I have a few questions regarding the OBD II connectivity option on the 4th gens.

1st - is the 4th gen OBD II bus a CAN bus and requires a CAN compatible cable?
2nd - has anyone gotten an OBD II cable that has been proven to work with 4th gens?
3rd - can anyone recommend a USB based one?
4th - what kind of software is recommended?

Thanks all!

 

No CAN bus on 4th. I believe it's the old fashioned ISO 9141 like many other Asian cars.

I just received Autotap USB, installed on a laptop and read P1320 and P0325 from my 99 I30 today. You have to manually type in the VIN as it could not read it. I am new to scan tools too but so far the Autotap kit works fine.

 

Any OBDII scan tool will work on a 4th. Actually any car made from January 1 1996 in the US is OBDII compatible. The only question is how much money do you want to spend? You can usually get a handheld scanner for about $100 but if you want a scanner capable of datastreaming you are talking about spending a few thousand dollars or so but they are awesome tools

 

Actron 9145 is OBD II and CAN compliant, and works fine on the 4th Gens, can read or snapshot live data, costs less than $200....................

 

I don't want a handheld tool; I want one of those cables that hooks up to your laptop directly so I can see all the live information - specifically timing so I can check on my knock sensor.

I see a lot of those going for like 130$, but I wonder - is a cable just a cable, or are they all different? I see a lot as straight cables, and a lot with a logic unit on the cable...

 

With a good handheld, you can see any of the live data in real time.......including timing...........................

 

Anyone have any recommendations on good units. Both handheld and downstreaming to a laptop?

 

The Actron SuperScanner is a great handheld unit - I use it doing diagnostic work on my own car, that and a Genysis scanner but the Genysis unit has an MSRP of about $3000 but the Actron does just as good datastreaming that the other does. As for downloadable units, I'm not too sure as the only ones I have ever used are vehicle specific but they allow changes to be made intsead of just being a passive scanner

 

Digimoto.com v4.03 is current -works good w/ELM interface to OBDII port, has logging and gauges, run in a notebook w/serial port. I like it.

 

Thanks Grey, I heard about digimoto.

Now - I have a TMobile MDA PPC phone - what can possible work with that thing? It has a mini USB interface...