Good cheap oscilloscope recommendations ?

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Boo2

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Anyone here been through the loop of choosing a cheap oscilloscope recently ? Constraints are it must be self contained with a built in display and not rely on external things like PCs etc in use.

Frequency range as high as possible, price as low as possible, ideally less than £50 or so.

Thanks,

Boo2
 
I have a mini DSO oscilloscope on board. ..Seems to get used quite regularly. ... Small, not quite in budget but totally self contained and pocket size.

Model DS203....

Not sure where you are but if you're somewhere near the Solent I'd be happy to demonstrate...
 
To be honest, I'm sure it was the 201 that I had first. ... but then went and bought the 203 for the increased frequency range. ..

To the OP.... Make sure what you buy will cover the range you might need. ..or you will end up buying twice like I did.
 
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nigelmercier said:
The DSO203 is way out of budget (twice) are you sure you don't mean the DSO201?

Here's one I've mentioned before: http://amzn.to/1tS2P3D
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I have one of those from ebay. Handy store to sd card option. Really handy little bit of kit for tracing nmea & dirty DC etc. Specs will be online somewhere.

IMAGE022.jpg
 
Martin_J said:
To be honest, I'm sure it was the 201 that I had first. ... but then went and bought the 203 for the increased frequency range. ..

To the OP.... Make sure what you buy will cover the range you might need. ..or you will end up buying twice like I did.
Click to expand...

+1

For portabilty and performance at a price the DS203 is not at all bad. I even found some developers with alternative firmware, allowing you to boot it into different modes when you start up.
I also have a PC based Hantek scope, bigger screen obviously, but less handy in many ways. The 203 is what I take on board if I need a scope. (not often on the boat!)
 
Just out of interest, can someone explain how you would use an oscilloscope to check something on a yacht? Simple example please!

Thanks in advance.
 
You might get a basic old style analogue scope for less than £50 used on ebay.
You need to take a firm grip on your requirements, 'frequency range as high as possible' means what exactly?
You can get a 20MHz scope which will be fine for most stuff like NMEA, audio, power etc, or you can look for a 400MHz scope which can look at your VHF and Ethernet etc.
Top end is way up in the GHz, not really called for much in amateur work.
For audio and 4800 baud NMEA, you can use the sound card of a PC...

People say not to buy twice, that's fine, but your requirements will always shift.
I have four scopes, an ancient Tektronix analogue with more knobs and buttons than anything made today, a basic analogue I got for £20, a digital bench scope and the DS203.
The £20 one is easiest to use for a lot of jobs!

The DS203 is a nice thing to have, and you will get most of your money back if you sell it used after a year.
Do you want digital or analogue?
How many channels?
 
Thanks to all who posted. I'm hardening up on the 203 because it does come in at a price / performance . I can justify spending a bit more than the absolute minimum because I work in embedded SW and can probably find uses for it in future.

My only concers is that all the Amazon and eBay suppliers seem to be foreignian, anyone know of a UK-based stockist for these 'scopes ?

Thanks,

Boo2
 
Boo2 said:
My only concers is that all the Amazon and eBay suppliers seem to be foreignian, anyone know of a UK-based stockist for these 'scopes ?
Click to expand...

Any that are shipping from the UK will probably just be box-shifters who won't be able to help you. It's a Chinese device, the expertise is in China. You get the benefit of DSRs, I guess, but chances are that Amazon or eBay would sort things out if required - and I've never had a problem in the first place buying electronics from China.

Pete
 
prv said:
Any that are shipping from the UK will probably just be box-shifters who won't be able to help you. It's a Chinese device, the expertise is in China. You get the benefit of DSRs, I guess, but chances are that Amazon or eBay would sort things out if required - and I've never had a problem in the first place buying electronics from China.
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Hi Pete,

It's the shipping time that kills me here, I need something tomorrow...

Boo2
 
Boo2 said:
Thanks to all who posted. I'm hardening up on the 203 because it does come in at a price / performance . I can justify spending a bit more than the absolute minimum because I work in embedded SW and can probably find uses for it in future.

My only concers is that all the Amazon and eBay suppliers seem to be foreignian, anyone know of a UK-based stockist for these 'scopes ?

Thanks,

Boo2
Click to expand...
Mine came from Sainstore in the UK IIRC.
It was on ebay and claimed to be UK stock, delivery was quite quick.
I didn't get a proper VAT receipt though, I was too busy to get upset about that.
 
LadyInBed said:
But mains driven! OK if you are in a marina and don't want to keep it on-board.
Click to expand...

I would not advocate keeping a scope, particularly old-style, on most boats, high voltage and damp don't go well together.
Also even light corrosion in the range switches is a menace.
Most scopes are fairly low power, so will run on a modest inverter.
There are some 12V ones around. Toshiba?

I don't recall ever feeling the need for a scope aboard mid-season let alone at sea...
YMMV
 
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