[Test-Equipment] RF spectrum analysis

[David]

On Sun, 19 Jan 2014 21:52:47 -0500 (EST), you wrote:

>> What I'm mostly interested in is ham receiver design, building, and 
>> alignment. So, that would involve looking at the passbands of the tuned 
>> circuits associated with RF amplifiers, mixers, and IF stages, including 
>> crystal or other types of filters. Perhaps 1 kHz to 100 kHz wide at a center 
>> frequency of  around 2 mhz. Of course it would be nice to be able to look at 
>> RF amplifier circuits at up to 30 mHz, as it's the good old HF region that 
>> I'm interested in. 
>
>Doesn't it seem like this requirement can be met with a sweep generator and oscilloscope?
>
>Wayne
>WB4OGM

I have done this before but it is really only feasible if low accuracy is
acceptable.

The sweep generator should have a marker output if any frequency accuracy is
required but an alternative is to use an oscilloscope which has a gated timer
counter but that is a rare feature and offhand I do not know of any modern
oscilloscopes which support it.  The Tektronix 7000 series can and maybe the
2247A or the 2465 series with the right options can also.

Amplitude resolution will be good but the dynamic range will be terrible without
logarithmic scaling.