EcuTek vs BRZ-Edit

[regal]

Originally Posted by ft_sjo

Yeah, EcuTek do nothing. Unicorns pay for their offices, their highly skilled staff and all the other overheads.

CAPITALISM IS EVIL!!!!

They did something (hacked the ECU before anyone else.) They are priced too high to rest on that. That's the beauty of capitalism and a free market vs a monopoly.

[Shit Luck]

Originally Posted by ft_sjo

Yeah, EcuTek do nothing. Unicorns pay for their offices, their highly skilled staff and all the other overheads.

CAPITALISM IS EVIL!!!!

ecutek hacked the ecu thus they have a product to sell to tuners. that should be how they make their money. selling their product to tuners. tuner then sell their product i.e. tunes to us.
thats how it should work.
if a tuner cant tune a car in a manner that keep people coming back to them for tunes that is their problem.

[Xero-Limit]

Been away the last week and missed most of this, and seems to be a moot point as everyone has their minds pretty much made up. But some misinformation should be cleared up and I'm not known for being silent

Open source is not a term that should be given to anything you pay for or that uses licensing (Tactrix cable, flashing software). So what some think is "free" or "community" derived is filling pockets for someone when talking about the above. The only question is who. The company that put in thousands of man hours or the company who snooped the handshake and copied the def? Before you think robin hood, read on.

DIY editing is fine for 5% of people. The rest have to rely on tuners. Tuners have to rely on good software. Some compete on price, some don't. Have at it with those who do, you get what you pay for. I'd rather go weld than sell a canned tune with no followup or attach my name to a tune that is not where I want it to be. Do you really want a tune for someone working for $12/hr? Doing something for a passion is all good and why I got into this, but if you want people sticking around, it has to be reasonable.

"Open Source" -- you're more attached than anyone else in this particular debate. If updates stop coming, software has issues, you're relying on ONE person out in the Ukraine to support it. The "community" that uses romraider has great tidbits that help add to the ecu definitions. But you're relying on volunteers. Fine for that 5%, not practical for anyone else. With that said, the true open source openecu/romraider is NOT the software being discussed here, so it is unfair to give it those merits.

"Corporatism" lol

A small shop with maybe less than a dozen employees who bust their butts supporting even the little guy in a high risk field where within months you're undercut by...your own work. I'm pretty sure that's not "corporatist". For those who think any of us private tuners are "corporate", you've not met us. We all drive modded cars and/or race and started this because it makes more sense to LLC up and pay the taxes. How great it is that people have options apart from the seedy places we have seen.

Now back to the "robin hoods," who snoop the handshake, steal one definition (which then is easy to transpose on them ALL) and then give them to you for "free" (oh yeah, just buy the cable and the software + licensing) are like the rolex you get in chinatown. Or the manifold you get on ebay. Most of us don't care because those folks aren't the customer that would want a professional tuner anyway, but I hope nobody thinks that ebay manifold, with mild steel flanges, thing gauge tubing, ill fitting holes--will hold that nice T4 setup for very long. There's a lot more to the backend of this and a reason most of us "professionals" use EcuTek, Cobb, SCT and not open source. Again, you get what you pay for.

It's certainly not because we make more money by paying their license fees. When dealing with numbers and not just your one car, you see the flaws much quicker. Have a flash fail? What if your def isn't supported? What about that nagging problem nobody's figured out, who will support the devs working on it?

The market can decide what happens, but I can tell you with 100% certainty that the market can shoot itself in the foot here. There's many vehicles that have 0 flashing support, and can stay that way because the volunteers aren't there. Take away incentive from the real developers to take the risk, cut the prices on tuning to take the honest folks out, and you're back to the seedy shops using the cheapest platform and booting you out the door so they can sell you that forged engine down the road.

[Dynotronics1]

Originally Posted by moto-mike

Been away the last week and missed most of this, and seems to be a moot point as everyone has their minds pretty much made up. But some misinformation should be cleared up and I'm not known for being silent

Open source is not a term that should be given to anything you pay for or that uses licensing (Tactrix cable, flashing software). So what some think is "free" or "community" derived is filling pockets for someone when talking about the above. The only question is who. The company that put in thousands of man hours or the company who snooped the handshake and copied the def? Before you think robin hood, read on.

DIY editing is fine for 5% of people. The rest have to rely on tuners. Tuners have to rely on good software. Some compete on price, some don't. Have at it with those who do, you get what you pay for. I'd rather go weld than sell a canned tune with no followup or attach my name to a tune that is not where I want it to be. Do you really want a tune for someone working for $12/hr? Doing something for a passion is all good and why I got into this, but if you want people sticking around, it has to be reasonable.

"Open Source" -- you're more attached than anyone else in this particular debate. If updates stop coming, software has issues, you're relying on ONE person out in the Ukraine to support it. The "community" that uses romraider has great tidbits that help add to the ecu definitions. But you're relying on volunteers. Fine for that 5%, not practical for anyone else. With that said, the true open source openecu/romraider is NOT the software being discussed here, so it is unfair to give it those merits.

"Corporatism" lol

A small shop with maybe less than a dozen employees who bust their butts supporting even the little guy in a high risk field where within months you're undercut by...your own work. I'm pretty sure that's not "corporatist". For those who think any of us private tuners are "corporate", you've not met us. We all drive modded cars and/or race and started this because it makes more sense to LLC up and pay the taxes. How great it is that people have options apart from the seedy places we have seen.

Now back to the "robin hoods," who snoop the handshake, steal one definition (which then is easy to transpose on them ALL) and then give them to you for "free" (oh yeah, just buy the cable and the software + licensing) are like the rolex you get in chinatown. Or the manifold you get on ebay. Most of us don't care because those folks aren't the customer that would want a professional tuner anyway, but I hope nobody thinks that ebay manifold, with mild steel flanges, thing gauge tubing, ill fitting holes--will hold that nice T4 setup for very long. There's a lot more to the backend of this and a reason most of us "professionals" use EcuTek, Cobb, SCT and not open source. Again, you get what you pay for.

It's certainly not because we make more money by paying their license fees. When dealing with numbers and not just your one car, you see the flaws much quicker. Have a flash fail? What if your def isn't supported? What about that nagging problem nobody's figured out, who will support the devs working on it?

The market can decide what happens, but I can tell you with 100% certainty that the market can shoot itself in the foot here. There's many vehicles that have 0 flashing support, and can stay that way because the volunteers aren't there. Take away incentive from the real developers to take the risk, cut the prices on tuning to take the honest folks out, and you're back to the seedy shops using the cheapest platform and booting you out the door so they can sell you that forged engine down the road.

Mike, could not have stated it better, well put!

[ft_sjo]

You'll never convince the open-sores freedom fighters, @moto-mike.

[mad_sb]

@moto-mike & @Dynotronics1,

I don't think anyone is arguing that EcuTek is not a good product for tuners, for sure it is.

I think the general consensus in the "alternative" camp is that:
1. We don't want to be locked out of our ecu (with the limitations that this brings)
2. Price is too high for EcuTek cable and license
3. Some of us want a solution we can tune ourselves

I see 1 and 2 as areas that EcuTek can improve on in the future. 3 may be best left to another product. I will say though, if EcuTek had a solution that would allow me to tune my own car at the current price point for the cable and license, i would have gladly paid it at the time.

At the end of the day, competition will make all of the tuning solutions better, since if they don't keep up with the competition they will become obsolete....

[Dodzilla]

Originally Posted by ft_sjo

You'll never convince the open-sores freedom fighters, @moto-mike.

Says the guy who bought BrzEdit because he wanted to tune his own car. And instead of posting any useful information about his BrzEdit experience decides to engage in trolling and flamebait. Where's the ignore user feature when you need it?

[ft_sjo]

You lost me with that one @Dodzilla, I don't see what it has to do with this thread.

Why should I want to share my brzedit experiences? Perhaps I want to license my IP to people?

[qoncept]

Originally Posted by moto-mike

Open source is not a term that should be given to anything you pay for or that uses licensing (Tactrix cable, flashing software).

EcuFlash doesn't use licenses. Do you want Colby to give away the cable for free? I have a source that owns a 20 employee business selling computer cables and the best deal he could get was $90/unit with a minimum order of 5000 cables from China. And that was for the old v1.2 cable with no flash block.

I've had a theory that the only reason EcuFlash was released as "open source" (though the source still hasn't ever been publicly released) was so Colby could sell the cables and not offer any support. But so what? The $3 billion company I worked for didn't have support for the operating systems on half of its servers.

So what some think is "free" or "community" derived is filling pockets for someone when talking about the above.

You're comparing a $180 cable that can be used on as many cars as you can plug it in to to a $500 license plus another couple hundred bucks for every tune? What a greedy, conniving bastard Colby is.

The only question is who. The company that put in thousands of man hours or the company who snooped the handshake and copied the def? Before you think robin hood, read on.

Funny you would start your post with the word "misinformation" and then spread bullshit like that. As I said before, Colby pulled the rom off an ECU on a bench. He's an electrical engineer. Why is it so hard for you to believe someone at Ecutek and Cobb (and at other companies for every single ECU ever made) could figure it out and no one else in the world could?

I'd rather go weld than sell a canned tune with no followup or attach my name to a tune that is not where I want it to be. Do you really want a tune for someone working for $12/hr? Doing something for a passion is all good and why I got into this, but if you want people sticking around, it has to be reasonable.

What are you even talking about? I'd rather have my car tuned by someone competent and getting paid $12 an hour than someone who thinks his time is worth $300 an hour. I paid a plumber $100 an hour and his skill is every bit as special as yours, and he came to my house.

"Open Source" -- you're more attached than anyone else in this particular debate. If updates stop coming, software has issues, you're relying on ONE person out in the Ukraine to support it.

Nice information there. Are you purposely misleading people or do you just not know any better? The only "1 person in the Ukraine" is epifan and brzedit is not open source software, period.

The "community" that uses romraider has great tidbits that help add to the ecu definitions. But you're relying on volunteers. Fine for that 5%, not practical for anyone else.

For the hundreds of ECU revisions already defined you are relying on the past work of volunteers. It's already done and it works.

"Corporatism" lol

A small shop with maybe less than a dozen employees who bust their butts supporting even the little guy in a high risk field where within months you're undercut by...your own work. I'm pretty sure that's not "corporatist". For those who think any of us private tuners are "corporate", you've not met us. We all drive modded cars and/or race and started this because it makes more sense to LLC up and pay the taxes. How great it is that people have options apart from the seedy places we have seen.

Ecutek. Cobb. Not tuners. You wouldn't believe the ridiculous phone calls and emails I've gotten from them. They had their pets calling me and acting like they were on my side to try to get dirt. They paid off totally unrelated companies to sabotage the work I'd done. They hired all the volunteers to get them to stop working on open source projects. And just to make sure there was no mistaking that fact, they hired them part time.

steal one definition (which then is easy to transpose on them ALL)

Didn't happen. There were dozens of ecus defined before the (probably) stolen stuff came up. As you said, easy to transpose from there.

It's certainly not because we make more money by paying their license fees. When dealing with numbers and not just your one car, you see the flaws much quicker. Have a flash fail? What if your def isn't supported? What about that nagging problem nobody's figured out, who will support the devs working on it?

The lack of help on RomRaider has truly surprised me and, honestly, is the most disappointing thing in my life. It seems like half the people on NASIOC are programmers. Why so few of them could put some time in to adding some features is beyond me.

But one thing I'm sure of is if the "professional tuners" would pull their heads out of their asses like, say, DSM or Honda tuners and stop scaremongering, lying and cheating on behalf of Ecutek and Cobb, there would be more OS users and probably more contributors.

Seriously, I truly don't get it. I don't understand how so many professional tuners have swallowed everything Ecutek has said so completely.

The market can decide what happens, but I can tell you with 100% certainty that the market can shoot itself in the foot here.

Yeah, it's been happening for years. The tools are there to tune cars without license fees if just a couple people would step up. Those people are out there but they blindly believe the first thing they're told.

I've been around a long time. I'm curious and I'm a skeptic, so I do a lot of reading. I know that reading and writing from an ECU isn't very difficult. I know that modifying binary data in that file isn't very difficult. I know that tuning isn't that difficult. Not just anyone can do them, and they all take a certain amount of commitment, but they can be learned and a lot more people are capable than you let on.

I had big plans for RomRaider but the slander and legal battles ruined it for me. When I started out all I really wanted was to tune my car for free and I got that, so I guess it worked out.

Cobb and Ecutek may or may not be able compete in a world where professional tuners use free software. Hondata does it. But back in the day Allsop used to make a killing on vinyl record cleaning products. They don't compete anymore, but I never heard them badmouthing CDs.

[qoncept]

Originally Posted by mad_sb

I will say though, if EcuTek had a solution that would allow me to tune my own car at the current price point for the cable and license, i would have gladly paid it at the time.

In retrospect I would have been better off. I spent literally thousands of hours working on RomRaider. If I had a part time job at McDonalds instead I could have tuned a whole lot of cars.

At the end of the day, competition will make all of the tuning solutions better, since if they don't keep up with the competition they will become obsolete....

It has. I can't remember what features they've added since, but if nothing else, the price of AccessPort dropped quite a bit and Street Tuner more than half.

[Dodzilla]

The thread is about EcuTek vs BrzEdit, it could have been useful for everyone to get your thoughts on the actual software since you supposedly have experience using it and most of us don't. Instead you seem to be trying to steer people away from it without posting any actual information, for what purpose I have no idea. You seem to have zero interest in any constructive input, which is why your account is a prime target for an ignore user feature.

Originally Posted by ft_sjo

You lost me with that one @Dodzilla, I don't see what it has to do with this thread.

Why should I want to share my brzedit experiences? Perhaps I want to license my IP to people?

[Foobar]

Originally Posted by Dodzilla

Where's the ignore user feature when you need it?

User CP -> Settings & Options - Edit Ignore List

[zc06_kisstherain]

I wish BRZ / FRS has hondata K-Pro type product to tune. i remember honda forum members shared their data logging and helping each other for tuning with their similar bolts-on setup. also tuners love K-Pro

[coyote]

Originally Posted by qoncept

EcuFlash doesn't use licenses. Do you want Colby to give away the cable for free? I have a source that owns a 20 employee business selling computer cables and the best deal he could get was $90/unit with a minimum order of 5000 cables from China. And that was for the old v1.2 cable with no flash block.

I've had a theory that the only reason EcuFlash was released as "open source" (though the source still hasn't ever been publicly released) was so Colby could sell the cables and not offer any support. But so what? The $3 billion company I worked for didn't have support for the operating systems on half of its servers.


You're comparing a $180 cable that can be used on as many cars as you can plug it in to to a $500 license plus another couple hundred bucks for every tune? What a greedy, conniving bastard Colby is.


Funny you would start your post with the word "misinformation" and then spread bullshit like that. As I said before, Colby pulled the rom off an ECU on a bench. He's an electrical engineer. Why is it so hard for you to believe someone at Ecutek and Cobb (and at other companies for every single ECU ever made) could figure it out and no one else in the world could?


What are you even talking about? I'd rather have my car tuned by someone competent and getting paid $12 an hour than someone who thinks his time is worth $300 an hour. I paid a plumber $100 an hour and his skill is every bit as special as yours, and he came to my house.


Nice information there. Are you purposely misleading people or do you just not know any better? The only "1 person in the Ukraine" is epifan and brzedit is not open source software, period.


For the hundreds of ECU revisions already defined you are relying on the past work of volunteers. It's already done and it works.


Ecutek. Cobb. Not tuners. You wouldn't believe the ridiculous phone calls and emails I've gotten from them. They had their pets calling me and acting like they were on my side to try to get dirt. They paid off totally unrelated companies to sabotage the work I'd done. They hired all the volunteers to get them to stop working on open source projects. And just to make sure there was no mistaking that fact, they hired them part time.


Didn't happen. There were dozens of ecus defined before the (probably) stolen stuff came up. As you said, easy to transpose from there.


The lack of help on RomRaider has truly surprised me and, honestly, is the most disappointing thing in my life. It seems like half the people on NASIOC are programmers. Why so few of them could put some time in to adding some features is beyond me.

But one thing I'm sure of is if the "professional tuners" would pull their heads out of their asses like, say, DSM or Honda tuners and stop scaremongering, lying and cheating on behalf of Ecutek and Cobb, there would be more OS users and probably more contributors.

Seriously, I truly don't get it. I don't understand how so many professional tuners have swallowed everything Ecutek has said so completely.


Yeah, it's been happening for years. The tools are there to tune cars without license fees if just a couple people would step up. Those people are out there but they blindly believe the first thing they're told.

I've been around a long time. I'm curious and I'm a skeptic, so I do a lot of reading. I know that reading and writing from an ECU isn't very difficult. I know that modifying binary data in that file isn't very difficult. I know that tuning isn't that difficult. Not just anyone can do them, and they all take a certain amount of commitment, but they can be learned and a lot more people are capable than you let on.

I had big plans for RomRaider but the slander and legal battles ruined it for me. When I started out all I really wanted was to tune my car for free and I got that, so I guess it worked out.

Cobb and Ecutek may or may not be able compete in a world where professional tuners use free software. Hondata does it. But back in the day Allsop used to make a killing on vinyl record cleaning products. They don't compete anymore, but I never heard them badmouthing CDs.

Great post.

It has always been part of the Ecutek marketing strategy to slander Colby and attempt to mislead people by associating him with Epifan. The know the difference, they choose to mislead.

As a customer you shouldn't be choosing between software packages anyway, you should be choosing between tuners and leaving the tool selection up to them.

The only reason you can't just do that is that some software vendors (okay, one) have a history of lying about locking ecus. We all know who I'm talking about.