Club G40 Forum

Club G40 => General Chat => Topic started by: Alexiskayak_7 on June 18, 2010, 06:53:08 pm

Title: Vagcom from ebay
Post by: Alexiskayak_7 on June 18, 2010, 06:53:08 pm
Does vagcom (obd cable and cd) from ebay working properly, or they are crap?
Also, i ordered a 2+2 to obd cable for diagnosing my g. Will i have any issues loging with the usb/obd cable the digifant ecu?
Title: Re: Vagcom from ebay
Post by: cheys03 on June 18, 2010, 08:23:08 pm
Mine worked for a while then died. New one can't even make a connection. I'd say avoid.
Title: Re: Vagcom from ebay
Post by: Alexiskayak_7 on June 18, 2010, 10:52:07 pm
Mine worked for a while then died. New one can't even make a connection. I'd say avoid.

The software or the cable was wrong?
Title: Re: Vagcom from ebay
Post by: cheys03 on June 19, 2010, 06:51:49 am
Cable itself. VWTool was the most useful software when it did work. Even with the first cable it was tempermental. The first cable burnt out and died. After receiving the second cable and not being able to connect to my ECU again I tried a second ECU and then a friend's car and second laptop. Nothing worked with the included software, torrented software or VWTool though to cable itself seemed to at least part-work because Windows would detect the USB device and the LED would flicker on it when attempting comms to the ECU. My friend then used another ECU diagnostics device on my ECU (a code reader) which worked fine. I believe Hayesey uses a serial cable rather than USB and has more sucess, though for what information it can actually give even when it does work, it's not really worth the cost or hassel. As Hayesey says somewhere in another post - the best diagnostic tool for the engine management on these cars is a multimeter. I second  that advice.
Title: Re: Vagcom from ebay
Post by: Alexiskayak_7 on June 19, 2010, 07:04:33 pm
Thank you cheys for the advice!
I downloaded and extracted vwtool, but when i'm installing it a window pops that says: 'COMMDLG.DLL could not be installed'?
Does anyone has any idea what i'm doing wrong?
Title: Re: Vagcom from ebay
Post by: cheys03 on June 19, 2010, 08:23:16 pm
Sorry, haven't come across this error. Did you extract to the default location C:\VWTOOL ?
Title: Re: Vagcom from ebay
Post by: Alexiskayak_7 on June 19, 2010, 09:24:52 pm
Yes i did! Is there a possibility that vwtool doesn't work with vista? What windows do you have cheys?
Title: Re: Vagcom from ebay
Post by: g40chris on June 20, 2010, 04:49:29 am
mine wouldnt work from ebay
it wouldnt find the usb port apparently
Title: Re: Vagcom from ebay
Post by: cheys03 on June 20, 2010, 08:10:57 am
I'm running XP on both the laptops I tried. It's probably a Vista thing as you suggest as that DLL will have to be extracted and registered to the OS. On my system it was extracted to C:\Windows\system and C:\Windows\system32. Registry value HKLM\System\ControlSet001\Control\WOW\KnownDLLs lists it as does ControlSet002,003 and CurrentControlSet.

Hope this helps match the install to your system
Title: Re: Vagcom from ebay
Post by: hayesey on June 20, 2010, 12:34:19 pm
people seem to have more trouble with the USB leads than the serial cables, which is why I bought a serial one.  However, most modern laptops wont have a serial port any more. 

Apparently there is some tool you can install in windows that allows you to fiddle with the USB-serial emulation settings and apparently if you play about with them the USB lead is more likely to work with old stuff like a g40.  I don't know the details, you'll have to google it.

Yeah I use VWTOOL.exe on my polo and it works ok.  Vagcom works for me on newer cars (such as my passat) but I've never got vagcom working too well with my g40.
Title: Re: Vagcom from ebay
Post by: Alexiskayak_7 on June 20, 2010, 05:16:16 pm
VW Tool, has installed properly in windows xp i've tested...
One more question: If i buy a rs232 to obd cable and a vagcom softaware, is it going to be capable logging in newer cars that the vagcom software has?
Title: Re: Vagcom from ebay
Post by: hayesey on June 20, 2010, 06:01:13 pm
how new?  don't think it'll work with anything that has CAN-BUS, you'll probably need the proper vagcom leads for that.  Prob work on most things up to about 2000 though.
Title: Re: Vagcom from ebay
Post by: Alexiskayak_7 on June 20, 2010, 06:18:15 pm
Not so much new... I want to scan audi a3 8l/vw golf mk4 and vw polo 6n,6n2 and 9n... I think that it will be capable of diagnosing?
Title: Re: Vagcom from ebay
Post by: hayesey on June 20, 2010, 06:24:06 pm
not sure about a 9n polo but I'd have thought the others would be ok if the lead is for vagcom version 409.  Just check the ross-tech website, it says what cars the various versions work with.
Title: Re: Vagcom from ebay
Post by: Alexiskayak_7 on June 20, 2010, 06:33:26 pm
Ok! Thank you very much guys...
Title: Re: Vagcom from ebay
Post by: SamG40 on June 20, 2010, 08:48:33 pm
I've got an ebay usb cable. Used it successfully with VWtool on my G and also with VAG-COM on the Corrado and on Pete's Dads Octavia. There are settings to change to get it to work with ABS modules but its been a very worthwhile purchase for me.
Title: Re: Vagcom from ebay
Post by: Alexiskayak_7 on June 27, 2010, 11:09:56 am
one more quetion guys
The pc will automatically recognise the rs232 cable, like the usb?
It's a bit silly question, but really, i have no idea...
Title: Re: Vagcom from ebay
Post by: cheys03 on June 27, 2010, 01:37:42 pm
No, Windows will not recongnise the RS232 device. The VAGCOM software will try to use the comm port resource when it is loaded and/or when it attempts comms through the com port. If other software is using the com port at that time e.g. TeraTerm, then VAGCOM will not be able use the com port.

So long as there's no other software trying to use the com port you've allocated with whichever RS232 D9 connector you're using then there should be no problem  :)
Title: Re: Vagcom from ebay
Post by: Alexiskayak_7 on June 27, 2010, 01:43:00 pm
Oh, nice...
So you say that i won't have any problems using VAGCOM/VWTOOL with rs232 cable...
I've downloaded vag-com from ross-tech, is it ok?
Title: Re: Vagcom from ebay
Post by: cheys03 on June 27, 2010, 01:51:57 pm
Hard to say whether you'll have any problems. I'd personally be much happier with an RS232 cable than a USB one. Where did you get the cable from? From memory the VAGCOM from Ross-tech runs in demo mode with an unofficial cable.
Title: Re: Vagcom from ebay
Post by: Alexiskayak_7 on June 27, 2010, 03:16:28 pm
I haven't ordered a obd cable yet...
Ross tech dealer here sells the vagcom kit for 70 euros, which i find it expensive..
The bad thing is that i can't find any rs232 vagcom kit from ebay.co.uk or ebay.com...