Back up and tell us the story.
Did the scope work previously...while in your posession?
Did you buy it broke?
Did the seller tell you it worked?
EBAY crap? I've heard stories where commercial dealers put all
the bad subassemblies in one unit and sold it (using a different
account) on ebay, "AS-IS, have no way to test it."
OK -
Yes, I am ashamed, I bought it over eBay just a week or two ago. No,
it wasn't tested, but it came with half a dozen probes and the
original manual and I got it all for $100 so I gambled and took a
chance. The A trigger slope knobs were bent a little and subsequently
locked together. It didn't take much to straighten things out though
and get them rotating freely again. Quick background on myself: I am a
mechanical engineer, very hands on and mechanically inclined, only
marginally so with electronics.
Before I did anything with the scope, I read the manual and set
everything the way the manual did to get what they call a "normal
display". To get this display of course, it needs to be hooked up to a
signal. I don't have one except for the wall outlet, and I didn't want
to use it at first, so I jumped to the probe compensation section so I
could use the calibrator. The only way I can get anything on the
display is with beamfinder. With beamfinder pressed, I can adjust
intensity, focus, vertical / horizontal, V/div, time scale, etc...
This is all true for both Chan 1 and 2. I was looking for a good
input, and thought that the wall outlet may be a bit much, so I looked
at the specs in the back of the manual and they say input AC voltage
limit is something way over 120V. Knowing that the impedence is also
very high, I decided that pulling out the scope plug enough to probe
the neutral prong would be safest, so I did that with nothing showing
up. I did this with a 10X probe. I also used this probe in the
compensation procedure first and know it works. As far I've learned so
far a 10X probe scales down the amplitude of a signal by a factor of
10, and the light indicator on the V/div dial did switch to the higher
setting as it's supposed to. I set the V/div and time scale nearest to
what I thought should show 1 or 2 cycles of a full wave form. I tried
both AC and DC. I adjusted the V/div and time scales to no avail.
Pressing beamfinder shows a trace, although I couldn't get it to stop
moving. I went back to probe compensation and saw the same results as
before, again only with beamfinder pressed.
It's the only scope I have, so I'm limited on diagnosing things. I
will try other lower power signals, but I need to find or set some up.
Thanks for all the help,
Chris P.