My 1252a has been functionally well since purchase but the rubberized coat on the chassis is falling all off. Not something you'd expect in a $400 DMM, but I bought it as a close out for $140.
The flaking rubber coating issue hasn't happened with mine thus far, but I do see your point, particularly when purchased at full price.
Unfortunately due to the general trend of reduced quality, I've become conditioned to reduce my expectations to some extent.
Doesn't mean I won't nitpick though (genuinely in hopes that enough similar comments could help turn things around).
But like you, I didn't pay full price for mine either (got a U1252B with a $100 rebate). Not as good a deal, but it was still cheaper than a Fluke 287, which was the other model I was looking at (wasn't all that aware of/confident in Brymen at the time). So I'm a bit more willing to accept it, should it happen.
Worst case, Agilent does sell the case parts for reasonable prices, and are actually the cheapest source I've found for fuses should you need them (in your case, I'm not sure the blue case parts are still available).
One thing definitely annoying about Agilent's choice of LCD on any model I have, is the contrast is not very high on reflected light whereas on the Fluke 80 series excel on it.
I've not really noticed this an issue on my bench. Outdoors in direct sunlight, I have (need to view it pretty much dead on). Can you reconfigure your lighting by chance (maybe use hoods or white nylon as a diffuser like you would for photography)?
IIRC,
mjlorton did something like this on his bench, and stated it helped.
Given some reports of Agilent's response to warranty and support on this forum, I hope they realize competition is very keen in the DMM market and for the cost of these meters, every nation should expect premier service and if not, there are other competitors worth considering. There isn't enough unique functionality in Agilent HH DMMs line to warrant spending much more except on the hope of quality assembly and aftermarket support.
I definitely agree. Without such comments (or willingness to pay attention to them), nothing will ever improve, and likely continue to get worse IMHO.
Regarding unique(ish) functionality, FWIW the U127x and U125x models are capable of 4 wire measurements (not sure about any of the others).
man, agilent is really becoming the company to avoid, if you don't have bottomless pockets and infinite wallet.
Thus far, it's just a couple of people with issues, so though we need to be vigilant with purchases (as per usual IMHO), I wouldn't go so far as to conclude the company has truly gone down the shitter. Users should be vocal about such things to help prevent this from actually occurring though, so I'm not saying ignore issues and blindly give them a pass.
I'd also say we need them to keep other companies competitive (not get complacent and churn out warmed over crap each release cycle), as there's not that many players remaining in the general scheme of things (genuinely make their gear, not rebrand).
As per OLED, just skip it. LCD works just fine, and has a good track record.
OLED technology is pretty unreliable, and I honestly don't understand why a company as Agilent went for an OLED display.
Pretty simple really, the Marketing folks love flashy stuff, and got their way.
The Agilent handheld DMM's have a few other quirky annoyances too. But in my opinion, OLED is dead. I don't think it's going to last much longer, but's that's just my opinion!
I'd like to see it go away in it's current state on T&M gear, but that's me.
As per OLED being dead, I'm not so sure. For big screens, it certainly looks that way, but for small screens (i.e. cell phones), it has a larger market that can pay for the R&D (seem to recall that some large OLED plants are being closed, while small screen plants will be expanded). Users are also less likely to notice it's current flaws due to how frequently they upgrade their phones (every couple of years or so?).