Measure the whole impedance,
not just the face your DMM shows you.

1 · Mental model A DMM tells you a number. This tells you a vector.

A multimeter's capacitance function gives you one number and lets you assume the part is ideal. An LCR meter refuses that assumption. It measures impedance — a quantity with two parts, a resistive part and a reactive part — and only then computes the "capacitance" or "inductance" you asked for, plus a second number that tells you how much the real part deviates from the ideal one. Every button on the DE-5000 exists to choose which face of that vector you see.

1.1 · The impedance vector plane

The manual draws this exact picture to introduce the whole instrument. Resistance Rs runs along the real axis; reactance Xs runs along the imaginary axis. A part with positive reactance (inductive) plots above the real axis at a positive angle θ; a part with negative reactance (capacitive) plots below it at a negative angle θ₁. The vector's length is |Zs|, its angle is θ, and every measurement the DE-5000 reports is a projection of this one picture onto a display.

Sources: manual §II Measuring Principle Introduction, pp.4–7 (Impedance parameter introduction, Measurement mode, Open/short calibration).

2 · Prerequisite floor What this guide assumes, and what it doesn't

You don't need a physics degree to run this meter well. You need three ideas solid enough that you can lean on them without re-deriving them, and this guide will name every place it uses them.

2.1 · Self-check

• I can use V = IR and know what "resistance" physically resists.
• I know that reactance (from a capacitor or inductor) opposes current in a way that depends on frequency, and that it stores energy rather than burning it as heat.
• I can tell a series circuit from a parallel circuit by eye: series shares one current path, parallel splits current across branches.
• I'm comfortable with engineering notation — p / n / µ / m / k / M — as it appears on a capacitor or inductor's printed value.

Sources: manual §II (pp.4–7) supplies the formulas this floor leans on.

3 · Panel & display orientation Battery in, power on, and know what you're looking at

Fourteen keys, one dual-line LCD, and four input terminals. Before you measure anything, learn where the keys are and what the twenty-nine icons around the digits mean — the rest of this guide refers back to this map constantly.

3.1 · Battery and first power-on

The DE-5000 ships with a standard accessory set: the TL-21 alligator test lead case, an AC/DC adaptor, the TL-23 guard line, the user manual, and a 9 V battery (NEDA 1604 / JIS006P / IEC6F22 carbon-zinc or alkaline — alkaline recommended). To install or replace it: remove the tilt-stand, loosen the four screws on the battery cover with a suitable screwdriver, lift the cover, fit the battery observing polarity, and reverse the procedure.

1. Press POWER. Expect: every LCD segment and icon lights for two seconds — the manual's own display self-test — then the meter settles into its default state.
2. Read the default state. Expect: LCR Auto mode, test frequency 1 kHz. This is the meter's power-on default every time, not a mode you have to select.

3.2 · Front panel

Every key does one job in LCR Auto mode (measurement primitives) and often a second job once you leave it (SORTING/SETUP navigation). The diagram below follows the manual's own panel illustration and numbering.

3.3 · LCD icon map

The DE-5000's LCD carries thirty numbered icons around the two rows of digits. You don't need to memorize all of them — you'll absorb the ones you use constantly (Auto, LCR, the mode letters) in the first hour — but this table is the ground truth to check against when an icon you don't recognize appears.

Two special indication strings also appear in place of a number: OPEn during open calibration and Srt during short calibration (§4).

Sources: manual §III Panel Illustration (pp.8–10) and §III LCD Display Illustration (pp.11–12); §V Replacing Batteries (p.33).

4 · Calibration Open/short: cancelling the fixture so you measure the part, not the clips

Every measurement passes through a test fixture — sockets, leads, clips — and that fixture is not impedance-free. It adds a small series impedance and a small parallel admittance of its own, and at the extremes of the DE-5000's range those parasitics are not small relative to what you're trying to measure. CAL doesn't calibrate the DUT; it calibrates the fixture out of the picture.

4.1 · Why the fixture pollutes the reading

The manual models the measured impedance ZM as the true DUT impedance ZDUT in series with a fixture's series impedance, in parallel combination with the fixture's parallel admittance:

ZM = (Rs + jωLs) + [(Go + jωCo)⁻¹ ∥ ZDUT]

The open measurement captures the fixture's parallel admittance in isolation — with nothing connected, the current through ZDUT is zero and Y_OPEN = Go + jωCo is all that's left to measure. The short measurement captures the fixture's series impedance in isolation — with the leads shorted, Z_SHORT = Rs + jωLs is all that's left. With both known, the meter solves for the true DUT impedance on every subsequent measurement:

ZDUT = (ZM − Z_SHORT) / [1 − (ZM − Z_SHORT) · Y_OPEN]

4.2 · Running the calibration

1. Connect TL-21 to the meter's terminals, leaving the far end open. Hold CAL for 2 seconds. Expect: the display enters open-calibration mode, showing OPEn with a blinking ----.
2. Press CAL to start. Expect: a 30-second countdown runs (OPEn -30- counting down), then OPEn PASS or OPEn FAIL.
3. Press CAL again. Now short the TL-21 leads together. Expect: the display enters short-calibration mode, Srt ----.
4. Press CAL to start. Expect: another 30-second countdown (Srt -30-), then Srt PASS or Srt FAIL.
5. If both steps show PASS, press CAL one more time to store the calibration to EEPROM and return to measurement mode. Expect: the meter returns to the LCR Auto (or whichever) test screen; the calibration now applies to every subsequent reading until you calibrate again or the meter is reset.

4.3 · The guard line (TL-23)

"GUARD" is a separate terminal, wired to the meter's shield rather than one leg of the measurement. It provides a shield for the DUT, improvised test leads, or equipment sitting somewhere with high electrical interference. The manual's own note: test leads should be properly shielded to GUARD if necessary, especially at high or low impedance extremes where a small stray coupling is a large fraction of the signal.

4.4 · Decision matrix — when calibration is worth doing

Sources: manual §II Open/short calibration and Equivalent circuit (pp.6–7); §IV.2 CAL (pp.15–17); §III Panel Illustration guard-line note (p.8); §VII Electrical Specification note 2–3 (p.35).

5 · LCR AUTO & FREQ Letting the meter guess, and telling it not to

The LCR AUTO key does two jobs depending on mode: in its default state it auto-detects whether your DUT is an inductor, a capacitor, or a resistor and measures accordingly; press it again and it steps through manual single-parameter modes instead. FREQ decides at what frequency the meter's test signal probes the part — and for a real, lossy component, that choice changes the answer.

5.1 · How auto-detect decides L vs C vs R

Power on, and the meter is already in Auto-LCR mode at 1 kHz — the factory default. Each press of LCR AUTO cycles: Auto-LCR → Auto-L → Auto-C → Auto-R → Auto-DCR → back to Auto-LCR. In Auto-LCR, the meter measures the impedance, then classifies it using the quality factor:

Once Auto-L or Auto-C is selected, ranging is fully automatic. The primary display shows the L, C, or R value; the secondary display shows the paired quality/dissipation figure. The manual groups these pairs explicitly: (L + Q), (C + D), (R + θ). One footnote exception: when LCR Auto is active and the DUT's capacitance is under 5 pF, the secondary display substitutes the equivalent parallel resistance Rp for D — D becomes numerically unstable at such a small capacitance.

Manual (single-parameter) modes work differently: press LCR AUTO to step to Auto-L, Auto-C, Auto-R, or Auto-DCR directly, and the meter measures only that parameter without trying to classify the DUT first. Auto-R mode and DCR mode carry no secondary display at all — there's no D/Q/θ concept for a pure resistance measurement in the manual's model.

5.2 · FREQ and why frequency changes the answer

Press FREQ to cycle the test signal frequency: 1 kHz → 10 kHz → 100 kHz → 100 Hz → 120 Hz → back to 1 kHz. Default is 1 kHz. The LCR impedance scale ranges are based on the selected test frequency — this isn't cosmetic, it changes what range the meter auto-selects internally.

For an ideal capacitor, C would read identically at every frequency. Real capacitors don't, because their dielectric losses and parasitic inductance are themselves frequency-dependent. The manual's own worked example, sweeping FREQ on the same physical capacitor in Auto-LCR mode:

The same physical part reads 666.8 nF at 1 kHz and 646.6 nF at 100 kHz — a 3% swing — while D climbs from 0.003 at 100 Hz to 0.009 at 100 kHz, more than doubling. Neither number is "wrong." Both are honest measurements of a real, lossy capacitor at different frequencies. This is precisely why a capacitance reading without a stated test frequency is an incomplete spec.

Sources: manual §IV.3 LCR AUTO (pp.18–19, incl. footnotes *1–*3); §IV.4 Inductance/Capacitance/Resistance Measurement (pp.20–21); §IV.5 FREQ (pp.22–23).

6 · D / Q / ESR / θ Four faces of the same loss, and which one to trust for what

D, Q, ESR, and θ are not four different measurements — they're four different ways of reporting the identical resistive-to-reactive ratio from §1's vector. The D/Q/ESR/θ key just changes which face the secondary display shows. Which one you should be looking at depends on what question you're asking.

6.1 · Definitions, straight from the manual

Each press of D/Q/ESR/θ steps the secondary display: D → Q → ESR → θ → back to D. The manual's own worked example, all four readings taken on the identical DUT in Cs testing mode (1 kHz, Auto-LCR, primary reading held at Cs 666.8 nF throughout):

6.2 · Sub-display accuracy — how errors propagate from Z to D, ESR, and θ

The manual defines Ae as the impedance (Z) accuracy — the number from the resistance/capacitance/inductance tables in §11 — and derives every secondary parameter's own accuracy from it:

Q = 1/D          Rp = ESR × (1 + 1/D²)
D accuracy    De = ± Ae × (1 + D)
ESR accuracy  Re = ± ZM × Ae  (Ω)      where ZM = impedance calculated as 1/(2πfC) or 2πfL
Phase angle   θe = ± (180/π) × Ae  (deg)

The practical upshot: D and θ accuracy both degrade as the base impedance accuracy degrades — the same ranges marked * in §11's tables (worth calibrating for) also carry the least trustworthy secondary-parameter readings.

6.3 · Decision matrix — which secondary parameter to read

Sources: manual §II Measuring Principle Introduction, Q/D relationships (p.6); §IV.9 D/Q/ESR/θ (pp.27–28); §VII Electrical Specification, Sub-display parameters accuracy (p.36).

7 · SER/PAL Two descriptions of one impedance, and a 100 kΩ rule for choosing

§1 introduced series and parallel as two mathematically equivalent descriptions of the same impedance. This section is about the practical question: which description does the DE-5000 pick for you, and when should you override it.

7.1 · The two equivalent circuits

In series form, the DUT is modeled as a resistance and a reactance in series: Z = Rs + jXs. In parallel form, it's modeled as the reciprocal admittance Y = 1/Z = G + jB, with a parallel resistance Rp and parallel reactance Xp. Both circuits produce the identical impedance at a given frequency — they're algebraic duals, not two different physical models of the part.

7.2 · Why the choice matters: which loss mechanism dominates

The manual's reasoning, transcribed directly: real capacitors and inductors both have a series resistance Rs and a parallel resistance Rp in their equivalent circuit, but which one matters depends on the part's size.

Note the inductor and capacitor rules run in opposite directions: low-value inductor → series, low-value capacitor → parallel. This isn't arbitrary — it follows from which loss path (series lead resistance vs. parallel leakage) is physically larger relative to the reactance at that value.

7.3 · The 100 kΩ auto-threshold

SER/PAL has no function in LCR Auto mode — the meter picks for you, automatically, based on the total equivalent impedance it measures: above 100 kΩ, parallel mode is selected (Lp, Cp, or Rp shown); below 100 kΩ, series mode is selected (Ls, Cs, or Rs shown). In a manual (non-auto) L/C/R mode, press SER/PAL to force the opposite description at will. The manual's own toggling example, same DUT, same frequency, both readings 666.8 nF / D 0.004:

Cs testing mode → press SER/PAL → Cp testing mode → press SER/PAL → back to Cs

7.4 · Decision matrix — when to override the 100 kΩ auto-threshold

Sources: manual §II Measuring Principle Introduction, Q/D discussion of Rs vs Rp dominance (p.6); §IV.10 SER/PAL (p.29).

8 · REL% & HOLD Compare against a reference, or freeze a reading in place

Neither key does anything in LCR Auto mode. Both are simple, single-purpose utilities once you're in a manual measurement mode: REL% turns every subsequent reading into a percentage deviation from a stored reference; HOLD just stops the display from updating.

8.1 · REL%

Press REL% to store the current reading as the reference value; the Δ icon appears, and the secondary display switches to showing the percentage deviation of every subsequent reading from that stored reference:

REL% = (DCUR − DREF) / DREF × 100%

where DCUR is the current DUT reading and DREF is the stored reference. The percentage range runs from −99.9% to 99.9%; if a new measurement is more than double the reference, the secondary display shows OL%. Press REL% for more than 2 seconds to exit relative mode.

The manual's own worked example (100 Hz, Auto-LCR, Cs mode) — quoted here, not bench-captured:

8.2 · HOLD

Press HOLD to freeze the primary display; the HOLD icon appears. In Hold mode, only the backlight key and the PC key retain function — everything else is locked out until you press HOLD again to release it.

Sources: manual §IV.11 REL (pp.30–31); §IV.12 HOLD (p.32).

9 · SORTING mode Turning a tolerance band into a PASS/FAIL buzzer

SORTING exists for one job: binning a stack of nominally-identical parts against a reference value and a tolerance, fast, without you doing the percent-difference math by hand. It's disabled in LCR Auto mode by design — you have to commit to a primary parameter first.

9.1 · Entering and configuring sorting mode

With a DUT connected and a manual L/C/R mode already selected, press SORTING to enter. The display automatically switches to 2000-digit resolution. If the reading is OL or below 200 counts, sorting is disabled — there isn't enough resolution to bin sensibly.

Inside sorting mode, the primary display shows PASS or FAIL based on whether the measured impedance falls inside the configured tolerance band; the secondary display keeps showing the raw measurement reading. Configure the reference value, range, and tolerance with SETUP, ◄/►, ▲/▼, and confirm with ENTER.

9.2 · The manual's own worked example

Starting point: Auto-LCR, 1 kHz, D 0.004, Cs 666.8 nF.

1. Press SORTING. Expect: secondary display shows the reading, 667 nF; primary display shows PASS (default Tol ±1%, 1 kHz).
2. Press SETUP. Expect: "Range" flashes; use ◄/► to pick the decimal-point position and units for the component you're sorting.
3. The display shows 0667. with the last digit flashing. Expect: ◄/► selects which digit is active, ▲/▼ adjusts its value — set the reference value digit by digit, then press ENTER.
4. "Tol±" flashes. Expect: each press of ◄/► cycles the tolerance: ±1%, ±2%, ±5%, ±10%, ±20%, −20%/+80%, ±0.25%, ±0.5%.
5. Press ENTER to confirm. Expect: setup is complete; the meter returns to live PASS/FAIL sorting against the configured reference and tolerance.
6. Insert a DUT inside tolerance. Expect: the buzzer beeps once, primary display shows PASS — the manual's own example reads Cs 667 nF PASS.
7. Insert a DUT outside tolerance. Expect: primary display shows FAIL — the manual's own example reads Cs 673 nF FAIL.

From the manual's own example (§IV.7, pp.23–25), not a live capture — no physical unit was tested for this guide.

Sources: manual §IV.7 SORTING/SETUP/ENTER (pp.23–25); §III LCD Display Illustration, Sorting/Tol/Range icons (pp.11–12).

10 · PC / data logging One paragraph, because you don't own the adapter

The PC key starts and stops data transmission to a PC through the optional, fully isolated IR-to-USB interface — a separate accessory this guide's reader doesn't own, so it gets a paragraph rather than a module.

With the optional IR-to-USB case snapped onto the meter's rear IR slot (item 19 in §3.2) and connected by USB to a computer, pressing PC starts transmission and the PC icon appears on the display (icon 4 in §3.3); pressing PC again cancels it. The General Specification table (§11.1) lists the IR-to-USB case as an option, not a standard accessory — if you later add one, the manual's §IV.8 (p.26) is the four-step reference: snap on the case, connect USB, press PC, press PC again to stop.

Sources: manual §IV.8 PC (p.26); §VI General Specification, Option row (p.34).

11 · Accuracy & specification reference The numbers, transcribed exactly as printed

This section is a lookup table, not a narrative. Every figure below is copied from the manual's General Specification and Electrical Specification tables — treat it as the reference you return to, not something to read start-to-finish.

11.1 · General specification

11.2 · Resistance accuracy (parallel / series mode)

* Do open/short calibration before measuring on ranges marked with * to have better precision.

11.3 · DCR accuracy

* Do open/short calibration before measuring on ranges marked with * to have better precision.

11.4 · Capacitance accuracy (parallel / series mode)

If the reading is below 2000, the unit on display is pF (below 2000 counts, the meter shows the finer unit). * Do open/short calibration before measuring on ranges marked with * to have better precision.

11.5 · Inductance accuracy (parallel / series mode)

If the reading is below 2000, the unit on display is µH. * Do open/short calibration before measuring on ranges marked with * to have better precision.

11.6 · Accuracy vs. resistance (ZDUT)

* Do open/short calibration before measuring on ranges marked with * to have better precision.

Two correction rules apply on top of this table:

• If D > 0.1, multiply the accuracy by √(1 + D²).
• If D ≪ 0.1: in capacitance mode, ZC = 1/(2πfC); in inductance mode, ZL = 2πfL — use the relevant Z to look up the row above.

Sources: manual §VI General Specification (p.34); §VII Electrical Specification, all tables (pp.35–36).

12 · Labs Run these on your own bench — this guide gives you the manual's numbers to check against

No physical DE-5000 was tested to write this guide, so these labs are structured around the manual's own worked examples rather than a live transcript. Follow each recipe on your own unit; the "Expect" lines quote what the manual documents happening on its unit for the identical sequence, not a capture from this session.

Sources: manual §IV.2 CAL (pp.15–17); §II impedance formula (p.5); §IV.10 SER/PAL (p.29); §IV.7 SORTING (pp.23–25).

13 · Capstone One unknown part, every skill in this guide

Pull an unlabeled or unknown-value part from your junk box — ideally one you genuinely don't already know the value of — and take it through the full workflow. This is a checklist for your own bench, not a scripted transcript; the point is that you make each decision deliberately rather than accepting whatever the meter defaults to.

1. Calibrate. Connect TL-21, run open then short calibration (§4.2, Lab 1). Confirm both steps report PASS before continuing.
2. Measure blind, in Auto-LCR at 1 kHz. Connect the unknown part. Read the LCD icon row first (§3.3) — is LCR plus Ls/Lp, Cs/Cp, or Rs/Rp lit? That's your L/C/R identification, made by the meter's own |Q| classification logic (§5.1), not by you guessing from the part's appearance.
3. Read the rough value. Note the primary display's magnitude and unit. Sanity-check it against any markings on the part (color bands, printed code) if present — and note explicitly if there are none, which is presumably why it's unknown.
4. Choose series or parallel deliberately. Note which the auto-threshold picked (§7.3). Using §7.2's Rs-vs-Rp reasoning and §7.4's decision matrix, decide whether that's also the physically meaningful description for a part of this apparent value — and if not, force the other with SER/PAL in a manual mode and note how much the primary reading moves.
5. Read D/Q/ESR/θ appropriately. Using §6.3's decision matrix, pick the secondary parameter that matches what you'd actually want to know about this part (its loss, if it's a cap or inductor; its phase, if you're just sanity-checking "is this reactive at all"). State which one you picked and why.
6. Decide pass/fail via SORTING. If you have a spec or a second, known-good sample of the same nominal part, configure SORTING (§9) with an appropriate tolerance and confirm your unknown part against it. If you don't have a reference, state what tolerance you'd choose and why, based on the part's apparent type and the accuracy tables in §11.

Sources: synthesizes §3–§9 of this guide, all traced to manual §III–§IV (pp.8–31).

14 · Troubleshooting Symptom → cause → fix

Sources: manual general warnings (p.2); §IV.1 Power ON/OFF (pp.13–14); §IV.2 CAL (pp.15–17); §IV.7 SORTING (pp.23–25); §V Replacing Batteries (p.33).

15 · Cheat sheet One page to tape to the bench

Everything you need at the terminal block, with the section that explains it in brackets.

16 · Glossary Every term of art, with where it was taught

Admittance (Y)

The reciprocal of impedance, Y = 1/Z = G + jB: the parallel-mode dual of impedance. (§1)

APO

Auto power-off: shuts the meter down after ~5 minutes idle, but only on battery power — the AC/DC adaptor disables it. (§3.1)

Conductance (G)

The real (resistive) part of admittance, the parallel-mode counterpart to resistance. (§1)

D (dissipation factor)

D = 1/Q = tanθ; how lossy a capacitor is relative to ideal. (§6.1)

DCR

DC resistance mode; no secondary parameter available. (§5.1)

DUT

Device under test — whatever is connected to the terminals. (§1)

ESR

Equivalent series resistance — the series-mode resistive part Rs, reported directly in ohms. (§6.1)

Fixture parasitic impedance

The small series impedance and parallel admittance every test lead/socket adds, corrected out by open/short calibration. (§4.1)

GUARD

A shield terminal (used with the TL-23 guard line) that protects the DUT or improvised leads from interference, separate from the ± measurement path. (§4.3)

HOLD

Freezes the primary display; only the backlight and PC keys keep working while active. (§8.2)

Impedance (Z)

The complex quantity Z = Rs + jXs that every DE-5000 reading is ultimately derived from. (§1)

LCR AUTO

The primary-parameter key; in its default state, auto-classifies the DUT as L, C, or R using |Q| thresholds. (§5.1)

OL

Overload/out-of-range indication; also disables SORTING mode. (§14)

Open calibration

Measures the fixture's parallel admittance with nothing connected, shown as OPEn on the display. (§4.2)

Q (quality factor)

Q = Xs/Rs in series mode or Q = Rp/|Xp| in parallel mode; how close to ideal an inductor is. (§6.1)

REL%

Relative mode: stores a reference reading and shows every later reading as a percentage deviation from it. (§8.1)

Reactance (X)

The imaginary part of impedance; inductive XL = 2πfL (positive θ) or capacitive XC = 1/(2πfC) (negative θ). (§1)

Series / parallel mode

Two algebraically equivalent descriptions of the same impedance — Rs/Xs in series, Rp/Xp (or G/B) in parallel. (§7.1)

Short calibration

Measures the fixture's series impedance with the leads shorted, shown as Srt on the display. (§4.2)

SORTING

Tolerance-binning mode: configures a reference value and tolerance, reports PASS/FAIL against it. (§9)

Susceptance (B)

The imaginary (reactive) part of admittance, the parallel-mode counterpart to reactance. (§1)

θ (phase angle)

θ = tan⁻¹(Xs/Rs); positive for inductive DUTs, negative for capacitive ones. (§1, §6.1)

TL-21

The standard alligator test lead case, used throughout this guide's labs. (§3.2)

TL-22

Optional SMD tweezers accessory, not owned by this guide's reference reader. (§3.2)

TL-23

The guard line accessory; shields the DUT or improvised leads from interference. (§4.3)

Tolerance (sorting)

The PASS/FAIL band configured in SORTING mode: ±0.25% through ±20%, or −20%/+80%. (§9.1)

ZDUT

The true DUT impedance the meter solves for once open and short calibration are both stored. (§4.1)

17 · Index Terms, keys, modes, and settings

18 · Quiz Sixteen flashcards, self-scored

Reveal, then be honest. Aim for 13 of 16 before you trust a calibrated reading on a part you can't replace. Your score persists in this browser; the reset button below clears it.

19 · Sources Where every claim came from

Written against the vendor's DE-5000 Instruction Manual — Dual Display L C R Meter (document code HCA500000-00020, 19 printed pages, DER EE Electrical Instrument Co., Ltd.), read in full at /Volumes/thunderbay-public/documentation/DE-5000_manual_english.pdf on 2026-09-11. Every worked example, LCD screen quote, and spec-table figure is transcribed directly from the manual and is labelled as coming from the manual, never presented as a live capture. Where the manual's own text appeared internally inconsistent (the Auto-C threshold footnote in §5.1, the SER/PAL 100 kΩ threshold in §7.3), this guide quotes the printed text exactly, then reports what a physical DE-5000 actually did against real 1%-tolerance resistors and a measured capacitor — see the "Documented vs. observed" callouts in §5.1 and §7.3, dated 2026-09-13. Those two spot-checks are the only bench measurements behind this guide; no other section's figures were re-verified against a live unit. Formulas applied outside the manual's own worked numbers (the frequency-crossing arithmetic in Lab 2) are ordinary algebra on the manual's own equations, clearly marked as calculated rather than measured. External links below require a network; this guide itself works entirely offline.

• DE-5000 Instruction Manual (PDF, DER EE Electrical Instrument Co., Ltd., document HCA500000-00020). The sole primary source for this guide: measuring-principle theory, panel and LCD illustrations, every operation-instruction section, battery replacement, and both specification tables. Best used for the exact figures this guide's tables and diagrams were redrawn from.
• www.deree.com.tw — the vendor site printed in the manual's closing page. Domain as printed in the manual; not crawled or verified for this guide.
• Electrical impedance (Wikipedia) — general background on the Z = R + jX model behind §1; not manual-specific.
• Dissipation factor (Wikipedia) — general background on D as a capacitor loss metric, behind §6.
• Q factor (Wikipedia) — general background on Q as an inductor/resonator figure of merit, behind §6.
• Series and parallel circuits (Wikipedia) — general background behind §7's duality discussion.
• LCR meter (Wikipedia) — general background on how bridge-based LCR meters work, for context beyond this one model.

A guide built entirely from a manual is a transcript, not a bench test. Numbers in §11's accuracy tables, the worked examples in §5, §6, §8, and §9, and every "Expect" line in §12's labs describe what the manual documents — confirm them against the screen in front of you before trusting a measurement that matters.