LOR Staff Posted June 8, 2020 Share Posted June 8, 2020 This probably is not of interest to most of you, but I'd like to share. In the past year or so I have worked on designing electronics hardware for myself and learning how to control it with Windows IOT. I've played around with Arduino, Raspberry Pi, PICs, and some discrete logic stuff (I have not got to ARM/ST Micro YET). Eventually I want to build this: https://eater.net/8bit - a real computer that only uses LSxx logic gates (well, and some other stuff - but no CPUs). I've been slowly building up my lab, and last year I purchased a digital scope (A Siglent SDS1104X-E 100Mhz 4 channel that I then upgraded to 200Mhz). It's great and is a lot of fun to use and learn about circuits . I even diagnosed an issue with a Servodog using it! If you don't know, I like to solder - I find it a very Zen thing to put a board together. So needing some practice I looked around and found this: a $23 pocket oscilloscope called the DSO 138. I put it together over the weekend and it's not bad. If you like to put kits together, I recommend it. The SMT stuff is pre-soldered to the board which is nice. The through hole stuff is small pitch so your solder skills will need to be sharp - or will be sharpened! There is not a lot of hand holding here. You'll get a bag of parts, a PCB, and 2 pages of instructions which amount to "Put this component in this place". Everything is just in the bag loose, so you are going to be sorting parts, measuring components (to make sure you get the right one in the right spot), etc. From start to finish it took me about 4 hours. If you don't like to solder, I have even better news for you. The DSO 138 is actually LESS EXPENSIVE if you purchase it already put together. In fact, I have seen it for as little as $12 on the chineseium sites like Alibaba/etc. The DSO 138 does require a 9V source, and many people run it from a 9V battery. Otherwise a 9V power supply will run you around $5. You may even have a 9V supply laying around your house. The board only draws 150mA so pretty much ANY 9V DC wall wart should work. I do recommend that you purchase a probe or 2. The alligator clip thing that comes with it is not going to work for anything in circuit. Probes can be had for as little as $9 on Amazon. I personally would add $2 to that for $11 total and get TWO probes. I use the probes that came with my big bench scope, so I can't really speak to how well those work. You may also want a case. If you have a 3D printer, print one 🙂 So if you look around really hard you could get it complete for $20. Or don't look so hard just get it from amazon and spend around $32. I remember in the early 90s a TEK scope was around $12,000. Even my Siglent was $500. Just a few years ago the display alone was that price. Buy it to have a toy to play with 🙂 NOTE: I am NOT an electronics person. My 'big' bench scope is entry level, and I am sure this thing is a joke to anyone who knows anything about electronics. I'm sure the probes I linked to are also not 'high quality'. Some Video on how to use it: Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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