Thursday, 23 July 2015

rf - Choosing a DSO, advice sought


As a tinkerer, hobbyist, wannabe-'maker' (as in the protagonists in the Make magazine), sometimes I feel the lack of better tools in some projects, although for most, I can make-do with my DMM for test/measurement. Have been considering buying a basic 2-channel DSO, because I am having some timing issues which I'd like to investigate. I have used a DSO back in school for a semester, as part of an Analog electronics elective, so I think I can manage to refresh and learn.


The latest project for which I felt motivated to buy a DSO, involves some RF based sensor network. The RF in question is the 315MHz/433MHz kinds, with the prototyping being done around a 80MHz Cortex-M3 MCU based board.


Other than that, at the moment, I do not foresee much analog projects. Given my nature of requirement, can someone confirm if a 50MHz 2-channel 1Gs DSO would be good enough ? I am not very keen on used CROs, since I believe there is a bit of gamble with used stuff, and chasing for returns/refunds is no fun, especially for online transactions.



Answer



If all you care about looking at is the output of your receiver (which is likely a slowish serial output like 2400 baud if it's anything like what I used on the Wicked Node) you don't need a DSO, just get an inexpensive USB logic analyzer like this one. If you have built your own RF front end (because you are a masochist for instance), you'll need an RF-rated oscilloscope, which will cost you a pretty penny (>$2k USD probably). Hope this helps.


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