Hi Chuck-
Actually, if working with RF anywhere in the lower HF range or MF (such as AM bcst) or any number of analog circuits, the old 500 series mainframes provide plenty of bandwidth.
And the controls are laid out in a very logical manner, the controls are big enough to grasp without having to be careful not to hit something you don't mean to touch. The display is razor sharp. And maybe it's just that Greg and I are old, but I'm right with him on hearing the fan spin up, the time delay relay pull in and that delightful smell of vacuum tube electronics. When the old scope has enough capability for the job at hand, there is such an extreme "pleasure of operation" factor involved for some of us.
I solved the heat issue in my old shop decades ago by adding a small window unit air conditioner to run when I was using either my 555 (particularly if I needed two of them at once!) or my Collins 30L-1. The extra cooling from the window unit did the trick and was a very equitable trade for the opportunity to use those instruments in comfort.
My new shop has plenty of capacity in its own dedicated central air conditioner so there's no problem there.
I think it's just a matter of what you like. I have a 7104 and a 7934 sitting within arm's reach and they get used regularly, but when it's up to the job, the 555 is my first choice! :-)
Hope you have a good night!
Tom
Chuck Harris wrote:
Au Contraire? Mais non, certainement pas!
Even Jim Williams was vexed by the 50MHz limit imposed by
his favorites, the 547, and 556....but for opamp, and low
performance switching supply work, they were adequate, as
long as you didn't consider the environmental aspects of
using such a scope (by environmental, I use the traditional
usage, as in: the environment in the lab...).
I grew up as an engineer in the waning days of the 545B, 547
and 585A. I have used all of them for serious electronics work,
as they were what we could get, and I was damn glad to have them
at the time. Still, I simply don't know of anyone that does
serious work with 500 series scopes anymore. The limitations
are too severe. They can't even keep up with a modern USB port.
1MHz switching supplies have spikes that they cannot even come
close to seeing. Just because your scope can't see them, doesn't
mean they won't burn out your transistors and diodes.
Disregarding the low bandwidth, the heat they produce is enough
to eliminate them from serious consideration. I not so fondly
remember my lab in graduate school over taxing the building's air
conditioner with all of the HP and Tektronix gear we needed for
our research. It was intolerable to have the lab get over 110F
in the summer; doors open, huge floor standing fans blowing papers
everywhere. It was so hot that the thermal overload switches in
the scopes were tripped.
Nostalgia is great, especially if you remember only the good
stuff. Thinking fondly of using a scope in the '70s, and using
it for serious electronics work today are not the same thing.
I pull out my 547, 545B, and 585A from time to time to play with,
but when work needs to be done, they are parked in their corral.
My 7854 does most of my heavy lifting, scope wise.
-Chuck Harris
