Current Clamp Probes for DSO6014L

Looking for clamp-on current probes compatible with our surplus Agilent DSO6014L rack-mount scopes. Agilent makes a wide range of current clamp probes, but many use an ungainly external power supply to achieve sensitivity, others are not the right type or too cheap, leaving just a couple of good candidates.

The basic probe is this 100MHz 15A range model. It is compatible with a wide range of Agilent oscilloscopes including ours. It has contacts for Agilent's proprietary "auto probe" system, which seems great except I later noticed that our 6014L's seem to be an antique revision that don't have the contacts so I'm not sure how this probe feature will work for us. The datasheet avoids revealing the probe's sensitivity as far as I can tell, but the range is about right for what we need it for. At $3.8K it's pretty expensive. http://www.keysight.com/en/pd-1912832-pn-N2893A/100-mhz-15a-ac-dc-current-probe

Agilent apparently makes a cheaper version of the 100MHz probe which is apparently only sensitive up to 50MHz which still isn't too bad. It's only $2.4K. http://www.keysight.com/en/pd-2202912-pn-1147B/50-mhz-15a-ac-dc-current-probe

There is a series of Agilent clip-on current probes which go up to quite high current ranges, which we wouldn't need, but these are the ones that require the external power supply. The lowest range probe out of this series has a 15A range similar to the basic probe, and interestingly its datasheet reveals that the lowest DC current that it can measure is 5mA. http://www.keysight.com/en/pd-2029388-pn-N2783B/100-mhz-30-arms-ac-dc-current-probe

This probe is the equivalent 50 MHz probe with a single BNC connector and external power supply.http://www.keysight.com/en/pd-2029380-pn-N2782B/50-mhz-30-arms-ac-dc-current-probe

Here is the power supply module for these current probes. Oddly, it has three outputs, and even odder it has $1000 price tage: http://www.keysight.com/en/pd-1062115-pn-N2779A/power-supply-for-the-n2780-83a-b-current-probe

These probes seem to have great sensitivity, but reading a little closer reveals that they are actually inline shunt probes, not clamp-on: http://www.keysight.com/en/pd-2229629-pn-N2820A/3-mhz-50ua-high-sensitivity-ac-dc-current-probe-2-ch?pm=PL

Rohde&Schwartz makes current probes, but they're mostly for high current ranges and are also fantastically ugly! Here is the basic probe that's closest to Agilent's. Also their specs for the probe don't make much sense as it is rated in V/A which is impedance?: https://www.rohde-schwarz.com/us/product/rtzc15b-productstartpage_63493-158914.html

The cost for the Agilent current clamp probes was a little hard to bear, so looking into cheaper options, Agilent makes a 100kHz probe (with a k) that's a mere $600. But it apparently has terrible sensitivity specs. It also doesn't have the fancy "auto-probe" feature, which makes it basically generic: http://www.keysight.com/en/pd-2329609-pn-1146B/100-khz-100-a-4-current-probe?nid=-32553.1066112&cc=US&lc=eng

Similar to the Agilent cheap probe, BK precision. makes one with about the same specs and price.http://www.newark.com/b-k-precision/cp62/current-clamp-probe-ac-dc-100a/dp/08X6498

Here's the cross-reference of probe compatibility to oscilloscope modelhttp://literature.cdn.keysight.com/litweb/pdf/5968-8153EN.pdf

For some reason, here's a fancier catalog of probes, probably updated for newer scope lines: http://literature.cdn.keysight.com/litweb/pdf/5968-7141EN.pdf

Here is the online tool for comparing and contrasting probes. It doesn't seem to yield the same results as the documents, which calls its accuracy into question: http://www.keysight.com/en/pc-1000000101%3Aepsg%3Apgr/oscilloscope-probes?cc=US&lc=eng&pm=SC

One day I noticed that our surplus Agilent DSO6014L rack mount scope was lacking the "autoprobe" contacts that the basic current probes seemed to use. Clearly the current probe needs to be supplied with power to operate the sensor. So it seems that the basic current probe might not be compatible with the scope.

Interestingly, the photos of the DSO6014L in Keysight's catalog presently do show that it seems to have the autoprobe contacts. http://www.keysight.com/en/pdx-x202272-pn-DSO6014L/low-profile-oscilloscope-100-mhz-4-analog-channels

The datasheet for the DSO6014L has an answer buried deeply in the "Performance Characteristics: , where it says that the 500 MHz and 1 GHz models have "Auto probe sense and AutoProbe interface" but the 100MHz has just "Auto probe sense". Presumably this is not enough to support the N2893A and 1147B current probes. http://literature.cdn.keysight.com/litweb/pdf/5989-5470EN.pdf

interestingly, there exists a kit for adapting an auto-probe to a simple BNC scope using an adapter, as shown in this drawing, but it's a full $3000 of extra stuff, and supposedly this won't work for me anyhow because it's for 50 ohm impedance rather than 1M ohm: http://literature.cdn.keysight.com/litweb/pdf/E2696-92000.pdf

Here's more on the probe adapter: http://www.keysight.com/en/pd-155489-pn-N1022A/probe-adapter

DSO6014L User Manual

I am no longer happy about the spare Agilent DSO6014L rack mount scopes that we got surplus, and they seem to be a gigantic pain to use.

First off, you can't just plug a display and a mouse into one and just use it like a scope. You have to send it SCPI commands for configuration, either over GPIB, USB, or LAN.

Secondly, there doesn't seem to be an easy way to run the scope untriggered. I haven't tried doing the web-page control because I can't put mine on a LAN, at least not without a lot of work.

I hooked up the GPIB connector to my PXI chassis and the scope wasn't found. However that seems likely to have been due to the GPIB driver on my PXI CPU failing, as later on the power supply wasn't found either but was recovered when I rebooted the CPU. I was able to hook up using a USB cable which worked great. The scope was assigned a VISA address and I started playing with example VIs in Labview.

None of the VIs for the scope supported untriggered operation. In all examples, the steps consisted of opening, configuration of vertical and horizontal ranges, and taking either a single reading or repeadedly requesting single readings. In many cases if the readings were out of range or no trigger was found, the VIs returned errors or timeouts.

I began searching for the user manual for the scope, which was a long and fruitless search.

Support documents page for the scope. An unhelpful mix of white papers, 3D drawings, and FAQs. There is a "User's Guide" for the entire series of scopes which was a tiny bit of help. The programming guide seems like the most relevant document but I didn't have time to dig into the low-level SCPI commands.

This fact sheet clued me into the existence of the web browser interface: http://literature.cdn.keysight.com/litweb/pdf/5989-7200EN.pdf

This so-called Data Sheet was mostly an advertising brocure: http://literature.cdn.keysight.com/litweb/pdf/5989-5470EN.pdf

Here's the user guide for the 5000,6000, and 7000 series scopes. Has barely a mention of the 6000L series. I did learn that the 6000 series scope alone doesn't handle certain active probes. http://literature.cdn.keysight.com/litweb/pdf/54695-97026.pdf

The "What's included," both here and on the Newark website seems to indicate that a User Manual was shipped with the scope, and it wouldn't have been the one for the full 6000 series scope. But I can't find it. http://www.keysight.com/en/pdx-x202272-pn-DSO6014L/low-profile-oscilloscope-100-mhz-4-analog-channels

The User's Guide does mention that the 6000L series scope requires this GPIB extender, because apparently somebody forgot that a lot of GPIB cables come out sideways from the connector and somebody put a bulge in the case for a power supply right next to the GPIB connector on the back of the chassis. https://www.artisantg.com/TestMeasurement/63656-20/Keysight_Agilent_10834A_HP_IB_Adapter

Here's a link to a 6000 series-only manual, probably an earlier one than is presently available. It does mention that the web interface should allow operation of the 6000L just as if it were a full scope, so I need to give that a try: http://ridl.cfd.rit.edu/products/manuals/agilent/oscilloscopes/6000seriesmso.pdf