehand that it could be hacked to 500MHz, so "saved" 3000 USD for 1 
>>hours work :-)
>>
>>https://www.batronix.com/shop/waveform-generator/Siglent-SDG6022X.html
>>
>>EEVBLOG has hacking details if anyone is interested...
>
>We bought a few Rigol 300 MHz 4-chan scopes and insisted that they
>throw in the 500 MHz upgrade.
>
>I remember when FFT was an extra-cost feature. Now it's free.

Excuse me for being a bit slow on the uptake here, but it seems to me
that there are a *lot* of products which are fundamentally all
manufactured to the same spec - but then deliberately crippled unless
you pay some sort of ransom to have them 'unlocked' as it were. Would
that be correct or am I being too cynical?