Review and Teardown of the Mastech MS8268 Multimeter

[@mohammedpakhter9400]

I have a MS8229 model. Today after several years of purchase and being put away in storage, I needed to change the battery. Tragically, the unit did not power up, saw this video, opened the unit and found out that the spring had some salt from the old battery blocking the current. Cleaned it up and put it back together. The unit did turn ON. Great. Thanks for posting this video.

[@tcmtech7515]

I for one own a Mastech MS8265 multimeter and I have run it for years in working environments most people wont run their high dollar fluke meters in and I have never once had reason to not trust it. It's been ran against every fluke snobs meter in real life on the job testing and it has never came up short on any challenge. If anything the fact that a single $70 Mastech can do the job and functions that take 3 - 4 different flukes costing over $1000 combined and match them all within their rated specs in head to head testing says a lot! The thing is handheld multimeters are not designed or intended for and were never intended for high precision high accuracy laboratory work. They are designed for day to day general work regardless of what professional environment a typical person works in. Which means when you are using one to test a 120 vAC line to see if it has power and is within the typical +- 10% of nominal line voltage if it says 119.8VAC Vs 120 VAC +-10% it's frigging close enough to know where the circuit is powered up and within range or not which is all any typical electrical contractor or general hobbyist needs to know. Now as for this clowns comments on things . At ~ 8 minutes in he whines about the continuity not latching. What the fuck? You don't want a meter that ignores a loose/weak connection when doing a continuity test Anyone who understands what a continuity test is knows that you want a meter that will pick up an any degree of weak connections not ignore them. As for the fuse. If you are sticking your meter into a live power source with that level of current to destroy any type of ceramic fuse plus blow the meter to bits you're too god damn dangerously dumb to be working on such electrical systems. Like posking the leads into a 480 VAC multi hundred amp service while still having the meter setup for current testing and not voltage. Now for true RMS, Again unless your doing application specific work where you have non sinusoidal based waveforms and not common electrical AC power system testing it's not that big of concern. If your power system waveforms are that far off from being a sine wave you have far worse issues to deal with than how accurate a handheld multimeter is that will require far more application specific testing gear like power line frequency spectrum analyzers and an oscilloscope at minimal. The rest of the review just makes me shake my head at the overall bias and ignorance. Too much of it's just regurgitating largely irrelevant common keywords and phrases that most people who know very little about electrical and general testing work use to sound smart and credible even when they aren't. A- Multimeters D- review.

[@robc8468]

Fluke has real high voltage safety most people would not see a difference unless something bad happens in a high energy circuits that is the risk.

[@cr76802]

I'll I've noticed that about people with fluke meters.. lol I love my mastech definitely holds its own in industrial applications.

[@Cagmito125sportsbikespares]

he just showed you why the shit fuse protection watch arc flash videos and go industrial with this , and when you say fluke snobs YOUR doing exactly the same thing i can do what you do but without a fluke snobs .

[@dthtr1]

I have a MS8268 , the only thing that annoys me is the DC V scale which values jump a lot. Besides that it performs well and looks very solid . Good multimeter , happy with it.

[@rpasche]

This video helped me fix my MS8268 that wouldn’t turn on. Turns out some battery acid leaked down and corroded a spring that provides power to the board. Thanks for showing how to take it apart.

[@DrLumpyDMus]

Do you think this meter would be ok for building a space shuttle and working on 10kv primary supply lines? If not, I guess I could use it to keep virtually everything running in my car, boat, RV, ranch, blow up doll, lawn mower, margarita blender. Thanks - Lumpy

[@jerimymccray]

I've actually used a Mastech MS8264 for work up to 480v. Its pretty reliable actually and I've been using it for a year. Their are some stability issues, but it's always less that .01%. For example 6v on a fluke will read between between 6v and 5.994v on the Mastech. These are fine for automotive, and Residential application, and even some industrial applications if you are a competent technician.

[@willyrivero470]

That Mastech actually looks very well built and for a good price. In reality I don't find very smart to test in danger environments even if the meter says it can hold it. That meter looks excellent for general uses.

[@neptunevibe]

I own this thing and a few UNI-T .. they are very precise. Ai compared them against Ambrobe and Flukes. They have the same margin of error like the expensive ones. Don't pay for brand pay for what's fair, and this is very fair.

[@FinalVertex]

where is the "review" part?

[@mackmurr]

Appreciate the breakdown and analysis - sorry I didn't see your (and other) videos prior to purchase. Amazing what you can find on KZbin.

[@yambo59]

I have one of these meters, its been better than expected. To improve the continuity beep on these cheap meters its a good idea to give the probe tips a good cleaning with alcohol and fine steel wool - made a night and day diffrerence in the performance of mine, works much better. I dont know what kind of invisible coating is on these cheap probe tips but it needs to be cleaned off. If all else fails try a nice set of gold plated Probemaster leads, they can make even a cheap meter perform like a more expensive one (sometimes).

[@pedroc6823]

For the price it’s worth it. For the average hobbies it’s perfect. My Honda Accord is Cheap compared to my Friends top of the line BMW also. I ordered this Mastech unit as a travel mm on my motorcycle. I also have a Uni-t 139c that I use at home for basic car , home and car audio stuff. I have seen several reviews and tests destroying these meters for the sake of testing and it clearly says the specs on the manuals. If you make a living at it I can see getting a high end Fluke or like it. Over kill for me.

[@haylspa]

you should just get rid of it if you are going to mock it the whole time without using those functions! these are actually really good multimeters especially for the price! they also make multimeters for other companies

[@Copozeras]

Mastech makes the best quality low priced multimeters!

[@mafaldawu435]

Hello, are u sales Mastech meter?

[@xmenken1]

I would say if you got enough money, go buy a Fluke 289 or Brymen 869s. Otherwise Mastech and Aneng are fine.

[@dsayars1001]

Thanks. I left mine out in the rain and in took in a lot of water and stopped working, no surprise, I ruined a digital camera and an electronic welder's helmet this way, one dousing and that was that. But I thought I'd give the Mastech a chance if I could figure out had to get it apart to dry it, and here's where your review came in. I had no idea the boot was a boot, partly because over time it had gotten stuck on as if glued there. A LOT of water had gotten in, good news is that after a good drying it works fine. I got it to replace a Fluke I'd used and abused for years and almost certainly left out in the rain occasionally ( I use these a lot for car work), with no ill effects. The Mastech not only doesn't like the rain, it doesn't like bright sun, either: the LCD blackens, though it recovers in the shade. Apart from these outdoor issues and the Fluke being more solid and compact, I have no complaints about the Mastech as a replacement that's also cheap to replace if it comes to that.

[@alfianprasetya5675]

What is the screen protector made of the multimeter? plastic or glass?

[@seangannon193]

its a lot better quality than most DMM ive used for the money its fine. think this guys expecting far to much from such a meter

[@makersdigest4752]

I have owned one of these for several years. A lot of use and abuse and still kicking. Decent meter for $30.00.

[@jamesdavies686]

What were the markings on the main chipset, I couldn't quite tell. I love to research the chips they use, especially when they aren't blobs.

[@edicksongonzalez4187]

Hi I have the mastch ms8268 and I had a novelty, I was measuring the frequency of a transistor driver of a tv, but I forgot to change it for continuous voltage and measured the collector of the horizontal transistor and that made a short and now the multimeter does not want Measure FREQUENCY IN CONTINUOUS VOLTAGE. What do you think happened

[@ilike600baud]

Just a side note... I know Dave Jones calls it a "tilting bail", but I prefer to use the term "tilt stand" as this is more widely used, and easily understood.

[@mgl_international_group]

Thanks for the video! MASTECH will launch new products soon. Stay tuned and follow our progress!

[@johnmiller9219]

what mm you recommend (under $100)? i need a max range of 1000v

[@therealb888]

which screwdriver is that? is it ratcheting?

[@jrose92081]

I picked one of these up used on eBay for three dollars. I mostly do consumer electronics repair and tube amplifier builds. I took it apart and it’s a 2018 and looks basically the same but has four trim pots located up by the top spring that are labeled VR1 through VR4? A very good vintage amp repair tech on KZbin by the name of Uncle Doug swears by these and has two of them.

[@fakeapplestore4710]

how can I measure a transistor with this?

[@spamcan9208]

@ 7:30 I literally said out loud "what the fuck is this guy doing?" I can't take a review seriously if someone tries to start a camp fire with their test leads. It ain't flint steel bro.

[@musashikaneko5651]

Mark, you were wrong about the sketchy HRC fuses not having sand in them. I found a fuse with the same details as in the video, and indeed it had white sand in it. I only opened 1 fuse so you might be right. I really enjoyed the video so keep up the work!

[@alecjahn]

Thanks for doing a teardown on top of your review. I'm considering one of these as a nice cheap low-voltage meter. I think for the price this looks good enough for me and as long as it is decently accurate it'll be just fine for my needs. I like that it has trimpots on the back so that... theoretically... I could calibrate it... maybe.

[@TheUbuntuGuy]

+alecjahn To be honest I grew to like it quite quickly. I use it as my primary low voltage meter now. It's actually pretty accurate as far as I can tell (it has more digits than my other meter so I can't do a really good comparison).

[@alecjahn]

+Mark Furneaux and thanks for the update! I think I'll order one the next time I get paid (spent a little too much on toys/projects this month... whoops!)

[@STomo30]

Possibly the best meter for a hobbiest, and priced amazingly - and this guy is so negative about it. I'm glad you clarified that we shouldn't use this $35 meter on industrial electronics 🙄 Great detailed vid though.

[@AnandaJa]

Thank you for the video. I took my meter apart today with the hope that my mega mistake might be remedied by doing a visual inspection and finding mechanical or other obvious problem. I connected my meter to a neon lighting system today in the range of 15,000 volts. I didn't pay attention to the limits written on the meter- not a bright move ;o(. All that has failed is the AC ranging function. AC voltage measurements are in 'left field' now. Do you suppose I blew the input detection chip you discussed. Is this meter e-waste now? Thank you so much for your great support!!!

[@firstnamelastname7476]

your tone comes across as a bit derisive and arrogant to me from the get-go. almost seems like you avoid pointing out something nice because you're afraid of getting nerd mobbed for 'slumming it'. there were some good points and good visual coverage and photography which I appreciated very much.

[@pepzi_]

Thanks for the review and teardown! I have a very shitty DMM, and saw Afrotechmods recommending this on his Amazon list and did a search and found your channel! Subscribed :)

[@jeffdieringer1]

I can sum up his review thusly: "It's a pretty great VMM for what it's intended for and a great value". Geesh, who in their right mind is going to use it on big industrial equipment?

[@timsaxon822]

I read some reviews on Amazon about how this thing basically dies after 6mo or so(there were a few) and a lot of the negative reviews talk about how its difficult to get accurate readings after a while. What has been your experience in the past few months with it? It's only $23 on Amazon right now, but I still don't want to have to replace it anytime soon once I buy it.

[@TheUbuntuGuy]

+Tim Saxon So far I haven't had any problems with it (and I use it exclusively). It is possible that those that experienced problems after some time are using the meter on class 2 or 3 circuits. Since the meter has no input protection, the chip might be getting fried by voltage spikes. I only use mine for low voltage DC stuff where high voltage transients don't really occur, but this is just a guess. As for accuracy, I haven't had any odd readings yet, but then again if you really need a truly trustworthy meter, you should probably buy something from a real trusted company.

[@iralperman247]

Mine is 5 years old. Still accurate and calibrated - just as the first day I used it.

[@sosacebren9799]

Good attention to detail, appreciate the review

[@therider3939]

Between that and the uni-t 139b what is the better one?

[@Michael_Michaels]

Where did you buy that multimeter?

[@xmenken1]

Thank you for your uploads of MS8268. I have a Mastech multimeter of similar model which has IR temp function. It was sold for USD70 in eBay. It is a product for people with low income. Now I know it has no input protection circuitry because of this video. I will be careful when I use it next time.

[@PauloConstantino167]

I think you sound a bit dismissive, arrogant and unpleasant. I don't think this is a good attitude at all. Learn to show some respect for other's work.

[@iralperman247]

Totally agree. This guy has a snooty attitude that comes from willful ignorance. How many times does he say "I'm not even going to try to test this....('cause I know what to expect from a $30 DMM)"?

[@gordselectronicshobby3853]

@@iralperman247 He gets that snotty attitude from watching and trying to be like that guy from Kangaroo Country.

[@davidprice2861]

The word is detents, good review. Dave Jones says indent too. (you indent a paragraph or sentence). Seems a reasonable meter to me. I like the warning for incorrect probe connection.

[@neptunevibe]

11:30 Sounds a good fuse to me. Professional enough. If the wire is well calibrated I don't see any problem with that. No of course it will never explode. At 10 Amps? Dude you are an amateur. Explode :))) What an exaggeration. It will burn in a place and break the circuit. If you don't like it buy a sand filled crappy fuse.

[@rosskrause3926]

Thats right.. I love mine..had it 4 years and it does what I need it to do everytime,and damn good on battery life.

[@captiansparkles8139]

Just bought one! Does anyone recommend or has changing the fuse in their mastech for a sand filled safer one?

[@igrewold]

Thanks for the review dude. I hope people understand that not everybody is a NASA Engineer thus there is really no need for a Fluke! These DMMs are suitable for hobbyists & DIYers. There is also the UNI-T brand which you can hook up with a computer using open source software: sigrok.org/wiki/UNI-T_UT61D

[@peckelhaze6934]

There is writing on the end cap of the fuse.

[@milandadasovic4657]

and i would like to see an exploding fuse!!!

[@geezer4444]

remember one thing YOU BOUGHT IT it wasnt given to you so why be so critical ? it works for many people who cant afford a fluke or need one

[@frankoo2]

Can you get a better fuse/

[@TheUbuntuGuy]

+Francisco Flores Of course. It's just a 10A HRC ceramic fuse.

[@frankoo2]

Thanks

[@gaudencioalcivar1642]

I like the way he criticized his gift :)

[@blatz4306]

"I don't care about accuracy, they're not that important" Ok.

[@Cheese_1337]

Blatz430 Yeah. The thing is he doesn't care about meter's accuracy but he whines about its build quality.

[@gordselectronicshobby3853]

The meter does have input protection. You just don't know where and what the protection parts are.

[@Ottonic6]

WTF you want for $30.00. You keep talking how cheap it is.

[@tasoulman]

The package is from another model, MS8261

[@saroroot7535]

Many thanks for the review. Keep up the good work!

[@farmerwayne1404]

This thing claims to "do everything ". ( But I don't even know what these things are). And all that b.s.! Try knowing what your talking about before you do a review.

[@LennyCooke636]

Very good review, I was wondering how far my hard-earned 25 bucks would take me.

[@cekpi7]

hahahahaahahah same here, ordered it today

[@glynnetolar4423]

That's helpful. Thanks.

[@nickhudson9344]

useful youtube review!

[@OriginalUsername9000]

Very informative review, quite Dave Jones-ish but without shitting on people who can't afford a 200$ fluke meter for basic hobbyist uses.

[@RainerK.]

Slightly less pre-based, but not much.

[@dewoody76]

Read reviews of Mastech meters before you buy. Features quit after about 6 months and the company is non-responsive.

[@bhoot1702]

I have measured voltage amp everything. I never came across measuring very high voltage like say more than 250. No problems till now

[@jazzochannel]

"I don't even care what this is". Google... How many employees are working in Mastech Digital? Mastech Digital employs 501 to 1,000 employees in India.

[@saviofonseca5210]

tenho um alicate amperimetro mastech ms 2109a muito tempo de uso testes ate agora muito bom.

[@mandankadarshil863]

👍

[@mandankadarshil863]

Roboting my multimeter is multimeter is Voltas the voltage is memory t m the futures is next technology the robot technology in the my register is my value is my multimeter se royal touch this is the DC current in the my multimeter is electronic

[@mandankadarshil863]

My my my field is Unix in the robot programming in the drone the drowned in the motor refine mobile

[@mandankadarshil863]

Channel is electronic in the drone room is kept is capacitor is

[@rlinwood2478]

Thanks for the effort in making this video. I appreciate your effort. w0ui

[@subigirlawd_7307]

I just got one ☺

[@cuahangngoc507nhattao6]

I sales mastech mutilmeter in vietnam :) thanks bro

[@gregoryyaden]

you are very condescending in your delivery.

[@robc8468]

Look under the fuse holder it says 10A 250 volts! If I owned this meter I would keep any voltage measurements to 125 volts or less for personal safety. Otherwise looks ok enough for the money for a homeowner willing to stay away from 220 or more volts.

[@Javeed821]

I have mastech MAS830L

[@XChaoticComposerX]

if you dont know anything, how could you review it. you just keep saying this is bad... this is cheap... this is shitty... then why you bought it. go buy yourself a fluke. go... i dare you...

[@nor4277]

Cant buy the better sand filled fuse

[@mandankadarshil863]

Mai aap ki janm ko dhanyvad

[@mandankadarshil863]

Hiii

[@stacbond3362]

Хороший прибор от фирмы Mastech,имею такой же прибор !