Tektronix TDS-210 Broke; Any ideas?

Hi all,

	I've got a Tek TDS-210 DSO that gave up on me last Sunday. I bought it 
on eBay for ~$700 2.5 years ago and it's worked great until Sunday. I 
was using it Saturday night and when I woke up Sunday and went to use it 
I get a blank display. The LCD backlight comes on but no display. I get 
a 5kHz wave from the probe comp connections according to my DMM.

	So, is this common? Anyone heard of it or have any ideas of what might 
be wrong. Tek wants $575 to repair and there's just no way I can do 
that. I'm guessing the display has just given up the ghost on me but 
where to find a replacement?

Thanks,
Jason

On Jan 30, 9:45 am, Jason von Nieda <j...@vonnieda.org> wrote:
> Hi all,
>
>         I've got a Tek TDS-210 DSO that gave up on me last Sunday. I bought it
> on eBay for ~$700 2.5 years ago and it's worked great until Sunday. I
> was using it Saturday night and when I woke up Sunday and went to use it
> I get a blank display. The LCD backlight comes on but no display. I get
> a 5kHz wave from the probe comp connections according to my DMM.
>
>         So, is this common? Anyone heard of it or have any ideas of what might
> be wrong. Tek wants $575 to repair and there's just no way I can do
> that. I'm guessing the display has just given up the ghost on me but
> where to find a replacement?
>
> Thanks,
> Jason

If you need the service manual, send me an email.

Dave :)

"Jason von Nieda" <jason@vonnieda.org> wrote in message 
news:TNuvh.42367$VX1.34061@fe05.news.easynews.com...
> Hi all,
>
> I've got a Tek TDS-210 DSO that gave up on me last Sunday. I bought it on 
> eBay for ~$700 2.5 years ago and it's worked great until Sunday. I was 
> using it Saturday night and when I woke up Sunday and went to use it I get 
> a blank display. The LCD backlight comes on but no display. I get a 5kHz 
> wave from the probe comp connections according to my DMM.
>
> So, is this common? Anyone heard of it or have any ideas of what might be 
> wrong. Tek wants $575 to repair and there's just no way I can do that. I'm 
> guessing the display has just given up the ghost on me but where to find a 
> replacement?
>

I would do that either. Probably just a bad resistor or something very 
simple and they'll charge you 500$ to replace a 2c component. Its outrageous 
how companies gouge people now days and specially when they tend to do a 
piss pour job.

Did you open it up and check it out? Maybe you can probe inside a little and 
see where your signal cuts out? Try checking the net for others with similar 
issues and you might find the culprit but opening it up and looking at it 
and you might find out what happened.

"Jason von Nieda"
>
> I've got a Tek TDS-210 DSO that gave up on me last Sunday. I bought it on 
> eBay for ~$700 2.5 years ago and it's worked great until Sunday. I was 
> using it Saturday night and when I woke up Sunday and went to use it I get 
> a blank display.



**  Tried taking your sun glasses off   ??




.....  Phil    ;-)

Jon Slaughter wrote:
> 
> I would do that either. Probably just a bad resistor or something very
> simple and they'll charge you 500$ to replace a 2c component. Its outrageous
> how companies gouge people now days and specially when they tend to do a
> piss pour job.


   You have never dealt with Tektronix, have you?  Some of these scopes
are near EOL, and are repaired by replacing modules, then the item is
calibrated to NIST traceable standards.  You are quick to condemn
everyone, yet you don't know enough to do the work for yourself.  The
scope still sells for around $1000, it is a dual channel 60 MHz digital
storage scope.  How do you propose to find that "bad resistor or
something very simple"?  Do you have any idea of the costs involved in
running a meteorology lab?  Don't the employees deserve a living wage? 
Do you want to wait months, or years while they order parts, or do you
prefer them to invest in an inventory that covers most of their needs? 
Grow up, and look at the real world.

   As far as workmanship, Tektronix and HP (now Agilent) has set the
world's standards in quality for decades.

   Either put up, or shut up.


-- 
Service to my country? Been there, Done that, and I've got my DD214 to
prove it.
Member of DAV #85.

Michael A. Terrell
Central Florida

Jason von Nieda wrote:
> 
> Hi all,
> 
>         I've got a Tek TDS-210 DSO that gave up on me last Sunday. I bought it
> on eBay for ~$700 2.5 years ago and it's worked great until Sunday. I
> was using it Saturday night and when I woke up Sunday and went to use it
> I get a blank display. The LCD backlight comes on but no display. I get
> a 5kHz wave from the probe comp connections according to my DMM.
> 
>         So, is this common? Anyone heard of it or have any ideas of what might
> be wrong. Tek wants $575 to repair and there's just no way I can do
> that. I'm guessing the display has just given up the ghost on me but
> where to find a replacement?


   Guessing is expensive. You need the manual, and do some
troubleshooting. You can buy a junker on Ebay and take your chances, or
check with other repair centers. I know Gerry Dorrin, the owner of MDS
labs in Ft Walton Beach, Fl. but it has been over ten years since I
visited his lab. When I did, I was impressed, and that isn't easy to
do.  That model is obsolete, so Tektronix will only support it, till
they run out of spare modules.


-- 
Service to my country? Been there, Done that, and I've got my DD214 to
prove it.
Member of DAV #85.

Michael A. Terrell
Central Florida

"Michael A. Terrell" <mike.terrell@earthlink.net> wrote in message 
news:45BF448F.D618C786@earthlink.net...
> Jon Slaughter wrote:
>>
>> I would do that either. Probably just a bad resistor or something very
>> simple and they'll charge you 500$ to replace a 2c component. Its 
>> outrageous
>> how companies gouge people now days and specially when they tend to do a
>> piss pour job.
>
>
>   You have never dealt with Tektronix, have you?  Some of these scopes
> are near EOL, and are repaired by replacing modules, then the item is
> calibrated to NIST traceable standards.  You are quick to condemn
> everyone, yet you don't know enough to do the work for yourself.  The
> scope still sells for around $1000, it is a dual channel 60 MHz digital
> storage scope.  How do you propose to find that "bad resistor or
> something very simple"?  Do you have any idea of the costs involved in
> running a meteorology lab?  Don't the employees deserve a living wage?
> Do you want to wait months, or years while they order parts, or do you
> prefer them to invest in an inventory that covers most of their needs?
> Grow up, and look at the real world.
>
>   As far as workmanship, Tektronix and HP (now Agilent) has set the
> world's standards in quality for decades.
>
>   Either put up, or shut up.
>

yeah right.  How many times have you been proven wrong already?  Anyways I'm 
sure a low level Tek techie and your afraid you my loose your bonus if it 
got out that they were overcharging.

I guess you really except me to believe that Tek is any different from the 
rest of the corporate scam artists.

Its amazing you are so guillible and ignorant.

Its funny how you say that they still sell them for aroudn 1000$ yet they 
want to charge 1/2x the price to "fix" it.

I guess when you go to the car repair shop and they tell you that it will 
cost you 2000$ to repair your 1980 toyota celica then you happily hand over 
the money with no questions? You didn't even have the balls to look under 
the hood to see whats wrong? When in fact all they did was clean the 
carburetor and change a spark plug. Not only that, they had some lacky with 
an education similar to yours do the job. He probably cross-threaded the 
spark-plugs so good luck next time.

Moron.

"Michael A. Terrell" <mike.terrell@earthlink.net> wrote in message 
news:45BF448F.D618C786@earthlink.net...
> Jon Slaughter wrote:
>>
>> I would do that either. Probably just a bad resistor or something very
>> simple and they'll charge you 500$ to replace a 2c component. Its 
>> outrageous
>> how companies gouge people now days and specially when they tend to do a
>> piss pour job.
>
>
>   You have never dealt with Tektronix, have you?  Some of these scopes
> are near EOL, and are repaired by replacing modules, then the item is
> calibrated to NIST traceable standards.  You are quick to condemn
> everyone, yet you don't know enough to do the work for yourself.  The
> scope still sells for around $1000, it is a dual channel 60 MHz digital
> storage scope.  How do you propose to find that "bad resistor or
> something very simple"?  Do you have any idea of the costs involved in
> running a meteorology lab?  Don't the employees deserve a living wage?
> Do you want to wait months, or years while they order parts, or do you
> prefer them to invest in an inventory that covers most of their needs?
> Grow up, and look at the real world.
>
>   As far as workmanship, Tektronix and HP (now Agilent) has set the
> world's standards in quality for decades.
>
>   Either put up, or shut up.
>

Ok. How bout this. I'm sure the logic will escape you but here goes. Why are 
they quoting 1/2 the price of the unit when they have no idea what is wrong 
with it? Do they know something that everyone else doesn't?  Are they going 
to charge the same price even if it only takes 5 mins to fix? Aren't these 
the guys that created the unit? If there really are so great then won't it 
only take them a few mins to diagnose the problem?  If they work on by using 
spare parts for it then wouldn't they be happy to support the customer and 
to get rid of there junk?  After all a happy customer is a happy customer. 
Hell, they built the fucker so they would be able to diagnost the thing 
pretty well even if it is difficult you would thing they would respect there 
customer base(someone brought the thing and it doesn't matter who if the 
wear on it was normative).

The fact of the matter is that all Tek is doing is gouging because they do 
not want to repair these products. They overprice it for those idiots(like 
you) that believe they really care about your wallet. They could charge 10k$ 
a minute and get some fish. By overcharging they keep the approximately the 
same profit without doing nearly as much work. They do this on purpose 
becuase they have better things to do than repair a bunch of there POS 
equipment. I guess you think they rather be repairing old used equipment 
where they probably make 300$/h instead of reparing the more advanced 
equipment where they can charge 1000$/h?  Even though its probably 5x harder 
to harder repair the more advanced equipment. The prices are not 
proportional. They overcharge on the stuff they do not want to do but will 
do it if the price is right(and they get to set that price).

Anyways, I'm sure these basic laws of economics escapes your large brain. 
Actually, my only guess is that you own stock in Tek. What was there profit 
last quarter?

Michael A. Terrell wrote:
>    Guessing is expensive. You need the manual, and do some
> troubleshooting. You can buy a junker on Ebay and take your chances, or
> check with other repair centers. I know Gerry Dorrin, the owner of MDS
> labs in Ft Walton Beach, Fl. but it has been over ten years since I
> visited his lab. When I did, I was impressed, and that isn't easy to
> do.  That model is obsolete, so Tektronix will only support it, till
> they run out of spare modules.

Hi Michael,

	I do have the service manual, but unfortunately the details are pretty 
slim for this scope. They claim that they only do module level repair on 
it. I checked all the test points for the power supply and they all seem 
legit. I couldn't check the backlight voltage cause my DMM doesn't go 
that high, but the backlight lights so I think it's alright :)
Unfortunately after that in the manual they just say to start swapping 
modules.
If I had another scope I might be able to probe some of the display 
lines and decide if the display or mainboard is dead, but no extra scope.

Thanks,
Jason

Jason von Nieda wrote:
> Hi all,
> 
>     I've got a Tek TDS-210 DSO that gave up on me last Sunday. I bought 
> it on eBay for ~$700 2.5 years ago and it's worked great until Sunday. I 
> was using it Saturday night and when I woke up Sunday and went to use it 
> I get a blank display. The LCD backlight comes on but no display. I get 
> a 5kHz wave from the probe comp connections according to my DMM.
> 
>     So, is this common? Anyone heard of it or have any ideas of what 
> might be wrong. Tek wants $575 to repair and there's just no way I can 
> do that. I'm guessing the display has just given up the ghost on me but 
> where to find a replacement?
> 
> Thanks,
> Jason

I don't know the TDS-210, but someone here
http://tech.groups.yahoo.com/group/TekScopes/
almost certainly does.

Ed