EDIT: See second post for updated information/pics
Hi all
, I didn't see anybody reviewing these so I thought I would make one for those who are looking to monitor things using their phone or pc. I'll start of with saying I looked for about a month and read reviews of all the different OBDII units you can buy. Here were the main choices for me:
1. cheap unit from e-bay $20
2. plx kiwi bluetooth $99
3. ObdLink Bluetooh $149 (special price on amazon)
4. OBDLink MX (Bluetooth) $199
The OBDLink MX came out just this past month so that was a new addition to my choice list and after reading about it I was sold.
The cheap units had bad reviews with high fail rates and low transmission speeds. The plx kiwi had good reviews but obdLink products had the fastest transmission speeds and came with a windows program so you can connect to a PC in addition to your android device. What the Mx does even better is it tops the ObdLink Bluetooth by getting rid of the long cord that was necessary, has even faster transmission speeds, and is more secure (class 2).
Review:
Price = 7 - it's on the high side of what I wanted to spend (even though I had a giftcard on amazon) but IMO it's not a horrible deal. You get what you pay for with these products and reading reviews, everybody loves these products. Plus Torque recommends this.
Quality = 9 - The unit is very well built and plugs into the diagnostic link connector (DLC) snuggly and stays in. The only reason I gave it a 9 is because some of the glue they use to attach the sticker is showing. Scantools also had good customer service and has forums for support.
The actual Product = 10 - Pairing this with torque on my android galaxy phone took 15 seconds and once the connection was established not once did I lose it in 2 hours of test driving it. Let me say the transmission speeds are as advertised and will be the closest you can get to live feed without investing much much more (really its basically live). There was no delay so when I push the accelerator, the engine load and rpm both shoot up instantly. Comparing it to my cars rpm's it was spot on. I did not test this on my Z because it's currently sleeping, but did run it on dd scion xD. The z has a more advanced computer so I fullly expect the obdlink mx + torque to have even more features for that. On the scion I could see the following all of which I normally can't:
Engine load, Air fuel status, temperature outside, manifold pressure, throttle position, timing advance, coolant temps, MAF rate, barometric pressure, fuel pressure, intake air temperature, boost (which I dont have
) and you have customizable sensors so you can add more. Oil pressure can only be measure with the on off that our computers measure so to measure that you don't need a guage but will need to by some of the extra hardware.
In addition to all of this, with torque you can see and reset fault codes which will save you money down the raod (nissan likes to charge $110 for diagnostics which is them plugging in and OBDII unit and checking the fualt code)
Overall it's a great product and I plan to buy torque pro for $4.95, which lets you time 0-60, take videos and overlay cars stats on them
(this is good for the track guys), and other good stuff. I will review that in more detail once I get it.
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this is how big the unit is compared to my android galaxy phone:
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