Introduction to the 7000-Series Oscilloscopes

In August of 1969, Tektronix issued a supplement catalog featuring a new series of instruments, called the 7000 Series.

Howard Vollum himself wrote the introduction message on page 1 of this supplement, where he presented the 7000 series as a replacement to the 500 scope series, emphasizing the necessity to switch to a new platform for modular high-end scopes due to the limitations of the original 500 series platform designed in 1953.

According to Vollum, a significant portion of the previous two years' $28 million engineering budget (~250m in 2023 dollars!) were spent to develop the initial components and products of the 7000 series.

The initial family introduction in 1969 consisted of the 90 MHz 7504 and 150 MHz 7704 mainframes, and no less than 13 plug-ins − the 7A11 FET-probe amplifier, 7A12 dual-channel amplifier, 7A13 differential comparator, 7A14 current-probe amplifier, 7A16 singles-channel amplifier, 7A22 differential amplifier, 7B51 and 7B70 delaying timebases, 7B50 and 7B70 delayed timebases, 7S11/7T11 sampling system, and the 7M11 delay line.

While the original 7504 and 7704 mainframes were short-lived, the series lasted until the early 1990s, with some of the original plug-ins like the 7A22 or the 7S11 remaining in production throughout.

Common features of 7000-series scopes

• Designed for plug-ins for flexibility. The last digit of the scope designation refers to the total number of plug-in bays.
• One (7912) or two (all other 7000) vertical plug-in bays
• Zero (7612D), one (7xx3, 7912) or two (7xx4) horizontal plug-in bays
• Horizontal and vertical plug-ins can be used in bays of the other type, e.g. an amplifier in a timebase bay can be used for X-Y display
• On screen readout controlled from plug-ins including probe scaling
• Differential, calibrated 50 Ω signal and trigger connections from plug-in to backplane

Meaning of the type numbers

• first digit − series
  • 7000
• second digit − bandwith
  • 3: 25 MHz
  • 4: 65 MHz
  • 5: 90/100 MHz
  • 6: 100 MHz
  • 7: 150/200 MHz
  • 8: 400 MHz
  • 9: 500 MHz
  • 1: 1000 MHz
• third digit − CRT type / storage
  • 0: no storage
  • 1: variable-persistence (7514: bistable) storage
  • 2: multi-mode analog storage
  • 3: fast multi-mode analog storage
  • 4: dual-beam
  • 5: digital storage
• fourth digit − number of bays

Prefix R: Rack-mount version

Suffix A or B: later variant

Suffix N: no readout

7000 series functional color code

Display Mode Selection

Trigger Source or Control

Uncalibrated Variable

Denotes functional relation

Caution

Exclusive funktion

Links

• Scopes
• Plug-ins
• Readout system
• Backplane Interface
• 7000-series remote control connector
• List of 7000 series equipment
• Tektronix 7k Series Assemblies, compiled by Shannon Hill (PDF)
• Introduction to the 7000 Series Switching and Logic Circuits (Ken Parker, 1970) (PDF,OCR,1MB)
• Plug-in packaging
• Back-lit switches
• Soviet Clones
• Gianni Becattini's book dedicated to the 7000-Series
• How the design of the frontend was developed @ YouTube