[time-nuts] HP Reliability

[Alex Pummer]

Quite often it works, but sometimes it does not,
not to long time ego I had to investigate one non-linearity case with a 
high mode QAM signal, there was something, what not supposed to be 
there, the only spectrum analyzer which had enough dynamic range was one 
from Rohde&Schwarz,
73
K6UHN
Alex
  On 2/14/2016 11:20 AM, William H. Fite wrote:
> They don't wonder; they know very well. But they're stuck. Consider
> oscilloscopes. Why pay for a Keysight or Tectronix or LeCroy or, God
> forbid, a Rohde & Schwarz when, for the vast majority of applications, a
> Rigol will give you everything you need at 1/N the cost?
>
> The hugely expensive, overbuilt gear that we grew up with is yesterday's
> news; that's why we can scarf it up so cheap on the 'bay. Lots of labs and
> manufacturing facilities now consider basic gear like DSOs, SAs, DMMs,
> PSUs, and sig-gens as disposable as cell phones.
>
> I'm not sure that is a bad thing.
>
> Bill
>
>
>
> On Sunday, February 14, 2016, Scott McGrath <scmcgrath at gmail.com
> <javascript:_e(%7B%7D,'cvml','scmcgrath at gmail.com');>> wrote:
>
>> HP's greatest advantage of old was being the largest and best vertically
>> integrated technology company as innovations in one line of business were
>> often applicable to others.    This was right down to things as prosaic as
>> packaging and or hybrid  circuit design
>>
>> Now Keysight is just another mid sized technology company who outsources
>> much of their production and wonders why Asian vendors can copy their stuff
>> so rapidly and undersell them.
>>
>> Content by Scott
>> Typos by Siri
>>
>>> On Feb 14, 2016, at 8:31 AM, Adrian Godwin <artgodwin at gmail.com> wrote:
>>>
>>> HP built their reputation for quality and reliability with test
>> equipment.
>>> Computers were always considered a bit weird (in a nice way, in the case
>> of
>>> handheld calculators) but printers have followed the consumer race to the
>>> bottom.
>>>
>>> It's sad to hear that the instrument division are no longer focused on
>>> keeping that reputation - perhaps that's why the medical division moved
>> to
>>> separate the names.
>>>
>>> On Sun, Feb 14, 2016 at 11:28 AM, Dr. David Kirkby (Kirkby Microwave
>> Ltd) <
>>> drkirkby at kirkbymicrowave.co.uk> wrote:
>>>
>>>>    On 14 Feb 2016 09:04, "Perry Sandeen via time-nuts" <
>> time-nuts at febo.com
>>>> wrote:
>>>>> Hi,
>>>>> It is rather depressing to me to hear RK and others remark about the
>>>> unreliability of HP test equipment.
>>>>> There is one area where they had outstanding equipment.
>>>> I have a friend with a fairly large lab. He must have 50 signal
>> generators,
>>>> 15 spectrum analyzers, plus plenty of other stuff. Mainly RF. Most is
>>>> HP/Agilent, but he has Rohde & Scwarz and Anritsu too. He finds the HP
>> the
>>>> most reliable.
>>>>
>>>> Also Anritsu seem to charge a lot for calibration.  A recent repair to a
>>>> modern 6 GHz Anritsu signal generator resulted in the repair bill plus
>>>> £1200 GBP (around $1800) for calibration. That particular sig gen, which
>>>> was sold for mobile phone use, has an electronic attenuator that will
>> blow
>>>> up if a mobile phone is transmitted into it.
>>>>
>>>> He used to think he preferred R&S signal generators to Agilent,  but the
>>>> reliability of the R&S has been poorer so his mind has been changed on
>>>> that.
>>>>
>>>> I am sure every company has some products that have been very reliable
>> and
>>>> some less so, but I would dispute that HP is in general less reliable
>> than
>>>> other decent makes.
>>>>
>>>> Support on HP is generally good, with the forums which are answered by
>>>> Keysight staff. (An annoying exception seems to be LCR meters and
>> Impedance
>>>> analyzers developed in Japan. The Japanese engineers hardly ever visit
>> the
>>>> forums so questions on LCR meters and impedance analyzers generally get
>> no
>>>> response.)
>>>>
>>>> There are instrument ranges where other manufacturers seem better (e.g.
>>>> Keithley for electrometers), but overall HP/Agilent seem the best
>> choice to
>>>> me.
>>>>
>>>> I know someone who is looking for a 20.GHz VNA. He just lost out on a
>>>> Windows based R&S VNA that sold on eBay for a bit over $7000. There's no
>>>> way a 20 GHz Windows based Agilent VNA would fetch so little.  This is
>>>> reflected in their higher resale values.
>>>>
>>>> At least with the older stuff,, service manuals for HP are useful,
>> though
>>>> modern service manuals are less so.
>>>>
>>>> Just my opinion.
>>>>
>>>> Dave.
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>