I like the good ole days. All I needed was my SnapOn timing light and a good dwell meter !

 

Oh boy do I miss those days. We are about to see a turn I think. We are where we are today mostly because manufacturers intentionally made it hard for us to do anything and there's lots of gatekeepers in the industry. AI is going to complicate new things more, but also be a really good tool for unlocking a lot of OEM stuff that's out there today. I've already started using AI as a 2nd opinion to my own when I'm trying to diagnose problems.

 

You seem to be forgetting the "world government" role in developing and mandating the OBD protocols that basically made computers essential. That is why old fashioned mechanics are afraid of them.

 

As far as I know, the ELM327 dongle doesn't limit what you a can read and write, the app running does. The dongle is mostly just a Bluetooth wireless connection in leu of a hard wire.

The OBD access mandate was an antitrust thing, to keep manufacturers from monopolizing maintenance and repair on their products.

At this point, it's completely stupid that you need a device at all to read codes. It it would be trivial in cost and design to display codes, complete with descriptions, as well as perform various calibration functions, at the whim of the driver. But legislatures are too dysfunctional for the necessary legislation to happen any time soon.

 

ELM327 is just the chip, they are literally a dime a dozen. The modules come in USB, wifi and BT.
What happened to complaining about government mandates that cost us? Like ABS, ESC, TPMS, mirrors, backup cameras.
There ought to be a law.

 

That should be another discussion in another area of this forum.

 

The way I understand it, the clones are a dime a dozen, the real deal, not so much. Some actually work, but when they do, their reputation is to work slower.