Reviews Archives - Page 21 of 43

TTi TG1000 Function Generator

2013/05/22 By staze

In my quest to learn electronics, as well as use some more advanced tools to diagnose broken electronics, I recently purchased a function generator. I got from reading online that I really wanted a DDS generator as analog ones, while still useful, aren’t capable of really high accuracy anymore, and that I didn’t want to spend that much on one. The one that seemed to come up a lot is the SFG-1003, which is a 3Mhz DDS generator for about $150 through Amazon. Knowing this was my price point, I went to eBay to see what I could find. As luck would have it, I found a TTi TG1000 that was being sold “for parts” that had a very descriptive image for the item. A powered up LCD backlight, but no other display, as well as an image of the back of the unit that clearly showed it was configured for 230V. This reminded me of the TTi power supply I bought a bit ago. The seller wanted $350 for it, but I managed to get it for $150 including shipping. Score!

Overview

After receiving it (which it was extremely well packed), it SMELLED brand new. On opening it, this was largely confirmed by a sticker on the transformer saying it was manufactured in July of 2011. It seemed to have very little use, and the front panel seemed extremely clean. The unit SEEMS a bit cheap in the casing. It certainly doesn’t pass the “Dave” test for how solidly the unit is built. The top and bottom of the case are held together with 4 plastic rivets, that kind of flex and creek when moved. This isn’t to say the unit isn’t good, it just feels a bit “cheap”. But, it’s made in England, which is no doubt a good chunk of why the device costs more than most Chinese made Arbitrary Waveform Generators (TG1000 is about $700 new, where a Rigol DG1022a is about $450 new). One big advantage of the TG1000 though is that it’ll do a square wave up to 10Mhz (the Rigol DG1022a will only do square waves to 5mhz), though my scope shows those waves to be pretty ugly. This could be due to my scope, the wiring, or something I’m doing wrong. But, I don’t really plan on doing that high of frequency work (above 1Mhz will probably be rare), so it’s not that big of a deal. Also a plus, I emailed Thurlby-Thandar about getting the service manual, and they responded next day with a pdf version (well, for the TG2000, which is basically the same device).

Voltage Links

In the manual for the unit, it specifically talks about changing the configuration for 115V vs. 230V. Unfortunately, it required removing the whole main board, so I could remove a 0Ω resistor, and then adding two links to two other positions (see picture, two yellow and black striped links between the power input, and transformer), but after reassembly, it powered up immediately, ran self tests, and started output of a 10Khz sine wave. Sweet! While I was doing the soldering, I also noticed that TTi seemed to use the same board for both the TG2000, and the TG1000, but unfortunately, unlike the Rigol DS1000 series, it doesn’t seem like it’s a software change to get the added functionality. While there are solder points for the RS232, and USB connections, there are also chips missing for said RS232 connectivity and USB (the Service manual actually shows the USB connectivity would be provided by a FTDI chip). Ah well. I also added a label to the back to say it’s configured for 115V operation now.

In testing the unit, I was using a BNC Tee and a 50Ω terminator into the Scope, but then I saw the TG1000 has a “HiZ” output setting (as well as the standard 50Ω and 600Ω output), which basically treats it as an open cirtuit, which allowed me to just go straight into the scope, and get accurate readings. Double score!

I’m very happy with the unit. Purchase was a breeze thanks to a great seller, and getting 115V working took about 10 minutes (couple for teardown, all of 2 minutes of soldering, and a couple to re-assemble). All at the cost of a cheaper, less capable FG!

[xrr rating=4.75/5]

Iron Man 3

2013/05/06 By staze

Over the weekend, I saw Iron Man 3 in the theater, in 2D (I want to do everything possible to eliminate 3D from the movie theaters). I will say that going in, I wasn’t sure what to expect. Iron Man 2 was not particularly good, and the early reviews on IMDB for Iron Man 3 were less than stellar (though this seemed to be due to people wanting the movie to by like the Chris Nolan Dark Knight movies).

Previews took for bloody ever (not unlike other Disney movies), but once we finally got to the movie, it pretty much set a pace within the first few minutes, and kept up on it through the rest of the movie. Acting and Direction is pretty much what we’ve all come to expect from A. A Marvel Movie (post Daredevil/Fantastic Four/X-Men Last Stand), and B. A Robert Downey Jr., Gwen Paltrow movie.

Without ruining too much, the movie is darker. Stark does suffer from PTSD after what happened in Avengers (which seems a bit lame, but whatever). But it stays pretty true to the previous two movies, as well as the larger Avengers universe. No doubt Joss Whedon is getting some editing “rights” to the scripts.

All and all, a good movie. Never felt like it dragged during the action (which there was a fair amount of), and it has to be the best example of a movie introducing a “kid” but not allowing that to ruin the characters or the movie. And Ben Kingsley is awesome.

In short, see it. It’s well worth the 2 hours.

[xrr rating=4.75/5]

TTi 30V 2A Bench Power Supply (EL302P)

2013/04/22 By staze

For the last several weeks I’ve been really interested in electronic circuit design. I’ve been buying components for little projects, a bigger breadboard, shopping for an Oscilloscope, and recently purchased a bench top power supply.

Shopping for the power supply involved a fair amount of eBay. But after a week or two of looking, and reading reviews, I found the Thurlby Thandar (TTi) EL302P (shown on the left) on eBay from a seller for a total of $86 with shipping. Only caveat was that the screen was non-functional. No problem, I can either fix it, or just use the computer interface. So I purchase and wait eagerly.

I get shipment notification through USPS, and then nothing else. No updates or anything. After wondering for about a week a large, semi-destroyed (tracking barcode has been torn through), box shows up on my doorstep. Dreading the contents, I open it to find the power supply, only it looks like the picture on the right. Pretty much toast I’m thinking.

The local post office went so far as to stamp the box as “received damaged” to remove blame from themselves. So the damage must have occurred earlier in transit.

I contact the seller, and he refunds the purchase and shipping no questions asked saying USPS can be difficult to get payment out of. And tells me to keep the unit since it’s no good to him.

My interest piqued I immediately pull the whole thing apart and realize two things. 1. The front panel somehow survived unharmed. And 2. The insides are completely intact save one severed wire that I can easily replace. So, channeling my grandfather (who owned a autobody shop), I take a rubber mallet, and my bench vise to the chassis and top cover, and get to work.

With no details, a couple days later, I have the picture you see on the left. Nearly as good as new. Plus, once I had the unit opened I saw it was still wired for 230V rather than 115V. Some quick soldering and shrink tubing later, and I have a unit that works perfectly. Apparently these units will “sort of” power up if set to 230V and plugged into 115V, but obviously the other way around would result in a “pop”.

I’m obviously pretty happy with the result. I’ve replaced the fuse, and the bumpons on the bottom since they were pretty old, and had shifted. Testing the unit with a 12V 35W bulb was encouraging, as well as with a multimeter. I hope to build up an adjustable dummy load this weekend and give it a real test at it’s full range. But for a free bench supply, with a couple hours work (and less than $10 in parts for the bumpons, fuse, and a couple replacement speed nuts), I’m extremely happy.

Also, testing the RS-232 worked perfectly as well. The command set is extremely simple, you just have to make sure your terminal program uses LR for line termination. Should be interesting to see the output of this unit once I have an oscilloscope.

« Previous Page