Not sure if this went through the first time. On Fri, May 1, 2015 at 11:08 AM, Gene Heskett <ghesk...@wdtv.com> wrote:
> > > > Never say never. I own a set of them there input attenuators, as well > > as almost all the gear required to calibration most Tek analog scopes, > > up to, and including the 7104 1 GHz mainframe. > > > How deep are your pockets? > > When that 2235 was about 7 years old, I found the input attenuator wasn't > anywhere near the 1,2,5 sequence on 1 channel, off on both but waaaayyy > off on one, as it had been left for days looking at a 285 volt dc level, > with 150 volts of video on it, looking for an intermittent, which when > it finaly showed itself, was a bad .5 uf paper capacitor that was > opening up. > > Called tek after having verified the R's on that fawncy ceramic plate > were sick (but not discolored in the least), found that it was past the > federally mandated 5 years since it went out of production for parts > availability, that yes they still had one left, no claims that it was > good, and they wanted $1750 from me for the privilege of testing it when > I installed it. I sent it to the transmitter forever, and spent that > money and another thou on a Hitachi v1085, which 20 some years later > still self tests itself at powerup and remains in calibration yet today. > The pushbuttons aren't getting as much use today so they are a bit > flaky, but then so are the buttons on my 30 yo V1065, whose computer > isn't near as smart as the later version. > I'm talking about guys like me out there that collect "vintage" Tek stuff relatively inexpensively from Ebay, hamfests, Craigslist and other sources, and they are malfunctioning, repair them. And then run them through the performance checks and calibrate if necessary. My calibrations don't carry certs, but the scope will end up close enough for gummint work, or for that matter, just about any shop work you or I would do. And then there are the amateur metrologists out there who have full-up cal labs in their shop, called the volt-nuts and time-nuts (I unashamedly admit to being on both those mailing lists... ;-) ) will cal your measuring equipment for you. I've got close to a dozen different Tek scopes from an SC502 TM50x mainframe plugin up to a 7854 four-bay mainframe which does waveform calculations and has digital storage. All are quite repairable should anything break. There are a few Tek products with almost unobtanium proprietary chips in them, but I avoid those. None of the scopes I have have those parts. > > > And there are quite a few shops out there that will cal the scopes > > with certs if you require them too. > > Which is why I asked if you had really deep pockets. We have been frugal > so I could do it, once. But I would never hear the end of it for paying > 3 or 4 grand to calibrate a 99 dollar (+ ship, that thing must weigh 35 > lbs) ebay scope. For under a $500 bill you can own a 2ghz digital > sampler that masquerades as a 200Mhz, dual trace scope, with a full > color display 2x the size of the teks, and 10x brighter. And weighs 2 > lbs & change. > No need for deep pockets, as I mentioned above. They aren't Tek. They're guys like me that enjoy playing around with the vintage scopes, and have built labs for repair and calibration. As I mentioned before, I can repair and calibrate a scope close enough (without certs) for pretty much any use I, or just about anybody else on this list would have. We aren't running NIST labs, creating satellites, or stuff like that, though as I mentioned previously, there are guys out there that can cal your gear and back it up with NIST certs. > > The beginning of the end for tek was when they went public, then bought, > or was bought, by the Grass Valley Group, both of which made top of the > line test and production video gear IN THEIR DAY. Then they rested on > their 1980 laurals. Today, they are both history, having been surpassed > in the night by people whose names you may never have heard of, but who > WILL give you the state of the art tools you need today, at a reasonable > asking price. > > I gotta say it, Mark, that 2015 morning coffee smells pretty darned good > from here. The 1985 version? Gah, its hopelessly burnt sitting on the > back burner that long. > So, perhaps there's a spot in your shop that requires 20 GHz+ bandwidth digital scopes, VNA's, spectrum analyzers and such that cost well over $20k a piece? I gotta see your shop! ;-) Let's face it. A 500 MHz analog scope is way overkill for pretty much anything you, I or anyone else on this list will do in their shops. > Cheers, Gene Heskett > Cheers, Mark ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ One dashboard for servers and applications across Physical-Virtual-Cloud Widest out-of-the-box monitoring support with 50+ applications Performance metrics, stats and reports that give you Actionable Insights Deep dive visibility with transaction tracing using APM Insight. http://ad.doubleclick.net/ddm/clk/290420510;117567292;y _______________________________________________ Emc-users mailing list Emc-users@lists.sourceforge.net https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/emc-users
