I've used a predecessor to this scope (100 MHz, 2 analog + 16 digital channels), and it certainly is not bad. The screen is definitely a bit on the small side for 16 channels, and the lack of color only makes the problem worse; having different channels in different colors would make them easier to visually separate.

The version I used does not have all of the advanced triggering modes you describe, but it is, nonetheless, a solid entry level scope. 100 MHz also strikes me as a bare minimum these days. If I were out shopping right now, I would probably want more, as I have a strong interest in catching transient behavior in high speed subsytems, such as logic implemented on CPLDs.


I really like Agilent's Infiniium series of scopes. The big, color displays are great. I also find the UI to be very friendly, and the analysis features to be very useful. Although the fact that these are based on Windows might make some forum members cringe, I truly appreciate the ability to log on to these things over the network, grab my data, and pull it out for further analaysis in Matlab or whatever the tool du jour happens to be. To me, doing this using standard tools (i.e., Windows file sharing of text files) over the LAN is vastly superior to GPIB/proprietary software based solutions. These scopes also have a variety of other little perks, including parallel ports, serial ports, VGA output, etc. Unforuntaely, they are rather expensive.

Finally, have you seen Agilent Application Note 1490? It has some discussion about how much bandwidth you need, and also talks about advanced triggering and other features, both topics that have been mentioned in this thread already.

--Sasha Jevtic