Works great, use it to check rigging on Barons and Bonanza landing gear

Turned the unit on this morning to use it and it just flashes the screen and beeps. Reset switch does nothing. Purchased in March, so got 6 months of sitting time out of it. Used it maybe 25 times since purchase. So, if the function is worth $250/year to you - this may be the piece of equipment for you....

Worked like a champ

I bought this item to use it at work. It arrived fast and properly packed as usual with Prime.Using the unit as a stand alone force gauge is easy and intuitive. Power it up and push the nut in, negative reading. Pull out, positive reading. If that is what you need it works perfectly fine. But if that is what you need there are many cheaper options than this one.Getting the unit to run attached to a computer is a different story. It came with a CD with options in chinese and english. First thing to run is the e-setup.exe file. In most computers it will not work. The antivirus will detect a trojan malware and prevent the file from running. This e-setup .exe works as your driver so you are basically not able to use it. OR... you disable your antivirus, which you need to know what you are doing. I chated with Amazon tech support and emailed the seller. Seller provided two links. One to download the same software from the internet (same trojan issue), and one with a video on how to use the software.If you decide to go the disable antivirus way, this is what you need to do:1.- Run the e-setup.exe file and proceed. It will work if you have a physical serial port on your computer. If you don't and are using a usb to RS232 dongle, install the driver for the dongle first.2.- Run the Handy Gauge Communication software. It should match what your COM port numbers is. I used a dongle and set it to COM3. Your Handy Gauge com software should be selected to use COM3 before hitting Receiving. If you followed these instructions the right side of the tool with populate with info from your gauge, HF-500 on my case.3.- Run the Force software. This will allow you to track your readings.4.- On your force software go to top left and hit SET->NEW TEST, then save.5.- Go to SET->CONNECT STYLE and select AUTO CONNECT. On my unit it was default to COM3. Not sure if that is the only port and you should go back to everything done before this if it shows a different port, or if it detects the COM port it is connected to (I doubt this is the case). This will enable the connect button on the Control area. Hit Connect. If everything is connected properly you have a good chance that it will work. The bottom left area of the screen BASIC TEST PARAMETERS will populate with the info of your meter. If you are properly connected you will see the ANGULAR DISPLAY tab to show which units you are working on and the max force the gauge can read to each +/- side. Once you hit START you will start seeing the readings on the computer.From here you will be able to run live readings. if you are on the CHART DISPLAY radio button you will see a chart. On the ANGULAR DISPLAY radio button you'll see as if it was an analog gauge.The most interesting thing together with the CHART DISPLAY to me is the option to export the data. To do this go to REPORT-DATA QUERY. Select the test item you created at the beginning, select the chanel (default to 1), and hit DATA QUERY. Now select your 1,2,3,etc items, and hit SHOW CHART. This will create a nice little chart for you. This you can export as a BMP file, or as a .xls file to open in a speardsheet.I managed to make some measuremens to test. Unfortunatelly even if following this guideleines I am not always able to connect onto my unit. It usually takes a lot of time connecting and disconnecting, restarting the software (both of them) to get the readings on the screen.EDIT: I now figured out why the connections were randomly possible. The connection is thorugh a COM port. If the Handy Gauge Communication Toll is open, The Force track software will not connect. Try running the communication tool to ensure you are connected. Then close it. Then fire the Force software. It should connect instantly.Now I do recommend this product if you feel confortable disabling the antivirus.It would go to a 5 star product review if the software was not detected as Trojan by the antivirus

Seems to work OK, but I question the 4, five star, reviews.The instrument is so inexpensive I still rate it 3 stars for now since it is clean, new, and is as described.I have not been able to get RS-232 interface to work yet, and the software sent did not read off the disk.I has little documentation, so maybe I didn't learn how to upload the data.That may get resolved, and that will make it 5 stars.I expected this to be a process, and for this price I am still happy.Right now it is a manual gauge with peak reading and memory.It does not appear to have any live data feed capabilities

This is a great product. Meter worked perfect for all our applications.

Does the job and is accurate and affordable.

Great new condition when it came!!!!