Use for DMM square wave output

[Stuey]

Hi all,

I've just bought a cheap tiny DMM to throw in my car tool box, and it has a 50 Hz square wave output.

What are the uses for this?

Thanks

Stuey

[Frank Berry]

How odd.
I've seen DMM's with frequency readouts but never one with a squarewave oscillator.
Who made it? Model number?

[Stuey]

It's a real cheapy - a UNI-T UT20B.

I bought it simply because of its tiny size and price - it's about 3" x1.5" and weighs 100g with battery and was a mere $9 - including the battery!

I have another couple of better meters but they are a bit unweildy to keep in a gereral purpose tool box.

I actually found on the web some high end meters such as Agilent's with this feature, but no explanation of what it's for. I also found some suggestions that it's for logic testing, but that's well out of my sphere of knowledge. Yet another site speculated about it being to test audio amplifiers.

Thanks

Stuey

[Eva]

Basic transformer testing, basic inductor and capacitor testing, logic testing...

[star882]

In my ENGR 111 class, the meters supplied had a very simple signal generator. (Of course, I brought my own meter since I knew they aren't going to have any good stuff in that class.) It was fixed at about 55Hz and I don't think it would be very stable.

About the only real application I can think of is simple go/no go audio equipment testing. Even a simple 555-based signal generator is much more useful for real testing.