Twscarp

Well they stole the technology, so they are dishonest, so could you believe any claims they make? And I have a feeling all of these $5-$10 scanners are v1.3, so all the following updates, and improvements (6 newer versions and years out of date) have not been made in the knockoffs. Let's see what version they send TM1.

Teammuir1

STAN.. thats what I am hoping... Twscarp : I will post my finding screen shot them
for everyone to see.. it should be interesting.. and a learning experience ....
but for my vehicle to be 2006 .. and how technology changes with the blink of an
eye and how the computers in these vehicles have upgrades like you stated ...
I would suspect for me... cause of my year I will get what I am looking for..
on the other hand.. if STAN takes my reader.. then he may not get the full
potential that he wants... for his year of van...
( Dont take this as an argument.. ) I truly am not.. as far as I am
concerned we are just brain storming here.. and you have brought up very valuable
concerns... I wish others that have had these ELM327's ( ARTIE1 ) would
put there 2 cents in here and bring more info to the table.. if not then we will
have to do this on our own.. lol

Twscarp

Hey guys if eBay was selling a legitimate product we would be saying oh wow, that is such a great deal, and 99 out of 100 people don't read description and version numbers they're claiming. Only after watching a couple YouTube videos, did I get a feel for what is going on. I totally understand it's all about the money, who wants to spend $80 when they can supposedly get the same part for $15? Like a couple months ago a deer hit my Explorer and smashed the passenger side mirror, and by a miracle there was absolutely no other damage. Well the mirror was power with the puddle light, I didn't even check the Ford price, I know it would've been at least a couple hundred bucks, but I went to A1Auto.com and got the identical mirror for $36, with free shipping. I am assuming that was a legitimate knockoff. But like I said before you don't know what you don't know, I guess the only way to figure out what is happening is to do a side-by-side test. That would be an interesting topic for one of these YouTube guys do a video comparison between a $10 ($15/w shipping) knockoff, and the $60 ($80/w shipping) genuine ELM part scanner.

Artie1

I am not sure I understand the whole point of discussion here. All my ELM327s were Chinese for $8. Yes I have had a couple of defective ones, that won't pair up with my phone but at $8 buy another, no big deal. Function-wise they are identical, and display all the vital parameters they can get. All that ELM327 does is just receives raw PCM data and transmits it over Bluetooth. Interpreting that data is the job of the software on your device.
When the Torque app doesn't display, for example, the Current Gear and Torque Converter slip on 2008+ vans, that is due to GM PCM firmware changed the PID (Process Identificator). If you really-really need to display some crazy info, then you may dig in and decompile the hex data flow, and add this as a custom PID in the Torque app. In fact, there is a whole another community of Torque enthusiasts, just like ours with vans, that enjoy tinkering with this stuff - https://torque-bhp.com/forums/.

But I am just a happy user. I was able to see my trans temp raise up to 260°F on long 6% hills when towing. I then installed a deep trans pan and a huge cooler, now it never goes over 215°F.

Also, whatever the improvements/updates you mention, are to support newer cars. A Chevy van will work just as fine with the 10 year old version of the ELM327.

Teammuir1

Artie1
Thanks for your reply... I was wondering if you were around..lol
I had asked a couple questions back a few pages ago.. to you ..
but I guess you never caught them....

Twscarp

Hello, the point of this discussion is if you don't have a genuine ELM chip in the scanner, then you have something that the Chinese pirates added to the ELM327 original version v1.0, that was left unprotected (copyright). So they have taken this v1.0 and are selling them as v1.3, v1.4, v1.5, (ELM never had a v1.5), v2.0, v2.1, v2.2, trying to mirror or mimic the ELM chip that was protected after v1.0 (I don't know when they started protecting their property). This is all common knowledge, just Google counterfeit ELM327. So my point has been, you don't know what you don't know. We don't know if all the parameters are being utilized, or what exactly the Chinese did to the chip. From what I can find out there is only one company that sells the genuine ELM chip in a scanner, ELM-327.EU, in Romania, they sell version 2.2 for $57.80 with two shipping choices $22 or $4. There is another company totalcardiagnostics.com, in Australia, that has built their own chip from the ground up, basically trying to emulate EML's workings, they sell for $37 I don't know the shipping arrangements. We would like people who own these scanners to please download this free app that identifies what EML version it is. The app is https://play.google.com/store/apps/d...entifier&hl=en, using the Bluetooth you pair it up with the scanner and it will tell you what version you have. I believe all the scanners from eBay are going to be v1.3 or v1.4. And I don't know how they got from v1.0 to v1.3 or 1.4 The genuine Elm chip is currently at version 2.2. So far StanVan has revealed his version, bought several years ago as v1.4, we are hoping you can check your version and tell us what version the seller was claiming, thanks.

StanVan

Of course there is. "There's a forum for that" is going to replace the phrase "There's an app for that".

I think what we're trying to nail down is whether these Chinese knock offs are as bad as some vendors are leading us to believe. Both yours and mine do what we want them to do, and that's all Ron (Teammuir1) wants as well. One thing we might learn, for example, is whether it's a earlier or later version. I've found, regarding our earlier comments, is mine is old enough to not have a "sleep" mode, so it most likely draws more current than a newer one. If this is true, and a cheap one passes the ID app, I'd pop $8.00 for a new one.

Twscarp

I haven't been able to get this website to open, is it working for anybody else?

StanVan

I never tried until you mentioned not being able to access it. I Googled the title, and it shows up. It sorta acts like their server may be down.

Teammuir1

So here is what came in the mail today....
I just got back from out to eat with my lovely wife..
which Didnt tell me by the way... that I had a package today...
so during dinner she thought of it.. lol any way ..
at least I was told.. lol
so here is what I received .