Turn your Rigol DS1052E Oscilloscope into a 100MHz DS1102E
in [Design]
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From: Howard Eisenhauer on 31 Mar 2010 18:54 It's with some interest I've read the discussions on the legality/morality of performing this mod. Two thoughts come to mind- First, it's been the practice by many cellphone compamies to sell phones to customers at less than cost, up to 50-70% off the retail price, to attract customers with the expectation that over the course of the contract the'll make thier money back. They protect their investment in gaining customers this way by software locking the phones so that they will only work on the provider's network. Of course it didn't take long for hackers to learn how to un-lock the phone's network restriction leading to the situation where people would sign up for service, get their phone, then cancel the contract, get the phone un-locked & go on a cheaper plan from the original provider's competitor. There was a lot of talk from the providers selling the subsidised phones about the legality of this but to my knowledge the people offering the un-locking service operated openly & none was ever prosecuted, beacuse at the end of the day the phones belonged to the customer. The second thing that come to mind is a few years back suppliers of contact lenses (Boush & Laumb as well as Johnson & Johnson) ended up getting sued because they were selling daily use and long term contact lenses, with the daily use ones of course being significantly cheaper, when in fact both types of the lenses were the exact same product except for the packaging. At the end of the day, unless you'ver signed something specifically legally preventing you from making this mod then it's got to be legal. simply by the fact it isn't illegal. Whether or not it's "moral" is going to depend on the individual's viewpoint. H.
From: Jamie on 31 Mar 2010 19:59 John Larkin wrote: > On Wed, 31 Mar 2010 11:29:12 +1100, "David L. Jones" > <altzone(a)gmail.com> wrote: > > >>For those with a Rigol DS1052E oscilloscope, you can now turn it into a >>100MHz DS1102E with just a serial cable: >> >>http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LnhXfVYWYXE >> >>Dave. > > > What you have done is possibly a criminal act in the USA, using a > computer to deprive Rigol of revenue. In the US, "using a computer" to > perform an act can be a much more severe crime than the act itself. > > I have some sympathy for Rigol here. Many of our products have an > option that can be enabled in firmware, and that we charge for. We put > a lot of engineering effort into the firmware, and need to be paid for > it. If buyers of my gear can order the cheaper one and make it into > the expensive one, by copying an EPROM maybe, or setting a bit in > flash somewhere, I can't recover the cost of the feature. The act is > arguably legal theft. It's certainly moral theft. > > Products are increasingly IP and less hardware these days, and the IP > is expensive. > > Of course, Rigol made it too easy. They will probably go back and make > it harder to do, and that will make the scope cost more in both > versions. > > I recently got a 1052E, and it's a pretty nice scope. The digital > filtering is not perfect, but it's sure cute. It has way more goodies > than a comparable Tek for under half the price. I'll probably get a > few more. > > John > Is it possible the 50 Mhz models are rejected 100mhz versions that may have not past some test at 100Mhz bw ? Units that wouldn't pass at 100 Mhz and be ok at 50 Mhz, would be waste just through the boards out. Personally, I would get a little upset knowing they would charge an extra $300, with nothing more than a firmware setting change.. I would expect different internals for that much difference. But If it was like I suggested, then maybe some users can be happy with the possible defected operation at 100 mhz
From: Jamie on 31 Mar 2010 20:21 terryc wrote: > On Wed, 31 Mar 2010 10:30:26 +0100, Nial Stewart wrote: > > >>By your logic Microsoft should only be charging $0.50 for the costs of >>the DVD when they sell Windows7. > > > Is it worth that much? > I see and understand "Nial Stewarts" point. $0.50 is like a slap in the face for MS.. I would how ever, do the honorable deed and pay $0.75 for it. Jamie.
From: Trevor Wilson on 31 Mar 2010 19:35 "Phil Hobbs" <pcdhSpamMeSenseless(a)electrooptical.net> wrote in message news:4BB3505A.503(a)electrooptical.net... > On 3/31/2010 12:46 AM, miso(a)sushi.com wrote: >> On Mar 30, 8:03 pm, John Larkin >> <jjlar...(a)highNOTlandTHIStechnologyPART.com> wrote: >>> On Wed, 31 Mar 2010 11:29:12 +1100, "David L. Jones" >>> >>> <altz...(a)gmail.com> wrote: >>>> For those with a Rigol DS1052E oscilloscope, you can now turn it into a >>>> 100MHz DS1102E with just a serial cable: >>> >>>> http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LnhXfVYWYXE >>> >>>> Dave. >>> >>> What you have done is possibly a criminal act in the USA, using a >>> computer to deprive Rigol of revenue. In the US, "using a computer" to >>> perform an act can be a much more severe crime than the act itself. >>> >>> I have some sympathy for Rigol here. Many of our products have an >>> option that can be enabled in firmware, and that we charge for. We put >>> a lot of engineering effort into the firmware, and need to be paid for >>> it. If buyers of my gear can order the cheaper one and make it into >>> the expensive one, by copying an EPROM maybe, or setting a bit in >>> flash somewhere, I can't recover the cost of the feature. The act is >>> arguably legal theft. It's certainly moral theft. >>> >>> Products are increasingly IP and less hardware these days, and the IP >>> is expensive. >>> >>> Of course, Rigol made it too easy. They will probably go back and make >>> it harder to do, and that will make the scope cost more in both >>> versions. >>> >>> I recently got a 1052E, and it's a pretty nice scope. The digital >>> filtering is not perfect, but it's sure cute. It has way more goodies >>> than a comparable Tek for under half the price. I'll probably get a >>> few more. >>> >>> John >> >> The design cost is amortized over all the units. [Hey, don't worry >> what the consults charges, it will go to zero as we sell a million >> units.] >> >> Rigol does themselves a disservice by having to maintain two >> products. They should just sell the higher speed scope, bomb the >> market, and then own it. > > > Destroying a market isn't usually a good way to make money in the long > run. > > And it's easily possible that Rigol saves a boatload of money by having > only one assembly number to design, code, build, and test. Remember that > (as Dave discovered earlier) they're actually overclocking the ADCs on the > 100 MHz model--so one can argue it's really a 50 MHz scope that Rigol > themselves hacked into a 100 MHz one. > > Companies have been selling crippleware forever--the earliest example I > know of was the 6 MHz IBM PC-AT. You changed the crystal and one other > thing that I forget, and suddenly you had a blistering fast 8 MHz AT! > (Cooler than the coolest thing ever, no?) There were similar howls of > outrage over that one. **Not even close. The real con was the Intel 486SX. It was a 486 chip, with a deliberately disabled maths co-processor. -- Trevor Wilson www.rageaudio.com.au
From: George Jefferson on 31 Mar 2010 19:41
> You can't know what their manufacturing procedures are. They may > select the better scopes to be the 100 MHz versions. > > John AND you can't be sure that they don't do anything more than just twiddle a bit, can you? You are sticking up for them as if you are 100% sure they did absolutely nothing wrong when all the evidence supports the opposite case. IMO they should have to prove they did nothing wrong which is quite simple. e.g., if you made inherently different performance versions of your product surely you can prove that they perform different? Your justifications only show that you fit in the same group as Rigol. I won't be buying anything from you and I hope your customers will find someone else to give their money to. |