I’ve just looked around in my lab and counted a total of 16 bench multimeters – and there are some more in the cabinet. This is a collection that has built up over time, as bothering with handhelds in a lab has never been a tempting idea for me (of course I do have a couple of handhelds for field use though).
Regarding my bench DMM collection, none of these instruments is a Philips. I remember that for some reason they have never appeared that attractive and competitive – at least not for my requirements.
That said, you have clearly stated your requirements and having had a look at the datasheet, I cannot see a reason why a Philips 2525 would not be for you. Its accuracy seems rather low for 5.5 digits, but then again, high accuracy isn’t important for your applications anyway. On the other hand it has some great features like the 1µA and 10µA current ranges and the low burden voltage in general. But as stated before, I have absolutely no experience with Philips DMMs, and given the age of these instruments, they might be unreliable and in need of repair (with some obsolete and hard to source parts) by now.
For your requirements, a 4.5 digit meter would be all you need. 20000 counts has been the standard for lab meters (without special requirements) for many decades. In my collection, there are the Fluke 45, HP3466A and Tektronix DM2510 that belong in this category. All these are very nice meters, but…
The Fluke 45 is fairly modern and reliable, but a bit expensive on the used market for what it is, at least in Europe.
The HP3466A is much cheaper, but it’s rather old and most of them got unreliable by now (mainly because of the mechanical switches), so I cannot recommend it anymore.
The Tektronix DM2510 is fairly modern and reliable just like the Fluke 45, but it is very hard to find and because of this, prices are sometimes a little on the high side.
So even though all three meters would fit your budget, they are either hard to find (at least at a reasonable price) or unreliable, so I would not recommend them unless you can actually find a great deal on either the Fluke or the Tektronix.
As I said before, the Philips looks nice if the price is right, but I cannot comment on the reliability.
The problem with older 5.5 or even 6.5 digit DMMs is that they usually lack decent current ranges – and this would be something really useful (if not even essential) for your tasks. If it weren’t for that, and your requirements would be very different and just call for exceptional accuracy and stability, then I might have recommended a Fluke 8840A or even a Keithley 2000 or 2015 THD. But all these meters won’t fit the bill when it comes to current ranges. One has to be particularly cautious when purchasing a used Fluke 8840A, because True RMS AC measurements are an option and advertisements for used instruments often don’t clearly state which options are fitted. IEEE488 is also an option by the way.
I don’t have experience with the Rigol DM3058E and from the datasheet it would fit the bill, but from the comments I’ve read here in the forum, it doesn’t appear to be that great. At one point I made my department at work purchase a couple Rigol DM3068, as I figured they would be okay for our needs – and they certainly are, but then wasn’t overly impressed when I personally evaluated them. After that, I abandoned the idea to get one of these meters for my personal lab – because my requirements are quite obviously different from yours and also from the requirements at work. But that’s only a side note, as this meter is not within your budget anyway.
From the datasheet, the Siglent SDM3045X looks like a good fit for your needs and is very similar to the Rigol DM3058 - except for the resolution, which is 60000 Siglent vs. 200000 Rigol). In any case it’s a bit cheaper and has the fancier display for sure. But then again, I have no personal experience with Siglent DMMs either.