HEX-USB+CAN Interface on different cars

[lita_g]

Well, my husband has this HEX-USB+CAN Interface that he purchased with the VAG COM software for his Audi and well, back then my Jetta, and he wants to try to use the cable to maybe read/manipulate information off of other cars. We're still googling around and doing some research, but does anyone here know of any software that would work with that cable attached to other cars, like the Yaris maybe? It plugs into the OBDII port of the car, so we know if physically fits, the problem now is the software, and we're not even sure if we may need special drivers to use it with other cars

Any advice would be appreciated.

[CTScott]

Originally Posted by lita_g

Well, my husband has this HEX-USB+CAN Interface that he purchased with the VAG COM software for his Audi and well, back then my Jetta, and he wants to try to use the cable to maybe read/manipulate information off of other cars. We're still googling around and doing some research, but does anyone here know of any software that would work with that cable attached to other cars, like the Yaris maybe? It plugs into the OBDII port of the car, so we know if physically fits, the problem now is the software, and we're not even sure if we may need special drivers to use it with other cars

Any advice would be appreciated.

I think the VAG-COM works specificly just with VW and Audi. There are a lot of inexpensive readers out there for true OBDII compliant cars (like all of the Japanese cars). I built my own OBDII reader a few years ago (basically my own version of the SGII).

I recently purchased a USB ELM327 off ebay (for $22 including shipping From Hong Kong). It does OBDII (ISO 9141-2) as well as CAN (SAE J1850, etc.) I was hoping to be able to use the CAN interface to look at direct sensor data (there is more available on CAN than on OBDII), but thus far I can not find any info or inexpensive software for using the CAN data, so for now the ELM327 just lets me read the OBDII data faster than I can with my homemade reader.

[lita_g]

Ok, but yours is a reader, the cool thing about the VAG-COM is that you can also reprogram things in the car, and considering the cable that comes with it is just a cable, I would imagine there might be software/drivers out there, comparable to VAG-COM but that can be used on other vehicles, since VAG-COM was made to work only on VW and Audi. We'd like to be able to do some reprogramming on the car too, of course this is all a project that would be nice to get going but who knows?

Ideally we'd like to get it working on any car, the Yaris would only be a guinea pig (hey! it actually looks like one ).

[CTScott]

Originally Posted by lita_g

Ok, but yours is a reader, the cool thing about the VAG-COM is that you can also reprogram things in the car, and considering the cable that comes with it is just a cable, I would imagine there might be software/drivers out there, comparable to VAG-COM but that can be used on other vehicles, since VAG-COM was made to work only on VW and Audi. We'd like to be able to do some reprogramming on the car too, of course this is all a project that would be nice to get going but who knows?

Ideally we'd like to get it working on any car, the Yaris would only be a guinea pig (hey! it actually looks like one ).

Correct. There are VAG Com type tools out there for Toyota vehicles (including Toyota's own Techstream tool), but they are mighty expensive ($1,000+). The key is getting ahold of the protocol specs. OBDII is an open standard, so when I made my reader, I bought the SAE manuals for the protocol. The Toyota protocol spec seems to be one of those super-secret things...

[lita_g]

I know I've seen a digimoto CD in my home office, not sure how the hubby used it before, we'll check it out.

Reprogramming is mostly out of curiousity, I know he was able to reprogram a couple of things in his audi, including some settings on the radio (audi radios are "special") and he also made the doors lock automatically after the car starts going and being able to roll down and up the windows from the keyless entry remote, not sure what else he can do but I think there's other things out there.

Thanks PK for the input!

[CTScott]

Originally Posted by lita_g

I know I've seen a digimoto CD in my home office, not sure how the hubby used it before, we'll check it out.

Reprogramming is mostly out of curiousity, I know he was able to reprogram a couple of things in his audi, including some settings on the radio (audi radios are "special") and he also made the doors lock automatically after the car starts going and being able to roll down and up the windows from the keyless entry remote, not sure what else he can do but I think there's other things out there.

Thanks PK for the input!

Digimoto is still just a monitor/display/log OBDII data and reset the MIL application.

The Yaris supports a few configurable items, like the infamous "turn off the seat belt chime". Also, via the Techstream tool one can teach the TPWS a new set of tire pressure sensors, etc.