Star Diagnosis
06-25-2005, 11:10 PM
#1
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'06 C350 4MATIC
Star Diagnosis
Are there Star Diagnosis computers available for purchase either new or used.
Does anyone make a "clone" Star Diagnosis unit?
Right now I am not worrying about price. (Maybach owners understand that).
If I need to make one I will, I have exceptional hardware design skills but am a little light where it comes to programming. My sometime boyfriend and his friend (who I want to be his sometime girlfriend) are very good programmers.
Any ideas?
What I want to explore is the in-depth programming and firmware of the COMMAND units.
thanks
Tish
Does anyone make a "clone" Star Diagnosis unit?
Right now I am not worrying about price. (Maybach owners understand that).
If I need to make one I will, I have exceptional hardware design skills but am a little light where it comes to programming. My sometime boyfriend and his friend (who I want to be his sometime girlfriend) are very good programmers.
Any ideas?
What I want to explore is the in-depth programming and firmware of the COMMAND units.
thanks
Tish
06-25-2005, 11:41 PM
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E550 Coupe
im sure you can buy one from a dealer...my independent mechanic used to have one but he got rid of it because every year he had to buy the updates and it became pointless after a while.
06-26-2005, 03:08 AM
#5
The cost of an SDS machine is huge from MB as all dealers lease their SDS machines. Now let me get this straight.. you have a sometimes boyfriend but would rather be his friends sometimes girlfriend? Sounds like you are playing with fire to me.. Now when I look at your profile, it appears as if you are buying a 06 c350.. what in the world do you need an SDS for? The car is under warranty..
06-26-2005, 01:00 PM
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'06 C350 4MATIC
Star
Sure it's under warranty, but I can't poke around with the internals, adding mods, etc.. unless I have a decent way to access it's internal network.
It seems that every time someone wants to do something to enhance their MB they need to go find someone with Star D so they can activate the feature. Since I don't live on the east or west coast where most of y'all seem to be I would have to wait weeks or months before I could activate anything I installed that required bus communications.
There appear to be some gems with the techs at some MB dealerships who will work with you. But there have also been a few purists who believe that you keep it the way you bought it and don't go changing things.
It seems that every time someone wants to do something to enhance their MB they need to go find someone with Star D so they can activate the feature. Since I don't live on the east or west coast where most of y'all seem to be I would have to wait weeks or months before I could activate anything I installed that required bus communications.
There appear to be some gems with the techs at some MB dealerships who will work with you. But there have also been a few purists who believe that you keep it the way you bought it and don't go changing things.
06-26-2005, 02:44 PM
#7
In the realm of modifications what do you think an SDS is capable of? There are some features we can activate, but when tinkering with modifcations, changing engine maps.. not going to happen, at least not with an SDS.
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06-26-2005, 10:27 PM
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'06 C350 4MATIC
Star Mods
Heavens no, I would not want to dink around with the engine settings. A disproportonate number of enthusiasts who play around with stuff like that are found, broken down on the side of the road. When their car gets towed into the shop the first words out of the mechanic's mouth are "whoowee, I aint never seen a crankshaft go THAT far." (southern translation included at no extra charge)
My interests are in the COMMAND system, Telematics, CAN and MOST bus monitoring, adding devices like Distronic, Parktronic, parking cameras and mobile computing integration.
As an engineering professional some of my talents are in the dissecting of communications protocols, getting to OSI model layer 7 applications data and converting it into other formats for manipulation or display. (think of realtime data from a vehicle getting put into a SQL database for later analysis)
I have worked on automotive manufacturing lines using Siemens controllers running PROFIBUS, Allen Bradley using DH+, electric utilities using DNP-3 many MODBUS control applications and with Ethernet based process control systems. Many of these systems I have to go into usually are lacking in documentation of what was there before and so we can convert it to a new system, I have to reverse engineer the existing system and then design a new hardware and software suite to control the application.
I think I am up to the task of gradually unraveling what MB is doing on the busses. Interfacing to, and capturing data for later analysis I think that I can interpet some of what they are doing.
Why I asked about StarDiagnose is so I can make changes to my own soon-to-be-arriving vehicle. I did the same thing with the two VW Passat's I had before and found it fun to pick things apart, to turn on features that were disabled because it was shipped to the states.
It's big ideas but I am not going to be spending my time putting on chrome wheels or lime green **** carpeting on the dashboard. I want to know "the ghost in the machine".
My interests are in the COMMAND system, Telematics, CAN and MOST bus monitoring, adding devices like Distronic, Parktronic, parking cameras and mobile computing integration.
As an engineering professional some of my talents are in the dissecting of communications protocols, getting to OSI model layer 7 applications data and converting it into other formats for manipulation or display. (think of realtime data from a vehicle getting put into a SQL database for later analysis)
I have worked on automotive manufacturing lines using Siemens controllers running PROFIBUS, Allen Bradley using DH+, electric utilities using DNP-3 many MODBUS control applications and with Ethernet based process control systems. Many of these systems I have to go into usually are lacking in documentation of what was there before and so we can convert it to a new system, I have to reverse engineer the existing system and then design a new hardware and software suite to control the application.
I think I am up to the task of gradually unraveling what MB is doing on the busses. Interfacing to, and capturing data for later analysis I think that I can interpet some of what they are doing.
Why I asked about StarDiagnose is so I can make changes to my own soon-to-be-arriving vehicle. I did the same thing with the two VW Passat's I had before and found it fun to pick things apart, to turn on features that were disabled because it was shipped to the states.
It's big ideas but I am not going to be spending my time putting on chrome wheels or lime green **** carpeting on the dashboard. I want to know "the ghost in the machine".
06-26-2005, 11:14 PM
#9
Alright, I understand where you are coming from. However, in order to "install and activate" the majority of the features you are talking about is going to take $$$ to obtain the hardware for the item in question. Also, before you jump into this take this example to heart.. One option is cornering fog lamps, a simple option to turn on with the SDS right? Wrong actually. In order to activate a feature like this you need a completely different front sam (signal aquisition module). Can and most bus monitoring, not sure what you want to monitor, but MB does not really have a way of looking at the workings of Most/CAN using SDS. If you want to see the frequency and signal voltage a certain message is on the CAN network, just hook up an o-scope. If you plan on adding for instance a CD changer, yes it needs to be coded in the system but just order it with one.. it's cheaper in the end. Figuring out what MB does and how, really is not that difficult. What you need to do is possibly obtain some MB education materials.. How you obtain these materials is up to you, though a current MB tech would be the best. PM me if you need help. I'm just saying that it's going to be an expensive venture for you to figure out whats going on. If you have the money and don't mind, then by all means, have fun.
06-26-2005, 11:22 PM
#10
Sunman- $400 for a couple year lease. I'm sure this includes all updates as well, correct? If you can lease an SDS for a couple years at the cost of $400, you might want to go notify all the MB dealers in the area, they will probably hire you on to run the company. I guess this explains why independants are always severly lacking SDS machines. Hell at $400 they could raise their labor rate $1 and have the shop filled. I guess thats why in an 80 bay shop there are only 15 available. At a price that low every tech would have 2.
06-26-2005, 11:50 PM
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E550 Coupe
ohh authorized...then thats a diff story haha. in my area, "authorized" means "dealer." can you resell them to people that are not "authorized" since you have your own? they dont have to know its missing!
06-26-2005, 11:56 PM
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Before you run your mouth about my post sun(LOSER)man, You could ask me where I got that total from! As from the person who just posted, it was for a used machine from a dealership who ACTUALLY bought it from MB. They went out of business and were selling it. I declined to purchase it though. As for the WIS and DAS programs, I have both of them with the activation keys, and it only cost me 100 bucks! Sounds like you were scammed mister know it all!
Last edited by Needing2knowDud; 06-26-2005 at 11:59 PM.
06-27-2005, 12:31 AM
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1959 220S / 1979 230 G / 2002 A210 AMG / 2003 C320 SC / 2004.5 C320 SS / 2005 ML350 SE / 2008 smart
Originally Posted by Needing2knowDud
Before you run your mouth about my post sun(LOSER)man, You could ask me where I got that total from! As from the person who just posted, it was for a used machine from a dealership who ACTUALLY bought it from MB. They went out of business and were selling it. I declined to purchase it though. As for the WIS and DAS programs, I have both of them with the activation keys, and it only cost me 100 bucks! Sounds like you were scammed mister know it all!
06-27-2005, 07:42 AM
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'06 C350 4MATIC
mercedestech2, thank you for your informative post. Yes, I need to learn more before I dive in and I am going to make an effort to garner as much information as possible. I had also considered scoping the outputs, buying a fiber-copper interface and putting a protocol analyzer on the data. That's a fairly low cost venture since I have those tools already at my disposal.
I know that you guys are passionate about your vehicles and while I had mentioned Sunman the same applies for other posters who have offered useful, positive ideas that can be adapted to each of our situations. Everyone's MB is different, we live in different circumstances and have different ideas of what we want to do to make our cars unique.
I have lurked for months, follow and post in five different forums (always the same nick). I have seen good ideas everywhere, some that were planned out and implimented well. Others that serve as a warning to the attentive about the difficulties of some modifications. I do not say "impossible", just about anything is possible if you have two of the three; heart, time, money.
I know that you guys are passionate about your vehicles and while I had mentioned Sunman the same applies for other posters who have offered useful, positive ideas that can be adapted to each of our situations. Everyone's MB is different, we live in different circumstances and have different ideas of what we want to do to make our cars unique.
I have lurked for months, follow and post in five different forums (always the same nick). I have seen good ideas everywhere, some that were planned out and implimented well. Others that serve as a warning to the attentive about the difficulties of some modifications. I do not say "impossible", just about anything is possible if you have two of the three; heart, time, money.
06-27-2005, 06:19 PM
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Originally Posted by Tishers
Heavens no, I would not want to dink around with the engine settings. A disproportonate number of enthusiasts who play around with stuff like that are found, broken down on the side of the road. When their car gets towed into the shop the first words out of the mechanic's mouth are "whoowee, I aint never seen a crankshaft go THAT far." (southern translation included at no extra charge)
My interests are in the COMMAND system, Telematics, CAN and MOST bus monitoring, adding devices like Distronic, Parktronic, parking cameras and mobile computing integration.
As an engineering professional some of my talents are in the dissecting of communications protocols, getting to OSI model layer 7 applications data and converting it into other formats for manipulation or display. (think of realtime data from a vehicle getting put into a SQL database for later analysis)
I have worked on automotive manufacturing lines using Siemens controllers running PROFIBUS, Allen Bradley using DH+, electric utilities using DNP-3 many MODBUS control applications and with Ethernet based process control systems. Many of these systems I have to go into usually are lacking in documentation of what was there before and so we can convert it to a new system, I have to reverse engineer the existing system and then design a new hardware and software suite to control the application.
I think I am up to the task of gradually unraveling what MB is doing on the busses. Interfacing to, and capturing data for later analysis I think that I can interpet some of what they are doing.
Why I asked about StarDiagnose is so I can make changes to my own soon-to-be-arriving vehicle. I did the same thing with the two VW Passat's I had before and found it fun to pick things apart, to turn on features that were disabled because it was shipped to the states.
It's big ideas but I am not going to be spending my time putting on chrome wheels or lime green **** carpeting on the dashboard. I want to know "the ghost in the machine".
My interests are in the COMMAND system, Telematics, CAN and MOST bus monitoring, adding devices like Distronic, Parktronic, parking cameras and mobile computing integration.
As an engineering professional some of my talents are in the dissecting of communications protocols, getting to OSI model layer 7 applications data and converting it into other formats for manipulation or display. (think of realtime data from a vehicle getting put into a SQL database for later analysis)
I have worked on automotive manufacturing lines using Siemens controllers running PROFIBUS, Allen Bradley using DH+, electric utilities using DNP-3 many MODBUS control applications and with Ethernet based process control systems. Many of these systems I have to go into usually are lacking in documentation of what was there before and so we can convert it to a new system, I have to reverse engineer the existing system and then design a new hardware and software suite to control the application.
I think I am up to the task of gradually unraveling what MB is doing on the busses. Interfacing to, and capturing data for later analysis I think that I can interpet some of what they are doing.
Why I asked about StarDiagnose is so I can make changes to my own soon-to-be-arriving vehicle. I did the same thing with the two VW Passat's I had before and found it fun to pick things apart, to turn on features that were disabled because it was shipped to the states.
It's big ideas but I am not going to be spending my time putting on chrome wheels or lime green **** carpeting on the dashboard. I want to know "the ghost in the machine".
Last edited by BMWEATR; 06-27-2005 at 06:24 PM.
