That'd be a very expensive radio, but there are other reasons why doing wireless development for example, it might be useful to be able to listen to signals. In other words, you can listen to the radio station.
![rigol dsa815 review rigol dsa815 review](https://c1.neweggimages.com/ProductImage/A3C6_1_2014092538195278.jpg)
You can actually plug headphones in here and this thing will demodulate AM of FM signals.
![rigol dsa815 review rigol dsa815 review](https://www.salicontech.co.in/wp-content/uploads/2019/11/3-39.jpg)
One of the cool things about this spectrum analyzer is that it has a demodulator. That's WBJC, the Baltimore area classical station, and the signal is about minus 50, minus 55 or so dBm. I can ask it to search for the next peak to the left, and here it is right on top of this signal here which is 91.5 megahertz. The number is so small, the number one, indicator on that marker is so small I find it very difficult to see. You can see it jumping around right there, or maybe you can't. You're going to have a hard time seeing it but here is marker number one. This particular unit supports four different markers and this is one of my very few beefs with this particular unit. In other words, it's displaying all the frequencies it picks up from 90 to 110 megahertz.Īll spectrum analyzers have markers which let you identify signals. I've tuned to the FM radio band, a centre frequency here is 100 megahertz, and the span which is starting from here going to there is 20 megahertz. Now, it's connected to a clip lead, basically a meter of wire, and that of course is an antenna.
RIGOL DSA815 REVIEW GENERATOR
No longer is the signal generator driving it. Okay, so let's have some fun with the spectrum analyzer which will really demonstrate its capabilities. Other members of the family go up to seven Gigahertz and are correspondingly much more expensive.
![rigol dsa815 review rigol dsa815 review](https://m.media-amazon.com/images/I/31b6l+8L32L._SS400_.jpg)
This Rigol, this particular unit goes from 9 kilohertz all the way up to one and a half gigahertz and costs only $1,500, which is really a bargain for a spectrum analyzer. What the spectrum analyzer is showing us is the distribution of frequencies of an input signal. So our 40 megahertz peak is right there, 40 megahertz, and everything else is noise. And on the horizontal axis, this is now frequency. In this case, the vertical axis is not volts but is the amplitude that is measured in dBm, or decibels referenced to one milliwatt. The vertical axis of course is voltage, the horizontal axis is time, and here is the same signal being displayed on the Rigol spectrum analyzer. As you can see on the oscilloscope, it looks like a sine wave, exactly as you would expect. That is nice Agilent oscilloscope, and this is my Siglent generator which is currently putting out a 40 megahertz sine wave. Perhaps the easiest way to answer that is by demonstrating the difference between a spectrum analyzer and an oscilloscope. But first you might wonder, what is spectrum analyzer? Today we're going to do a short take about Rigol's new DSA815 Spectrum Analyzer.
![rigol dsa815 review rigol dsa815 review](https://ae01.alicdn.com/kf/HTB1aZJuXpOWBuNjy0Fiq6xFxVXaM/Rigol-DSA815-TG-1-5-GHz-Spectrum-Analyzer-with-Tracking-Generator.jpg)
RIGOL DSA815 REVIEW FREE
This is a companion to my free Embedded Muse newsletter which is available online. I'm Jack Ganssle and welcome to the Embedded Muse video blog. Thanks to Saelig for loaning me the unit. I reviewed it here.Įpisode 17: Rigol's DSA 815-TG Spectrum Analyzer
RIGOL DSA815 REVIEW SOFTWARE
Peter Gliwa is kindly offering a copy of his book Embedded Software Timing for December's giveaway. For novel ideas about building embedded systems (both hardware and firmware), join the 40,000+ engineers who subscribe to The Embedded Muse, a free biweekly newsletter.