2 things right, 1 thing wrong... I'm calling it *win*
Have I mentioned I really enjoy FailBlog? No, I haven't. I haven't mentioned much lately. Anyway... whoomp, there it is.
But more importantly, can you put your nerd hat on and spot the two things right with this picture?
The first one is easy - it's in the upper left hand corner, it's starts with "b", rhymes with "eer", and is dark and delicious.
The second thing that is currently judged as most awesomeness is the USB-powered 5MHz digital oscillioscope, datalogger, spectrum analyzer, and arbitrary function generator, for only $250. Picoscope, you fucking rock. For all the nerds out there that deal with integrating disparate systems and the wacky questions that come up about line noise, dropped encoder counts, and any of a billion ponderables (but not-easily-answerables) there's halfway decent o'scopes out there for about the same price as your trusty Fluke 77. Picoscope isn't the only one out there making products like this, but I just got one, and it looks like it's gonna come in really handy in the ol' bag-o'-tricks that you don't always need, but comes in really handy when you do.
And so you're wondering - what one thing is wrong with this picture? Count it as 3, maybe... location, location, location. What kind of fucking dork brings instrumentation into a bar and plays with it while drinking beer? Well, tonight... it was this particular dork, thank you very much. Whatever. I don't care. The box arrived with the widget, I wanted to play with it, I wanted a beer. So that's what happened.
I'm still calling it a win.
6 comments:
That is so cool! Now I am curious about it's specs... and kind of want to play with it with the TIG to see exactly what it is doing.
Geeks unite.
Well, you aren't going to get any grief about the bag o' tricks from me :)
Oh no, I'd say the biggest problem is that awful Windows operating system on the nice Mac. Too bad National Instruments can't make a real Labview version for the Mac. Or is it the picoscope not having drivers? Or what???
Nothing really that nice about CrapBookPro. It runs hot (i.e. a laptop that burns your lap), can't put a f-ing handle on a window anywhere other than the lower right corner, etc. etc...
I can't be bothered in the least that NI doesn't make a decent version of LabView for the Mac. Macs are for wussies, wankers, and webelos. No one in any self-respecting engineering or technical discipline uses a Mac as a platform. Why? Aside from the lack of any other systems to interoperate with, they'd get laughed out of the room. Even the companies that make/made Mac products to use in industrial environments are dumping them in favor of something more useful.
I've said it before, I'll say it again - I bought this thing with hope in my heart, and was let down from day 1. I'll jump at any chance to dump it for something better (i.e. Wintel). You think it's so great? I'll sell it to you. Send me an email and we can work out the details. Take my Mac... please.
Very nice. I looked at a USB scope a while back, but the one you have looks better. Using it for work, or just out of curiosity?
- G
there's a ton of USB scopes on the market these days... up to GHz, many-channel, etc. I went with low cost, USB-only power, and small and light. The only thing that's disappointing is the +/- 20V range (protected up to 100V, but only measures to 20)
I got it 50% for me, and 50% for work, but I plan to keep it. I ain't rich, but there's worse ways to spend $200.
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