I ordered this meter directly through Brymen's agent in Taiwan, and a friend helped me bring it back to Hong Kong. Having owned its big brother, the BM-867, for a while I had high expectations of this little 6000-count meter. I'm happy to report that it has lived up to my expectations
Disclaimer: I will be offering a few of these for sale soon so this review may be biased.
Again, I'm no expect in these things so here I'm just trying to give a few basic observations. I've also attached a few pictures at the end of the post. Unfortunately I couldn't take it further apart without desoldering a few joints, which I was reluctant to do.
Pros:
1. Very compact. There's an attached picture below that shows how small it is compared to the 867.
2. Nice display with big and clear digits, with a nice orange backlight.
3. Excellent build quality, inside and out. Feels solid like a brick in the hand. Very tidy inside. There are a few jumper wires but I'm not too bothered. Besides, those are silicone insulated wire (i.e. high heat resistance) too!
4. Very accurate, based on my DMMcheck Plus and PentaRef anyway. The worst reading is only 0.065% out (spec'ed at 0.2%+3d tolerance). It reads 6.004V (right on the max of its 6000 count range) on my 6.0001V DC reference. All other DC voltages are either spot on or 1-2 digits out at the most. Resistance and current measurements are pretty much all spot on or 1 digit out, for its resolution. AC voltage is about 0.5% out, still well within its claimed 1%+5d tolerance.
5. Fast screen update rate at 5 times/sec on V and A ranges. Bar graph 40 times/sec max (according to manual).
6. "InErr" displayed with beeps when leads plugged into the current jacks with wrong range switch selection.
7. A or mA selected automatically based on which jack you put the plug in.
8. Fast continuity tester.
9. It remembers your last selection on multi-purpose ranges such as ohms/continuity/capacitance/diode, so the next time you turn the range switch there you are automatically back to your last measurement mode.
10. Offers a low input impedance voltage measurement mode.
11. Comes with a pair of very high quality silicone leads, with gold plated tips!
Cons:
1. Slow screen update rate on the ohms range, only about 2 times/sec.
2. Autoranging is also on the slow side with resistance measurement.
3. Doesn't measure temperature without the temp probes.
4. Only measures temperature down to one degree resolution, no decimal places.
5. A bit pricey for a 6000 count meter (more on this below).
6. Enabling the PC data logging isn't the most intuitive, I had to read the manual to find out. The "HOLD" button needs to be pressed while the meter is being switched on.
I have bought the optional USB interface kit too but didn't really spent much time playing with it yet so I can't make too many comments about it. All I can say is that it's rather straight forward to install and it works. One VERY nice thing I see on the software CD though, is that it actually carries all drivers and software for all the Brymen meters capable of data logging! Not only that, the coolest thing is that it also has PDF's of the communication protocols of all these meters, which means you can write your own software to talk to them if you need/want to!
Overall I think there's a lot to like and not much to dislike about this meter. In terms of price, you can find this meter rebadged as the Greenlee DM-510A in the U.S., for about $135 from Amazon. In Europe tme.eu is selling them for 85 Euros (before VAT and shipping).
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