OBD2 scanners (Carly?)

ShiWarrior

ShiWarrior

ShiWarrior

Underboss
Joined
20 Oct 2002
Posts
33,318
Location
Oxfordshire / Bucks
Hi

I don't yet own a OBD2 scanner but read about them on here etc

I saw an article today about this scanner called Carly
www.mycarly.com

Diagnose and code your car

With the Carly app and scanner you can carry out diagnostics on your car, uncover odometer fraud or code your vehicle. Easy and at the push of a button on your mobile phone. One scanner for all car brands.
www.mycarly.com www.mycarly.com

which peaked my interest (the buying car part)

anyone got one? are these as good as the cheapy ones ?

tempted to get one whist they are on offer, but not sure..

never needed one in the past really , but electronics are getting more and more involved this days

my current car (15 years old) has never had any warning lights come on, but i will replacing it by the end of the year if all goes to plan..
 
Nice ! Saves me 100 quid or whatever these cost!

So can you recommend a decent one? I don't have a laptop (the one I have is windows 98 its that old!)

I do have a tablet though

Thank you for all the help
 
Last edited:
cjgardens said:
If your not fixing the car yourself I wouldn't bother with anything fancy. The cheap ones will do the job for, just knowing what's wrong.

Like my bwm has a light on, plugged my cheap eBay dongle in and found out it's the EGR value. I'm not going to fix it but at least I know it's not a major problem and I don't have to pay someone to diagnose it. I'll just get them to do the job.
Click to expand...

That's what I want really, also like to be able to change more settings if I want to
 
mrk said:
I have Carly, it's currently working for free but no doubt will stop working soon. I had a lifetime license in the past when I used the app via a K-line cable (universal with switches), thein in 2021 bought the official Carly universal dongle from them as I could leave it plugged in all the time and it was on offer... Little realising that when you do so, and connect to your account, that you automatically are put on a subscription service where they annually take £100 or whatever with no notice whatsoever.

So colour me confused a year later.

I opened up a refund request, they declined stating that German retail laws don't say they have to notify you before taking payment and that by buying the adapter, you automatically accept the subscription (at the time this was not marketed well or made obvious, basically some small print somewhere at the bottom which is easy to miss).

Anyway I opened up a chargeback through Curve because Carly's support people were inept and patronising/passive aggressive in responses and basically said "good luck getting your money back.

Well yes, good luck indeed because as of yesterday, Curve have rejected their reason for declining a refund as Curve found no reasonable evidence to support their rejection. I'll have my money back thanks.

The app itself is good. If you have a wired OBD adapter (about £30), then the app itself works without a subscription and is a one time purchase (or was) - It allows you to do coding via toggles on various modules on the car allowing tweaking of various cool features. The diagnostics side of things isn't bad either and has helped me pinpoint various ECU codes over the years to specific sensors and whatnot.

The company however are shady and will not deliver satisfactory customer support when they're found to be in the wrong. Once Curve complete the chargeback process I will reply to Carly's last email where they said good luck with a meme of a dickbutt or something just because it will be highly amusing to me.

I will likely revert back to my old wired OBD cable but you can use a number of other apps with the Amazon dongles costing £30 or so which are Bluetooth LE/WiFi and allow full support for diag/coding combo apps like bimmer-code and bimmer-tool - I assume there are versions of these for VAG group cars too. DeeoOBD gets mentioned often too.

I just liked the wireless dongles because they can be left plugged in and less faff, but it's simple enough to plug in a wired cable when you need to run a diagnostic anyway too and the wired cable works with any app generally.

Edit* I think I will get this dongle, Veepeak's higher end model for under 330: https://www.amazon.co.uk/Veepeak-OBDCheck-Bluetooth-Diagnostic-Supports/dp/B073XKQQQW/ref=sr_1_29?crid=UAP02FT3DYAR&keywords=elm+327&qid=1690244205&sprefix=elm+327,aps,99&sr=8-29

Got Car Scanner app set up, it does some coding too so that satisfies my uses really.
Click to expand...
I looked at that veepeak one, but don't know the difference between that one and the cheaper one
 
mrk said:
There's some info here: https://ljmcardiagnostics.co.uk/blogs/news/so-what-does-the-veepeak-obdcheck-ble-offer-over-the-ble

Essentially newer revision, same core protocols support but the BLE+ supports the full ELM 327 spec so better support for realtime dashboard readings if that's important.
Click to expand...

this ine is the one i thought of getting
10 cheaper than the BLU and BLE+ models
but do you need to buy one of the BLE models ?
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top Bottom