14 Mar
2023
14 Mar
'23
6 p.m.
On HP: yes, perhaps. I used one of those back at DEC,
in the mid 1980s. Nice machine, but my suspicion is that I'd run into the small memory
problem again that plagues me with the Philips/Fluke analyzer I use right now.
We use several HP analyzers around here, all from the 80s. Even the "small" ones
are 72 channel and more than sufficient for all your old computer needs. The big ones have
Ethernet and will talk X11 across the network, which is super handy. The older models are
serial-only, but can print to a ThinkJet emulator running on a PC. That's how I made
e.g. this capture image:
http://users.glitchwrks.com/~glitch/images/xtide/xt_ide_rev4/read_delay.gif
Before getting my first HP 1650, I had an older Sony/Tektronix that suffered from the
"not deep enough capture memory" issue. Haven't run into that with the HPs
yet, especially the big HP 16500 series. I've found that if I'm running out of
memory depth, I'm probably not hooked up right.
FWIW, I've ran into two hobbyists who were persuaded to buy used HP gear after their
Chinese knockoff Siglent analyzers started *driving* some of the channels.
Thanks,
Jonathan
