Test Equipment and Other Equipment
Revision as of 08:50, 26 January 2012 by DavidCary (talk | contribs) (Music Player as open source signal generator?)
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Contents
Test Equipment
Logic Analyzer
- Keith has made a list of "PC USB logic analyzers that cost under $1000."[1]
XYZs of Logic Analyzers from Tektronix
Multi Meter
if digital then a Digital Multi Meter or DMM
- Digital Multimeter Shootout!
- EVERYONE Needs a Multi-Meter
- Multimeters How to use 'em
- Using a Digital Mulitimeter to Make Simple and Accurate Resistance Measurements
- How to use a digital multimeter
Oscilloscope
Semiconductor Analyzer and Curve tracers
Signal Generators
- Signal (and other) Generators
- XYZs of Signal Generators PDF
- In principle, a Music Player can be used as a signal generator.
Stepper Motor Tester
Beginner's List
This is what you should get in approximate order. The type of electronics may vary this list a bit, here we are assuming you are starting with Microcontrollers.
- Arduino, perhaps a beginners kit, if not components similiar to a beginners kit. LadyAda has one, as does Sparkfun.
- Power Supply: you can start with a 9 v battery, when you need more current a wall transformer ( left over from some device you or a friend has thrown
out should be fine. For fancier regulated power you can just add some simple circuits using 3 terminal regulators ( or these may be built into your project.
- Some resistors 100 ohm, 200 ohm ( for led's ) 1K and 10K (for pull up/down) is a good first start. Should be 5 cents a peice at most. 2 cents is not too hard to find, even for 1% resistors.
- A cheap multimeter is not as good as an expensive one, but for 4 bucks ( harbor frieght ) you can be up and running.
- Wire is nice, sometimes phone wir or network wire can be had for free and will supply a large amount of wire.
- Some simple hand tools: needle nose pliers, wire strippers, and diagonal cutters. All for under 10 bucks at harbor freight ( and other places )
- Soldering iron. This is one place where cheap does not do well, you really need thermostatic control, and plated replaceable tips. Rough guess is that $50 is about as low as you can go.
- Signal generator ( sine square and triangle ) is nice, but a 555 timer square wave generator may be all you need and you can build it yourself.
- Oscilloscope really really useful. Can be very expensive, but you may be able to find a used analog 50 mhz scope on ebay for around $50.
Once you have most of the above you will probably know enough to know what comes next.
See Also
- The Open Bench project is developing a set of open source benchtop tools for the electronics workbench -- adjustable DC power supply; LCR meter; waveform generator; frequency counter; logic analyzer; oscilloscope.