Octavia II VAG-COM questions

[moosehead]

(Pasted from new octavia thread in the hope of an answer)

Been reading and reading trying to understand what vag-com can and cant do for the octy II vRS settings to see whether its worth getting the hex-can-usb version to play around with. Can anyone clarify a few things for me?

I translated this page to English
http://de.openobd.org/skoda/octavia_1z.htm#69
and compared it to the english page covering the golf V here
http://en.openobd.org/vw/golf_1k.htm
Seems that there are similar but not quite the same but all the settings that can be changed seem to be there including most of the questions I have seen in the forums (running lights, fogs, wipers, locking, anti hijacking, timing delay on coming home features, country, etc etc)

Now I am a bit stuck and my remaining questions are:
1 - Does VAG-COM clearly explain (via bubble windows or whatever) what all the long and short coding options do? ie does it recognise the car version when it connects? or do you have to manually work out the codes using the tables?
2 - Where do you get the full english tables from in this case? (or is openobd the source)
3 - Is the best place to buy from www.gendan.co.uk or is there a smarter way to get started?


Thanks

[Theresias]

Originally Posted by moosehead

1 - Does VAG-COM clearly explain (via bubble windows or whatever) what all the long and short coding options do? ie does it recognise the car version when it connects? or do you have to manually work out the codes using the tables?

Based upon the control module part number, the long coding plugin chooses the right coding table and presents it like this example from the CAN-Gateway coding.

Originally Posted by moosehead

2 - Where do you get the full english tables from in this case? (or is openobd the source)

OpenOBD is the source, but there will be updated ones in one of the next VAG-COM versions - point here is that the current tables do not devide between the control module versions (basis, medium and high). Note, VW/Skoda do NOT have complete tables documented, so quite a lot of these tables base on further investigation and testing.

Originally Posted by moosehead

3 - Is the best place to buy from www.gendan.co.uk or is there a smarter way to get started?

You can buy from any of the official distributors or just the vendor (Ross-Tech) directly.

http://www.ross-tech.com/distributors.html

[DGW]

I ordered direct from Ross-Tech. I placed the order on a Friday and it was delivered the following Monday by FedEx. Excellent service.

[moosehead]

Did you have to pay import duty and vat and fedex?
,i.e., how much all in?

[DGW]

Originally Posted by moosehead

Did you have to pay import duty and vat and fedex?
,i.e., how much all in?

Yes. Around £10-£15 cheaper than buying in the UK at the time (Feb 2005).