New member ... with an ancient scope :) - Page 1
Forum section: electronics / general

author: TImusan
author_rank: Newbie
timestamp: November 07, 2016, 10:39:21 am
content: Hi all!My apologies if this is in the wrong part of the forum, just wanted to say hi to the community, long time lurker but finally decided to subscribe and put out a message. I'm a Belgian freelance programmer currently living in Okinawa (Japan). Studied electronics engineering and general electrics a long time ago and left it for dead as I headed into the computer realm ... but recently decided to pick up the old hobby (although I most certainly consider myself a beginner again) Thus slowly getting equipped with some decent lab material. This means much scouting on Yahoo Auction (Ebay is nearly non-existent here) ... some material I think you should really get new (soldering iron, ...) but I could not resist the temptation to see if I could find a 50$ scope (just for kicks).And sure enough ... I could score an ancient Yokogawa DL3120B for just under that price :-D Besides a very very faint screen burn the thing is fully operational. I also did not know (care) anything about its specs, I just remembered Yokogawa being quite a good brand and who can resist an orange monochrome screen? As far as I could find (Yokogawa does not like to give out manuals on discontinued products so it appears) this is a 10 Mhz scope with a 25MS/s / 12bit sampling rate. From what I can find in the menus on the scope itself it is quite elaborate on the amount of analyzer tools in there ... it even has a tiny printer installed on the top and two "memory card" slotsBut 10Mhz is of course not that much of a bandwidth.Anyway ... I'm rambling ... my question is actually if anyone has any experience with this scope and its performance? Was this a decent scope in its day? Are there known "hacks" out there to increase its bandwidth or other?If I decide to actually use it I think it is a good idea to recap this beast as well since this is ~20 years of ago currently.Attached some visuals of the huge bastardCheers,Tim

author: singapol
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: November 07, 2016, 02:08:30 pm
content: Since you are in "Japan" you would do better with an Iwatsu or Kenwood analog crt scope..easily 20-100mhz. Be patient.Oh.. Ohaiyo gosaimas or konichiwa.

author: TImusan
author_rank: Newbie
timestamp: November 07, 2016, 11:35:15 pm
content: @singapolQuoteHmm, interesting ... Iwatsu is indeed quite common around here but if I am correct it is mainly their older equipment which is worth salvaging if you can get your hands on it.@blueskullQuoteHaha, I have to agree with you thereWell, I like them in that they have a great nostalgic feel and these days can be very cheap to pick up even with a "high" bandwidth. I recently had my hands on an old HP 300 Mhz analog scope in a thrift store here for 8000 Yen (~$80) and it was fully operational as well but somehow did not have the heart to buy it. The Owon SDS7102 you mention looks like a neat little scope for that money. But I guess I have to see if I outgrow the Yokogawa DL3120B first

author: JWag
author_rank: Contributor
timestamp: December 20, 2016, 06:12:21 pm
content: Quote from: TImusan on November 07, 2016, 10:39:21 amSame here! I just got two of these for $40 from a local eBay seller. I'm replacing my ancient B&K analog scope. I've already torn one down for spares and they're really well-made tanks. It's nice to have proper measurement tools at last.Both screens have some pretty awful burn-in, but I thought I might be able to dig out the video signal(s) and get them on a small LCD. The video signals are a little bonkers. ~56.5Hz vertical and 47.85kHz (~20.8uS sync interval) horizontal, which looks like acombination of two different 800x600 VGA "standards".Hope you're enjoying yours.

author: @rt
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 21, 2016, 04:16:37 am
content: Here’s my BWD vintage scope with it’s kinda matching audio sig gen

author: Cubdriver
author_rank: Unknown
timestamp: December 21, 2016, 04:45:21 am
content: But for the color (and the fact that yours are clean!), it's interesting how closely the BWD knobs resemble those on old HP gear. Did they have any affiliation?-Pat

author: @rt
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 21, 2016, 05:13:56 am
content: Aside from the colour they do look close. They are cleaner than they appear in the picThe scope was in use until it’s owner left us.BWD are (were) Australian. Apart from that, I don’t know anything about the company. I wasn’t around at the time

author: tpowell1830
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: December 22, 2016, 07:23:57 am
content: Hi all, I know this is not directly related but I noticed that most equipment still have the GPIB connections in back. Does anyone ever use these anymore? When I use to do electronic board testing, of course we had Labview setup and we used the GPIB ports, but that was over 20 years ago. Since I use my scope for troubleshoot and design, I have no need for that type of automation.Oh well, it sure was nice for automating tests back then.PEACE===>T

author: jimdeane
author_rank: Regular Contributor
timestamp: December 23, 2016, 07:30:30 am
content: Quote from: tpowell1830 on December 22, 2016, 07:23:57 amA physics lab I sometimes work at has a bunch of 90's era HP DSOs and network analyzers, and they use GPIB whenever they need to do something more complicated or long-term. They just don't have many computers with a GPIB card, so you have to plan ahead or be willing to wait your turn.

author: rrinker
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 24, 2016, 04:26:47 am
content: You can still buy GPIB cards for modern PCs - but be prepared for sticker shock.