Diagnostic Software

[Guest Locutus]

Does anyone know of or heard of software you can run on a laptop or desktop pc to turn it into a diagnostic computer for testing and tuning of your vehicle computer. I have 3 different vehicles this would be a advantage to have. I have a 97 Chevy Z71, a Mecury Mystique, and the 88 TPI setup that is going in my Z. I know snap on and those guys sell some stuff but it is way out of my price range. I got plenty of computers, just need connectors and software if they make them.

 

 

Mike

 

PS if there isn't any, anyone with good elec engineering skills(as related to PC peripherals) I am a excellent software engineer(though I currently work as a network engineer, I needed more variety in day to day work) and I would be willing to work on something we can share with our fellow car nuts

[Guest Anonymous]

Sure do! For anybody doing a late-model Chevy V8 swap with stock sensors/fi, CHECK THIS OUT. http://www.mindspring.com/~amattei/aldl.htm

I have already built the interface for my 95 lt1. This device interfaces the engine's computer to the serial port of any laptop/desktop computer. It is completely compatible with the LT1 edit software. AND, the site has info on the 'API', so to speak, for the 9x LT1 computers. Basically it tells you the memory map of the computer. I am a programmer and I play with electronics some.. but I don't think I have the time to build a monitoring/editing tool. I'm just going to fork out the cash for LT1Edit.

 

Also, I strongly recommend visiting lt1.net and lt1.net/editor. (home of LT1 Edit)

 

If you want to go nuts like I did..

Advantech.com sells various embedded computers. You're a hardware guy so I know you will appreciate this. I bought their PCM-5864 motherboard which is an all-integrated socket7 board with the same footprint as a 5.25" drive! It has onboard video in/out, both VGA and NTSC. It has built in audio, 4 serial ports, 1 parallel port, 1 PCI slot, 1 Dimm slot, 1 CompactFlash slot, one IDE controller, 1 Floppy controller, USB, PC104 expansion (good for hooking up a GPS. )...Damn, this board has everything. And it runs on +5 and +12v. (no -5 or -12 needed)

 

I stuck a K6-380 on it. It's running 98 and has a laptop drive and an external SCSI CD ROM hooked to it. I have it set up for music (MP3 or CDs) mainly, but I intend to hook my ALDL cable up to it and leave it attached to my car's computer most of the time. Hopefully I can get some realtime logging software too (dunno if lt1edit does that). The only drawback of this board was its $500 price tag. But they have cheaper 486 level boards too, many of which have integrated chips.

 

Ok, you can tell I'm inspired now. Owell, gotta go to bed so I can get to work on time. Got to keep those paychecks coming in if I expect to be able to support my habitz!