The cheapest USB scope I could find online
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- Опубликовано: 10 май 2019
- Reviewing the cheapest dual channel USB PC scope I could find, the Instrustar ISDS205A. It has a few disappointing limitations, but overall it's quite usable (it could be much worse).
and given that my goal was a cheap scope, it's not too bad. 
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Wow, this was pretty cool. I thought you were just an expert at woodworking. I appreciate your diversity of skills and interests.
Absolutely loving these recent videos! They’re awesome
I love these nerdier videos! (I live the projects too) Thanks for everything you do!!
Really excited to see you doing this kind of stuff. I have Enjoyed your wood working videos also. Thank you.
I am loving these videos more than your woodworking videos. Don’t get me wrong I also love your wood videos, especially when testing joints or new joints you create methods for. There’s nothing wrong with changing what you do and like doing during your RUclips career/journey. I started off learning woodworking and still do, but I have also been teaching myself electronic and appliance work and repair, and very slowly learning microcontrollers. I am not advanced as I would like to be, but the way you use the scope in this video raises an eyebrow of things I never thought of before. This tempts me to try my rigol 1054z in some new ways.
If anyone is curious, Windows 7 and Windows 8 drivers *generally* do work in Windows 10, if they're not labeled for Windows 10. Basically the same underlying OS for the most part! :)
I was going to say this
If you ignore the security updates, I think Win7, Win8 and Win10 are just re-skinned versions of Windows 95
@@detzels no this is totally wrong, they are closer to reskinnee versions of Windows NT 4.0, but there were major changes in Windows 2000 (NT 5.0), and Vista (NT 6.0). Windows 9x was a very different animal based on Windows 3.x. It's a totally different kernel.
But Win98 did have WDM drivers, not just the old VXDs. There is even a stripped ntdll.dll for usermode.
@@WndSks yes 98 and ME improved by supporting WDM drivers, but with drivers we're talking about the kernel space here not user space compat layers. The 9x kernel is very different from NT kernel. E.g. NT doesn't have MS-DOS kernel resident in memory at all, while 9x does and actually requires and often falls back on it. There's more to it than I can seriously get into on a YT comment.
A really excellent review, and overview of these types of scopes...thanks!
With most instruments like this, if you run the PC on battery power alone, without the AC charger plugged in, you should have significantly lower residual background noise.
also if you dont plug the pc in or have the pc running of an isolation transformer you can do differential meshurrments on mains eartht devices with no risk of short cirquiting something
Vega 128
If you want to ‘liven’ up your laptop!
The noise part is also true if you use and android phone and just download an audio scope and make headphone probes (the poor-man's / teenager's first scope) if you use it while charging you will see a lot more noise... however it's unwise to use such a set up to probe mains as the resistor you use is all the protection your phone gets, and headphone wire isn't rated for mains so there's some safety concerns not just for the safty of the device but also its user. But paying attention to the noise factor on those setups is how I immediately recognized the same issue when I graduated to USB scopes.
@@vega1287, I love your spelling choices. It tickled my brain.
Thanks for this review. Ordered it at once
!
A couple of years ago I also looked for this kind of USB oscilloscopes but could not find many good reviews on them back then. I eventually bought a Rigol DS1054 which is ok for home and hobby use.
I have a similar one purchased for working on vehicles and testing sensors and waveforms. It's an autel unit. Was about $600 I believe but it came with lots of different connectors and leads. Along with reduction coils for watching spark plug wires. The best part I think is it has 4 channels not just 2.
I really enjoy both woodworking, maths electronics and mouse maze stuff, just about everything you show us 😊 I'm sure the cheap scope will serve you well. The best scope is the one you actually use. I love the rigol ds1054z, it has been such an essential tool in many of my projects. Love to see scope plots in your future projects! It's a great visualizing tool for producing videos too.
Thanks for the updated video on these USB scopes. I can't justify spending ~250.00 to 400.00 for a tool that I will occasionally use for IoT interest/hobby. When the need / ROI occurs, I'll deal will shelling out the $$$.
Thank you for this. I saw it on your toothbrush video and ended up being more interested in the scope than the toothbrush. So I went looking for it online since if Matthias is using it, it must be decent.
I have an old Heathkit scope. It takes up a lot of real estate, but I'll probably just keep using that. Thanks for the info.
If I’m using it it must be cheap. Without being able to play with it I could not tell if it was good
I love your woodworking videos and the latest round of experiment and tech videos are just as good.
I would love to see strength tests comparing adhesives similar to the joint strength tests you did a few years ago. How does CA glue, epoxy, and construction adhesive compare to wood glue? Do some perform better on butt joints vs mortise, bridle, etc?
^*Darbin Orvar
Check out James Wright, he made a super in depth test of all available adhesives, I think it took him 2 months!
There's also a channel called Project Farm that does a lot of tests like that
I liked that he left the part in where he hooked it to the wrong probe. I think everybody does things like. At least I have. I was once working on a developing a very high input impedance high gain op amp amplifier and was reading all sorts of noise. It was driving me nuts. It turns on I hadn't turned on the power supply powering the circuit under test. So, I simply had a crude antenna picking up local radio stations and whatever other electromagnetic radiation was around. Of course, I believe that somebody who never makes a mistake, is somebody who isn't doing anything.
Very good information, thank you! Now I can really consider if to get one like this or not.
I bought one of these about 15 years ago. I've used in on a few hobby projects and it did the job.
Ion Ymous I bet it cost a lot more than 88$ 15 years ago
@@kwhp1507 I just looked back through some email. Just over 10 years ago and $225! You are right!
I got one of these too as a laugh, about a year after you did. I paid $72 CDN for it. For some reason on certain computers the drivers cause issues. Also the bandwidth, in real terms, is not 20MHz. Maybe 7MHz if you're generous. So for digital it's of limited use, even for those of us into retro computing. But for audio it's just fine. All in all I agree that i's a pretty good value and certainly better than no scope at all.
Can you do a how to use scope video? I would love that! Also SMPS troubleshooting 👍
cool. Thanks for doing this!
Interesting to see what one could do with one of those. Any interesting projects or explorations, some videos at a later time perhaps?
Looks the same as one of the Hantek cheapies, basically an ADC in a box.
I'd personally prefer the OWON USB scopes, mainly because they have a true scope front end and do all the signal processing in the scope.
I got my VDS1022 for sbout 85€ and it's pretty neat.
I just got the VDS1022I (Isolated) from sainsmart, it was on sale for ~$75 but new members got $20 off an order of $100 or more, so I got a few other things like 3d printer filament all for less than the price of the unit from Amazon
I have the Owon same isolated scope and it's great value. Probably the best of the cheap usb scopes.
You can make a portable oscilloscope with that, just by hooking it up to your single board pc of choice; an Orange Pi might be a best choice. You can always hook up the two using pocket holes.
i got my version of one of those as well for AC stuff - i even specifically made sure i could measure most buck converter' frequencies
There is an open source signal analysis software called sigrok that I think it supports your device.
But its Linux .. not Windows 10 ...Good thought.
Well, he knows Linux (see all the raspberry pi videos), but it also runs on Windows too.
I mentioned Linux because HE WAS SPECIFICALLY not running it. NOT THAT HE DIDN'T KNOW IT! Please view the video again if you need to. Specific software to run ON WINDOWS 10. Because he wanted to use his laptop which is Windows 10.
@@clydedecker765 Calm down, cranky old man. Take your meds and have a cup of tea for fucks sake.
@@clydedecker765 sigrok works on windoes as well :)
The software actually looks good to me
I like the idea of the convenience of a usb scope (or even a good digital scope) but I can't help feeling that it's hard to beat an old fashioned analogue scope.
You should consider the Instrustar ISDS2062A, this has 12-bit ADC, thus 32V and 320V (x10) at a very small amount ($18) extra. Now, this makes it really usable!
Noise you don't like is related to the bit depth. Many USB scopes do not have front end attenuaters for range switching.
That seems to me to be a pretty good scope for the price. I would have hoped that it would have some way to increase the buffer, though.
Just think how much something like this scope would have cost in the early 2000's, people would have killed for something like this lol.
Still, not too bad of a scope because when you need one you need one.
Great review! I have the same scope and considering the price I am pleased with it. I am interested in coil you made at 8:50 and how does it work? Does it have to have specific dimensions and turns?
Nothing specific about it. The signals coming out of that power adapter are pretty strong, it just picks it up by induction.
@@matthiasrandomstuff2221 I see. Thank you very much!
Good video. It's supposed to have spectrum analyzer fuctions. Can you share any experience with the FFT, THD and related spectrum analyzer functions?
Could not get anything useful out of that. Didn’t really work
Hopefully you can review the Pokit Pro when they finally start to release it.
Very nice your comments, really appreciated.
Gratifying that they've tested it against Wine, which is the Windows emulation layer which allows running Windows binaries on Unix-likes, including MacOS and Linux.
Very good 👍
I have a SainSmart DDS-140 that I use only for teaching, so it's more than sufficient. The SainSmart scope software would probably accept the feed from almost any USB scope.
the oscilloscope company finally has a video to play their ad on
I got Digilent's "Analog Discovery 2" which is really nice for embedded systems and hobby electronics. It's an oscope, logic analyzer, and function generator, with really good software.
Well its agilant's but it is a good compromise indeed
Neat unit, but costs 5x as much!
Sorry, I meant Digilent, not Digikey, obviously. Matthias, yeah, it's a little pricey. It has a large user base though, and a known brand name behind it, so that's worth something. Imagine what you would have paid for its functionality 10 years ago.
I just watched the entire video and gave it a thumbs up even though I have no idea what you said. I just enjoy your presentations no matter what the topic. Having said that I'm looking forward to build and non technical electrical product reviews etc. I hope you wrists are improving.
Keep the probe at 10x for maximum bandwidth. Bandwidth drops with 1x settings.
Why would that be the case?
Zartymil ruclips.net/video/OiAmER1OJh4/видео.html here check it out
Has to do with the capacitance of the coax cable from the probe. Indeed the video sugested by Amanpreet explains it nicely.
Cool stuff. Bummer it doesn't work with line voltage levels well, I'd think that might be an advantage of a USB scope on a laptop: the tool can be "floating".
I know for the cheapo signal analyzers, SigRok is a great piece of open source software. Haven't tried it, or looked around for another, to use with an analog unit like this though. Have you?
100x probes will get it to line voltage. I've used Hantek ($30 each, i think), and they work fine, but I've just upgraded to Stäubli.
That thing is cool
Hi
Great video thanks. Was it difficult to find and load the Win 10 driver.
I hope this eventually has something to do with mice...?
One thing that I am concerned about such scopes is that those cheapo scopes sometimes lack some safety features (like USB isolation) needed to protect your PC. It should be okay in most circumstances, but I don't plug mine into my main PC, just in case..
Own VFS1022i is isolated. Note the i suffix indicates isolated
Merry Christmas
Thank you so much.
I have a ISDS205C and cannot find where to download the ".exe" software from. I cannot find it on the Instrustar web site. Any suggestions?
Thank you for this video, Can you tell me if the FFT has a THD, THD + N, etc. or comes out redeuced...? Regards
Too many unknown TLAs to answer.
@@matthiasrandomstuff2221, I imagine Boris is wishing to know if the Fast Fourier Transform (FFT, i.e. the Spectrum Analyser Mode) has the ability to provide Total Harmonic Distortion and Total Harmonic Distortion + Noise. These measurements are often used in the realm of audio.
If I remember correctly, I thought you showed an old oscilloscope sitting in the attic above your father's workshop. Would be a cool idea to compare that to the digital one.
Oh, that thing is quite terrible!
Matthias random stuff even better!
@@matthiasrandomstuff2221, was it an old tube EICO? Those didn't even have triggered sweep
thanks bro
Why is your pc not made out of wood?
Hi, thanks for your video. I got a problem. I try to save a waveform with my instrustar, i click save and it return as csv file, but it set in ns, the period is from 0 ns to 50000ns wich mean that 0s to 0.05 s and the appearance of my plot is more tight depend to horizontal axis even my frequency is 100Hz. Did you know a right way to record waveform to csv from Instrustar ? Thanks
Sorry for my english :)
I only ever saved screenshots.
you should get the super cheap kit or reassembled kit with a small screen thats 1mhz iirc
Dso138. It’s a lot less capable than this thing - it’s basically just two inputs straight into a microcontroller.
Could of gotten one of those Hantek USB scopes for a cheaper price and would probably worked a little better.
PC digital scopes always has always failed short. It's better to get a real scope. Most modern scopes have a USB option to dump log info to a PC or even control the scope from a PC. I myself have an old HP 16500c and since I run Linux I can use X11 Server/Client mode to control it.
Hantek entry level scopes are awful and the Windows software is terrible
What is your profession/educational background?
Instrustar 2062 models have up to 320 VAC range and 12-bit resolution. Way more useful in practice.
You can get a 100x probe for these if you want to do radios
The cool thing about this is your probably going to get offered a new one.
"it is the cheapest scope i could find" *puts down scope in a non violent way and scope disconnects* 1:54
The clipping is acceptable, what's wrong there is that full-scale ADC should always map to full-scale on screen. Any other 'scope would have clipped at the very top and bottom of the screen.
that would be a problem too, because when showing multiple traces, sometimes you don't want the trace to fill the whole screen.
It actual can do data recording at 24M per sec for 1 channel or 16M for 2 into a full/. Minimum size is 1M samples. My old laptop seems ok to handle a few Ms. I can get a long capture going through record and playback. Quite unexpected, ok for around 10MHz. 😊
Into a flle..
File
The best very cheap USB scopes are the Own VDS1022i they are head and shoulders above the Hantek and the Windows software is excellent works with touch screen and has also been ported to Linux
One thing that you have to be really careful with on these USB scopes is that the scope ground is connected to your computer ground. If your ground wire accidentally touches a high potential (house power for instance) you can blow up your computer. Andreas Spiess (ruclips.net/channel/UCu7_D0o48KbfhpEohoP7YSQ ) likes to use a USB isolator with these kinds of equipment. That can help remove ground loops as well.
but that means I now need a separate power supply for the USB. That would be quite annoying
Yes, true. But if you are monitoring A/C powered devices I would say the protection is worth the annoyance of yet another brick. Definitely a personal risk-tolerance decision
Sir can I know this scope are really work with win 10..or not. Please advise me
Windows 10 on my laptop
R.I.P Electroboom
???
I bought a higher version ISDS210A . Should have been better but it is locking after few working minutes. It's too annoying.
I have old Grundig Analog osciloscope , and from time to time i think well i should get something better , but these things cant even measure what i want , or am used to 1mV per division, up to 50v per division , which is on 10x , 500V per devision , able to scope 2000V easy , and as low as below 1mV . I never took that seriously untill i saw what these scopes do . no way near that ,
i saw a good Tablet one with 100Mhz range , but it basically doesnt go below 1V per division and tops at 200V or something , witch is not what im used to .
I dont need advanced function because i do Audio gear , no need for high frequency but i do need 2000V ability because i do Tube Amps , so i guess this is not for me and im good with what i have .
It has roll mode too!!
Nice chair. Did you make it?
Cheers John
How can I measure electric current with this scope?
Same way as with any other scope. Use a shunt resistor.
Your a real genius, but i really miss your woodworking videos.
You make such cool stuff.
Danny from holland
I found myself going back and watching some of his old woodworking projects from years ago. To the best of my knowledge, he hasn't been able to do much woodworking due to a bad case of carpal tunnel syndrome.
@@52Ford
My bad, didn't know that.
Still doesnt change the fact the man is a freaking genius.
so basically the only thing my tds 1002b looses to this scope is the sample size
where to buy it?
Send me your link
Where you were buy this product
Would you develope and publish plans how to make this out of wood. Just kidding love all your videos
I never would connect a measure instrument with the pc. If the magic flash occures, instrument AND PC are over.
I adree but you can add a USB isolation device. It can help protect the pc. Most good instruments that connect to a pc will include isolation. However I expect this cheaply made scope will not be well isolated. www.analog.com/en/technical-articles/digital-isolators-offer-easy-to-use-isolated-usb-option.html
However these days, you could buy one of these and a dedicated cheap pc for the price of a decent scope, and if it let's the smoke out, your not out a bunch
I am a complete and utter layman when it comes to oscilloscopes, but could the 5V issue be a limit of USB? I am completely and utterly ignorant, so please forgive me if this comment is stupid!
Is it safe for the computer?
Obviously didn't look at the spec sheet you wouldn't have had half your complaints. The other model goes up over 320v. That one I believe only goes to 150v (15v at 1x) which is why it clipped.
I have only heard people who don't know much about scopes call the probes "ONE EKS" or "TEN EKS" rather than one times or ten times for the attenuator setting.
hmm ok what's your point? What about this guy? Do you think he knows much about the scopes? he say "one ex, ten ex" ruclips.net/video/SX4HGNWBe5M/видео.html
I've been using oscilloscopes off and on since the 1970s. In graduate school, I taught myself how to use the Tektronix 7904 by touch and from behind so I could see fast transient signals in the dark. I think I know a few things about scopes, and I have always used the terms 1X and 10X. I guess I must be the only one.
I don't claim to be an expert, but I don't think it would be accurate to say that I "don't know much about 'scopes." I have a BSEE and have been working with oscilloscopes for 19 years. Give me a call. I will say "10X" and expand your horizons.
For the money, it is quite cool. But finally, you only get, what you pay for. 20MHz are... hmm... not much compared to the clock frequency of a standard Arduino. Here it is sold for 48€. It is much better than the DS203 open hardware scope for less than half the price.
you can connect the dot too!! maybe you should familiar yourself with the oscilloscope and after using it sometime , then make a video like this!!
What is it used for?
Detecting idiots. Oh look, it just found one!
Can it generate clean signals?
its a scope, it doesn't generate any signals.
The only good thing I can see in this gadget is you can view oscilloscope on 50 inch TV!
Saskatchewan download speeds!
Thanks Matthias
I'd be disappointed with only 8 bits of resolution. The noise on your square wave looked like it was the last bit fluctuating. The real noise is probably much lower. I guess it costs about $11 per bit.
Most scopes out there are only 8bit, even fancy ones that cost over $10 000
The problem with this scope is the lack of a proper analog front end to scale and shift the signal to utilise as much range on the ADC as possible. Thats why other scopes show a much better signal.
@@berni8k Sounds right about the ADC. I guess the designers have to trade bandwidth for resolution. But what's this about the instrument scaling the input automatically, instead of ME? You youngsters don't know how lucky you are.
Is that scope can work for repairing amplifies
if you know how to repair amplifiers, yes.
@@matthiasrandomstuff2221 thanks man im asking about that because he said its have a5volt limit
Could be laptop cpu / gpu causing screen lag
A Hantek pc scope would be be much better, a 6022BE does 20MHz and can handle 50 volts, no ac coupling tho.
Costs about $90 AUD.
Hantek software is a joke also hardware spec doesn't compare with Own
You should think about adding some padding material for your broadcasts. The echoing that takes place against all that wood makes your speech hard to decipher.
Oooooh, new toys!
good news everyone! Software for win10 is out
At 7:04 _"it only does -60V to +60V, so you wouldn't use this thing to debug AC power."_
In any case I would never connect anything like this cheapest oscillo junk on the mains voltage.
Nothing on mains that isn't galvanically isolated or CATIII/IV certified. And even so, some chinese products like multimeters lie about being certified as Dave from EEV channel reported.
How many channels?
Two channels