babscossie

Evening guys,

Opinions on the new snap on scanners please. (ethos, solus, verus)

Whos using what?
What are they good for mostly?
What cars dont they read?
How much are they?
How much are the updates and how often?

Cheers guys
Dave

900ss

I've got a Solus pro
Had it a yr or so now but don't use it much
Cost 1k used from ebay
Bought it to do one job which it did
Use it once in a blue moon now to turn the odd airbag light out lol

Expensive toy but worth having when you need it

stevieturbo

Give a shout here too

http://www.ilexa.co.uk/forum/index.php

A friend uses the old Scanner, Heritage I think they call it. He sees little reason to update to the newer much more expensive stuff. It has its faults, but then I dont think there is any scanner that covers everything. Just need to determine what is the best value for the cars you will be working on.

babscossie

I've also got the old scanner at the moment and just like you guys i dont use it much. Theres been a couple of times recently where my scanner wouldnt read the cars and had to take it to a friend with the new solus to get me out the shite.

J1mbo

iTrader: (1)

Our friendly snap on man told us the new ones are shit and to not bother, we ended up buying texa for diagnostics

babscossie

oh right ok, did he say why they are shit?

andy130

iTrader: (2)

good thread

stevieturbo

I doubt they are shit. Perhaps not good value for money, but not shit.

J1mbo

iTrader: (1)

Just saying what I heard whilst old boy was gonna buy one he said the new ones are shit compared to the older ones, don't know why though !

jamie's

i was gonna buy a solus but the snap on dealer told me just to buy an ethos,
he said that unless your gonna be programming injectors constantly then its not worth the extra cash,
not complaining it saved me a whole lot of money buying the cheaper option,
it realy does depend on what you need it for,
i cant see past launch tbh,
i've used loads of diagnostic computers and find it the best balance for cost/usability,
as said above theres nothing out there that does everything, so best get 1 that suits your needs best

JamesR1

We use a solus pro. very good and does nearly every thing we get in. couple of cars i know it wont access is. s-type jag as jag keep there cars specific to them except the x-type. It wouldnt communicate with porsche either not even the cayene witch shares alot in common with the VW toureg.
It is very good and covers nearly all of the european and jap mainstream stuff.
Altho the verus runs a windows XP platform and there has been teething problems, but it can test components our snap on man gave us a demo and it looks very good. But isnt exactly cheap.
We also have a launch scanner But the snap on does 99% anyway.

jameswrx

My boss has got one of these, seems pretty good http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/Bosch-KTS-340-...#ht_3086wt_689 I've had it out with me quite a bit and it seems quite detailed and you've got other bits on there like service intervals, cambelt data etc

Bit pricey though, especially when you add the software in.

I've got a blue point mini scanner which is the opposite end of the scale! But it does read codes off ok, only trouble is it doesn't have a lot of car specific details stored. You either get the generic ones (if it's one) or it'll give you a code and say manufacturer specific. Obviously you can then look it up.

Code breaker book is also a good investment as it's got some good detailed info about the codes.

The DIVA

iTrader: (3)

I have a Solus Pro and it`s brilliant, does 99% of everything you`ll ever need it for, especially with the new 10.4 software update..... most people who complain about them haven`t got a clue how to use them, the VAG software has expert mode which does a lot of dealer level stuff.

I also still have my old Heritage colur graphing scanner for older stuff as they deleted all heritage models on Solus at software upgrade 9.4

SiZT

The new ones can be a bit mardy if you don't get the right engine code, thats the only bad point (compared to the old ones). We've got a Verus and an old Scanner and the difference is night and day, does oscilliscope readings for crank, cam and throttle position sensors, graphs sensor readings etc, etc. It's a tad expensive though.

Alan77

I haye a snap-on solus pro, vantage pro and the old scanner, they are all good if you know how to use them. solus pro is a code reader, does live data and graphs the vantage is a component tester,oscilliscope and graph meter.

I have a launch c reader for quick codes

A carman wi for japs

They all do the same thing in a different way.

No one tool will do all cars

stevieturbo

But a hammer is damn close.

DazC

iTrader: (1)

We used to use a Solus which did it's job. It was pretty good but an absolute pain in the arse with the personality keys and the Yes No buttons just made it long winded to operate. It was also slow to operate.

I've sold that on now and use a Bosch KTS 670. This is 6k plus the updates and at the time we compared it to the 7.2k (plus updates) Verus. The Verus is just not in the same league to be honest. The Bosch unit is fantastic and lacks very little in functionality and also does a few commercial vehicles and the data and technical information that comes with it is fantastic, as is the way the information is integrated into the oscilloscope and multimeter functions to give you your upper and lower limits when component testing.

My next choice would have been a Texa unit, but it depends on your budget.