How To Use Test Equipment Books? - Page 1
Forum section: electronics / testgear

author: riverrat373
author_rank: Contributor
timestamp: March 08, 2016, 05:35:23 pm
content: Are there any up-to-date books on how to use oscilloscopes, function generators and other modern test equipment? I have searched Amazon.com and have not found anything that deals with new, modern equipment. All the available books are either from the 60's, 70's and 80's or are out of print and only available as used. I know that these old books can give you the basics of, for example, oscilloscopes, but technology has gone far beyond what was available 10, 20 or 30 years ago! Is it because the current generation has no interest in DIY or learning what makes current technology tick?If anyone has any suggestions for good books on "How to use____" please let me know. I am also interested in books that teach how to test electronic gear.

author: D3f1ant
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: March 09, 2016, 04:52:25 am
content: As no has answered, I suspect there are not any new ones. Keysight have very good application notes on their website that apply to any oscilloscope, I suggest you start there and ask here if there is any specific questions you have when debugging a particular thing. I suspect that while those books you mention are old, the principles are the same and all of it will still apply, apart from maybe chapters on decoding signals, most modern scopes can do that part for you.

author: Wuerstchenhund
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: March 09, 2016, 06:37:59 am
content: Quote from: riverrat373 on March 08, 2016, 05:35:23 pmI guess the main reason is that for the basics a book that covers DSOs from 10 years ago is still as relevant today as it was back then. A modern entry level scope has a better screen and more memory than it's counterparts from 10 years ago, but that does not change the way to do basic things with it.It's a different story with books that describe analog scope techniques however, which in many areas are outdated, irrelevant and often even counter-productive if applied to a modern entry level scope. The same is true for stuff that has been written at the end of the '80s or the very early '90s where DSOs were still limited in their capabilities, or stuff written by someone who doesn't really understand digital scopes (I've seen that, too).Also, don't forget that these days it's more common to watch a video than to read a book if you want to learn about scope basics, although even there you'll find a lot of bad advice (but also a lot of good one).To give you a start, this are the slides of a presentation about scope basics and probe techniques given by LeCroy:https://www.digikey.co.uk/Web%20Export/Supplier%20Content/lecroy-1133/pdf/lecroy-presentation-oscilloscope-fundamentals.pdfAnd for Spectrum Analyzers there's a very good book written by one of the top engineers at Rohde & Schwarz which can be downloaded here:http://qtwork.tudelft.nl/~schouten/linkload/spectrumanalysis-rs.pdfMost manufacturers have tutorials and whitepapers but you'd have to take them with a grain of salt especially if they're from Agilent/Keysight as they sometimes stretch the truth and distort facts to promote their own product (this stuff is pretty much still mostly marketing, just with some technical content). But as long as you can filter out the marketing BS you can often get some good information from there, too.

author: vk6zgo
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: March 09, 2016, 01:54:00 pm
content: I've seen a few operator's manuals for DSOs on the 'Net,which may have been for older ones.To someone who normally drives an analog CRO,they looked to go into the operation of DSOs fairly well.This was usually when I was just being nosey about some problem somebody had with such a device.I usually just Googled for a model number,without knowing much about its vintage.

author: riverrat373
author_rank: Contributor
timestamp: March 09, 2016, 07:47:13 pm
content: The problem with lots of the good old ones is that they are out of print and very expensive used. I have bookmarked many websites that have info on what I'm looking for but I don't like reading from a computer screen. That's one of the reasons I don't own a Kindle or other kind of electronic reader. Real books don't need batteries!

author: Wuerstchenhund
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: March 09, 2016, 07:56:25 pm
content: Quote from: riverrat373 on March 09, 2016, 07:47:13 pmYes, but real books cost money while a lot of electronic documents can be downloaded for free. And pdf doesn't require a Kindle.And worst case, send it to the printer and you have your own physical book.

author: KE5FX
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: March 09, 2016, 08:39:56 pm
content: Quote from: riverrat373 on March 09, 2016, 07:47:13 pmGood book on the basicshere(not for oscilloscopes, though).

author: riverrat373
author_rank: Contributor
timestamp: March 09, 2016, 09:49:09 pm
content: Quote from: Wuerstchenhund on March 09, 2016, 07:56:25 pmYou would be hard pressed to find a printer in the U.S. that would print out a hard copy of a book from a PDF file because of fear over copyright laws! And a PDF file still has to be read on an electronic device! As I said, real books are the original portable and they don't need batteries!

author: vk6zgo
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: March 10, 2016, 03:16:16 am
content: Quote from: riverrat373 on March 09, 2016, 09:49:09 pmI think he meant that funny looking thing that sits next to your computer!

author: nowlan
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: March 10, 2016, 03:37:53 am
content: http://www.tek.com/learning/oscilloscope-tutorial

author: Wuerstchenhund
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: March 10, 2016, 09:32:48 am
content: Quote from: vk6zgo on March 10, 2016, 03:16:16 amIndeed! More like this type of printer:Not the older type: