BMW diagnostics
Discussion
Always been interested in getting diagnostics on my cars. From way back I used to have carsoft stuff, usually the cheap knockoff chinese stuff, and more recently I have had a succession of ISTA stuff. I have a closet of adapters which were always not as good at the GT1 professional stuff obviously. I used to buy one every few years to update. I probably have at least one copy of all the different types.
My experience of using them was always a little hit and miss. Worked for some things didn't for others. Occasionally got progman working on some adapters, not others. Diagnostics used to occasional give different results when run multiple times. Software was a bit edgy. I put this all down to not being prepared to spend the money on an expensive setup. Didn't seem to make any difference if I can the car running , or on a battery charger.
Half the problem is that when something didn't work you were never very sure whether it was the computer, dodgy software installs, or adapter causing problems, and it worked well enough to save me some pretty big bills.
Why am I telling you all this? Only to help out anyone who used to be my former self. I bought a voltage stabilised batter charger. Its been a bit of a revelation . Everything, and I mean every single crappy old adapter all the way up to the more expensive things have suddenly become reliable working systems.
So I thought I'd post this as a bit of an information broadcast to those out there with a few BMW diagnostic system bought cheaply rotting away in some cupboard, and identifying with the first few paragraphs of my post. If you can get your hands on a relatively cheap stabilised power supply then do so.
My experience of using them was always a little hit and miss. Worked for some things didn't for others. Occasionally got progman working on some adapters, not others. Diagnostics used to occasional give different results when run multiple times. Software was a bit edgy. I put this all down to not being prepared to spend the money on an expensive setup. Didn't seem to make any difference if I can the car running , or on a battery charger.
Half the problem is that when something didn't work you were never very sure whether it was the computer, dodgy software installs, or adapter causing problems, and it worked well enough to save me some pretty big bills.
Why am I telling you all this? Only to help out anyone who used to be my former self. I bought a voltage stabilised batter charger. Its been a bit of a revelation . Everything, and I mean every single crappy old adapter all the way up to the more expensive things have suddenly become reliable working systems.
So I thought I'd post this as a bit of an information broadcast to those out there with a few BMW diagnostic system bought cheaply rotting away in some cupboard, and identifying with the first few paragraphs of my post. If you can get your hands on a relatively cheap stabilised power supply then do so.
Really wish I'd discovered them years ago. I used to use a normal 200Amp charger which in my head took the voltage comfortably continually above 14v.
However all of the cheap Chinese stuff (which was all I wanted to afford) was unreliable so my search for reliable and cheap continued.
Since using the voltage stabiliser. I bought an MST-80+ everything is reliable.
Its such a revelation I thinking now about ditching the newish 3 series and doing what I used to do which was buying an old M series. I wish I could go back in time and try it on my old 8 series.
With less worry about being behold ant to BMW ,one can drive some more exciting stuff.
However all of the cheap Chinese stuff (which was all I wanted to afford) was unreliable so my search for reliable and cheap continued.
Since using the voltage stabiliser. I bought an MST-80+ everything is reliable.
Its such a revelation I thinking now about ditching the newish 3 series and doing what I used to do which was buying an old M series. I wish I could go back in time and try it on my old 8 series.
With less worry about being behold ant to BMW ,one can drive some more exciting stuff.
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