So which OBD2 scanner to buy?

Yellowshark

Well-known user
Hi I am looking to buy an OBD2 scanner and after 4 or 5 nights research it seems a bit of a minefield in terms of establishing exactly what a unit will do and importantly whether it will do it for a Corvette C5.
I have established
  1. It seems to me that the really cheap ones, say circa £30 will not give me anything that the DIC, the FSM and my speaker magnet for reprogramming the TPMS, will not do.
  2. The top of the range units are just too expensive, even the Chinese Tech 2 clones, to justify for my usage.
  3. Then there is a whole host of units in the middle ground; my max budget is really low £200s. But the major problem I have found is establishing in reality whether they will work on the C5 despite the advertising claims. The closest I have got is “Chevrolet passenger car”. I targeted one unit and on Amazon asked the question as to whether it worked on a 2001 C5 and got a response that said no, all it would do is display codes.
I have one overarching question – do these units do a deeper analysis and display more error codes than the DIC does? Right now I have a P0300 backfiring code but nothing else that might point me in the right direction or to a particular cylinder or bank of cylinders. Of course maybe no other codes have been set.
So guys has anyone had any success, or failures, with buying and using a scanner on a Corvette?

Need to get this fixed so I can go out driving more than 2 miles tomorrow :) :) :)
 

Braeburn 22

CCCUK Member
I would consider the Autel MD802, cost £120 covers all vehicles and systems along with transmission , abs, tc.

It is the one I bought, works back to 1996 and covers european, us and japanese cars and gets free updates.
 

Braeburn 22

CCCUK Member
Just checked my scanner and it definately covers all chevrolet vehicles back to 1996 and covers, all vehicles with diagnostic function as well.
My one is labeled autel maxi diag elite, but I think they have brought out a new model, the mk808bt.
 

Yellowshark

Well-known user
Haha thanks for that Braeburn 22. I was thinking about the MD802 but having just spent 3 hours looking at some more, not necessarily rejecting the MD802, I have now put the maxi diag MD 808 Pro. being the 802 upgrade, at the top of my list! I will do some comparisons tomorrow.
 

Yellowshark

Well-known user
Well I got my new scanner a few weeks back, an Autel MD808 Pro for £214. As I quickly found out they are not UK based, they just have a UK distribution centre for which no contact details are given (that I could find). All contact is with China. Stumbled at first step as it will not do a full Automatic scan - seems to be failing to pull the VIN number from the ECU according to Chinese view (case still open and being pursued). But manual scanning works. The car had started backfiring and the DIC reported a P0300 misfire but nothing else and having replaced plugs and leads for cylinders 2,4,6,8 along with the obligatory bloody abrasions, the scanner arrived and ultimately showed me a moving graph in real time of cylinder 5 misfiring. So having also bought a single coil I fitted that to cylinder 5 and hey presto problem solved :) So in many respects it has paid for itself already.
 

Braeburn 22

CCCUK Member
Great News, they are really good if you download the software onto a PC / Laptop - Maxi PC Suite and PC Link to update the SD card, did you do the VIN entry manually.
 

C6NL

CCCUK Member
I bought a VXDIAG VCX NANO for GM, its a Tech2 alternative which mimics a Tech2 on your laptop, for the C6 it works perfect.
 

Yellowshark

Well-known user
Blimey for 99$ it cannot be bi-directional surely?
How many Corvette systems does it display if you want to do a manual scan?
Will it give you a real time display of which cylinder(s) is misfiring (if any)?
 

Yellowshark

Well-known user
Great News, they are really good if you download the software onto a PC / Laptop - Maxi PC Suite and PC Link to update the SD card, did you do the VIN entry manually.
Well a number of elements here. The Pro version has a number of additional capabilities over the non-Pro version, including automatic retrieval of the VIN, which is not working. If I try to do an automatic scan I get a display asking me to enter the VIN but having done that the auto scan proceeds not to work. Perversely a Manual scan presents me with 10 Corvette systems to choose from, does not request a VIN and works i.e. I got a live data display showing which on of the 8 cylinders was misfiring, err which was rather useful in helping me fix my backfire problem !!!. Also when initially setting it up I also went into the OBD2 section which lets me access vehicle info. Now I do not remember but when I went in there for the first time, I think I entered the VIN no, although not 100% sure. Now every time I access that function it displays the VIN. whereas each time I try Auto scan it asks for the VIN. What is not clear to me is where the OBD2 section code is getting the VIN from. I have gone through the memory card with a fine tooth comb and cannot find any file that has had an update since before I received the unit. So if it is not getting it from the ECU I do not know where it is coming from. If it is getting it from the ECU why is the Auto Scan function asking me for it. On top of all that I do not know why the software asks for the VIN anyway when I have told it the car is a GM/Chevrolet/passenger car/rear hatch/2001/Corvette/LS1/manual transmission. It has the facility to create a vehicle record which stores all this stuff but the save option is at the end of the Auto scan which does not work so I never get that display!!
 
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