Noob direction scoping guitar amp? - Page 1
Forum section: electronics / beginners

author: jfharper
author_rank: Contributor
timestamp: August 27, 2022, 10:58:53 am
content: Hi, first post, introduce myself. I'm 52 years old, have a BA in Biochemistry, minor in Computer Science and earlier this year, I started getting into electronics by building this amp:Everything went well, it works and sounds killer. I'd like to learn with a scope I'm waiting to get on Wed, the 1104X-E.Watching YouTube vids on the scope, a good bit is going past my head, I was wondering what direction one would advise in learning to use the scope with an amp and perhaps other projects, like RF or other electronics projects/fixes. If someone could point me in a direction, that would be great...if not, no worries.Forgot to mention, I was looking at the FFT and wondering if tone/freq analysis might be cool to try. I watched this:was wondering how/if this scope can handle this for the amp, or am I totally mis-understanding.

author: Wallace Gasiewicz
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: August 27, 2022, 01:01:28 pm
content: Start here:https://www.eevblog.com/forum/beginners/oscilloscope-training-class-(long)/

author: Terry Bites
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: September 05, 2022, 01:23:44 pm
content: Autoset!

author: rstofer
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: September 05, 2022, 02:56:43 pm
content: Here is a display of a fairly clean 1 kHz square wave. Note that there is no spike at 0 Hz therefore there is no DC present.Note the odd harmonics (3 kHz, 5 kHz, etc) which is characteristic of an FFT of a square wave because the square wave is created from the sum of all the odd harmonics at declining amplitude out to infinity (mathematically).This was done with my Digilent Analog Discovery 2 - look how nicely those odd harmonics jump up at exactly the right frequency!

author: rstofer
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: September 05, 2022, 03:17:12 pm
content: As to whether any particular scope can do an FFT, read the User's Manual. The low end Siglents can as can the Rigol DS1054Z.Here is an EPIC thread started by a newcomer where we spent a lot of time testing the various functions.https://www.eevblog.com/forum/beginners/what-an-oscilloscope-recommended-for-a-woman-passionate-about-electronics/msg3100087/#msg3100087Charlotte buys a Siglent SDS1202X-E at reply 150 on page 7. Later in the thread we go through a lot of capability testing. I didn't know that a scope could calculate the definite integral of sin(x) over x=0 to pi and display the numeric results on a screen as well as a trace of the integral itself. This is AMAZING!See reply 816 in that mega-thread:https://www.eevblog.com/forum/beginners/what-an-oscilloscope-recommended-for-a-woman-passionate-about-electronics/msg3299294/#msg3299294

author: Old Printer
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: September 05, 2022, 03:54:21 pm
content: If you can find a cheap used analog scope it will make a great tool for tracing a signal through a guitar amp (tube). Lots of high voltages in there that requite a good deal of care to keep your scope (and you) safe. I am talking about a $50ish low bandwidth very basic scope from a hamfest or something like that that does not require shipping $$. More disposable that your spiffy new digital. Since most any old analog scope is going to require some maintenance, as a second scope it is a good place to learn. If you go this route make sure a serious service manual is available as it will be needed.