DT4282 - High End General Use DMM

An excellent meter for the electronics lab.

24 June 2017

I run an electronic service workshop and I generally use bench meters for their accuracy and stability. I was looking for a high accuracy and high resolution hand held meter for the workshop and had been deciding between offerings from Keysight and Fluke when by chance I happened across the Hioki DT4282. I had always admired Hioki's quality but had assumed that their multimeters were designed for electrical rather than electronic applications so I didn't actively look at their range. I was impressed with the spec of the DT4282 and decided to purchase one from Test Equipment Online. I have been testing and using the DT4282 heavily for the last week alongside Keysight's current top of the line U1282A, another 60,000 count meter. The Hioki DT4282 is a formidable meter indeed. The build quality is impeccable, it is the fastest hand held meter the I have ever seen, it handles dual display duties just as fast as single display and it auto-ranges in the blink of an eye. It settles almost instantly and holds a stable display. The test leads that are suppled with it are very flexible and the probes are gold plated. The continuity test response is the quickest that I have encountered in any meter and the entire backlight changes colour along with the continuity tone. The mechanical shutters across the current terminals are a nice addition, much better than a warning beep as found on other meters. There is no menu diving or setup menu, options are nicely listed on the inside of the tilting bale and are enable during turn-on by the use of button holds. I have tested the meter against a 6.5 digit Agilent 34401A bench meter and a recently calibrated 5.5 digit Rigol DM3058E and unsurprisingly all functions exceed their published accuracy spec. I believe that Hioki don't use the usual off-the-shelf multimeter chips that most high-end meters use, they have their own custom chip which may account for the exceptional speed of this meter. The included user manual is excellent and contains plenty of performance tables and data and is very clearly written. The display backlight is perfectly even and the display has good readability at all angles. It has been interesting putting the Hioki up against the Keysight U1282A. The Keysight is of course much more physically rugged as it is IP67 rated but I purchased this meter for lab use so that is not an issue for me. The Keysight has more configurability and some extra functions (pulse generator, remote voltage sensor, separate frequency counter input with higher bandwidth, longer battery life) but interestingly even though the Hioki does not have a separate frequency position and it reads frequency from the AC selector positions only I found that it was more useful as the Keysight's frequency input can only handle voltages up to 1.8Vp and the second (dual) display is larger on the Hioki and easier to read. The DT4282's continuity display is much better than that of the U1282A and it's "slow" reading feature is also superior to Keysight's "Smooth" mode which never seems to actually work. I also find that the ability to so easily switch the resistance threshold of the continuity buzzer and the diode test voltage on the DT4282 very nice, it is a very ergonomic control layout. Both of these meters are exceptional and both of them of course have construction befitting their cat III and cat IV safety ratings that you would expect from companies at the top of their game. I am very glad that I found this meter as it is a cut above the competition at the top end of the market for lab and electronics applications as far as smoothness, speed, ergonomics and confidence go. There are of course a few things that I would like to see improved on the meter, the most obvious is that once the meter goes into "auto off" mode it requires that the selector dial is rotated to the off position and turned back on which is inconvenient if you have a test lead plugged into a current input as you have to physically remove it so that the safety shutter can close as you dial past the voltage ranges on the way to the "off" position. Despite the smaller feature set of the DT4282 compared to the other meters in the top end range of the hand held market the Hioki DT4282 comes out on top for me as this meter feels as close as I have ever experienced to a bench meter in a hand held case. It has a superior finish, it looks and feels like a Japanese built product and it inspires confidence in it's readings. In a world where every Chinese built $100.00 meter is bristling with breathtaking features but is low in quality and reliability the DT4282 goes the other way, providing the essential feature set along with some nice innovations, a fast user interface, high reading confidence and a physical finish that only Japanese made equipment seems to attain. I have not tested the PC interface features of the DT4282 as yet as I haven't purchased the connection kit, that wil

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