What OBDII Scanner Should I Get?

[cn90]

OBD-II guru,

I am looking for a sedan for my son to use in High School.

I am thinking 1996, 97 850 or 98 S70.
I am staying away from ETM issues, so I don't want to look at 1999-2001 years (maybe I am wrong, if so please correct me).

I'd like to stick to generic OBD-II scanner that I have at home.

So the question is: which year did Volvo switched from the pin/socket diagnostic system to the generic OBD-II connector (inside the center console)?

[mrwillie]

IIRC, some 1995 had both under-hood diag box and OBD-II. 1996 was fully OBD-II.

[osman]

get a kiwi plx devices bluetooth adapter and run Torque on your smartphone, tablet, or laptop, Trust me its worth the $100. It even reads o2 sensor waveforms which many overpriced handhelds dont.

[osman]

Added bonus for turbos. you can have a digital turbo boost pressure gauge on torque I use it all the time on both Turbos and LPT's.

[rmmagow]

http://www.diydiagnostics.com/10in1.html
This one looks like they claim it can reset the Oil Service light on a volvo.

[shiloh51933]

http://www.diydiagnostics.com/10in1.html
This one looks like they claim it can reset the Oil Service light on a volvo.

That's a valuable tool for resetting the PITA Oil Service Light...good find!!

[Matty Moo]

http://www.diydiagnostics.com/10in1.html
This one looks like they claim it can reset the Oil Service light on a volvo.

I didn't see anywhere where it said it reads OBD codes, it looks like it only clears service lights and that's it.

For the price of a $10 cable you can have vol-fcr...read codes and clear everything.

[horse]

I'm a new guy on this forum, but I'm a life long gear head.
So I'll jump in here with my advice.
I use an Innova 3130 scanner. It does live and more. I'm very happy with it.
When I bought my 96 Volvo 850 glt, I found it did not read ABS or reset service light.
So after a bit of homework I found VOL-FCR software online and bought a VAG-COM 409.1 KKL OBD2 USB Cable off ebay for $14 from a vendor in Brooklyn NY. (super fast free shipping BTW).
Hooked it into my old Netbook and BINGO had my service light turned off and found and reset an ABS error.
I highly recommend the VOL-FCR software. At least for my 96 850 it worked flawlessly.
Only thing I needed to do was reset the default Comm from 3 to 1.
I also bought a ELM327 v1.4 USB Interface cable to use with different software ( same vendor for $16 and free shipping) and am trying out different scanner software I've found online.
So far it looks as if all you really need are an old laptop, these 2 cables ( $30 or less) and some internet savvy and you can do more than you could with anything except extremely pricey scanners. In fact it looks as if you could get a bluetooth version of these cables and run them into an android app setup....But I've not tried it.
Now...be aware... I've only tested the VOL-FCR software enough to definitely state it works great with my Volvo.
Cheers

[ChaddGostas]

auto zone sells a very nice one that does engine graphing for 200.00
http://www.autozone.com/autozone/access ... 988869_0_0_
this one is pretty good

http://www.autozone.com/autozone/access ... =61988_0_0_
I used this one and it told me the position of my intake cam.

[B234R]

...So after a bit of homework I found VOL-FCR software online and bought a VAG-COM 409.1 KKL OBD2 USB Cable off ebay for $14 from a vendor in Brooklyn NY. (super fast free shipping BTW).
Hooked it into my old Netbook and BINGO had my service light turned off and found and reset an ABS error.
I highly recommend the VOL-FCR software. At least for my 96 850 it worked flawlessly.

Hi Horse,

I´m very interested in VOL-FCR but I read that needs a OBD2-Serial cable...how did you get the VAG-COM cable worked (my laptop doesn´t have a serial port)?

Thanks!