ECUflash dsmlink ecmlink vs evo 8 ecu evoscan ecuflash

[colbyc]

Wideband of course. You'll always need a wideband. Safc no unless you don't plan on flashing the ecu and just logging with evoscan. But even then for the price of a safc you could get the 2.0 cable ;P

 

[Absit]

You still need a wideband controller, you should burn your SAFC.

 

[91stocker]

You still need a wideband controller, you should burn your SAFC.

Hey now they arent so bad . Went 12.5 on a ebay 16g and a safc a couple years ago. Just much much better options now haha.

Uhh Lets see. I get in soo many arguments about this subject because I went the "cheap route"

ECMLink/DSMLink:
Requires very expensive (unless you have hookups) Eprom ECU if not stock to your car (95 people only)
Requires ECU to be Socketed
Requires CAS or Spark Wires inverted for non 95 people.
Costs anywhere from 1-200 bucks for older Versions that are MAF Dependant and around 600 bucks before ECU for ECMLink with Speed Density
Software for ECMLink is awesome, its Novice Tuning setup is ungodly bad ass!

ECUFlash/H8 ECU
Requires More Common, Most likely Stock To Your Car ECU called the H8 ECU, AKA Black Box.
Doesn't Require Any Mods (except to 96-97 people need to add a wire to their ECU to connect to the OP)
Requires 50-160 dollar OpenPort 2.0
Requires Free ECUFlash Software which in my eyes is identical to DSMLink and ECMLink's software except for the novice mode.
Speed Density is achievable by CeddyMods.

In my eyes, its a No Brainer, ECUFlash. Speed Density, Complete Control of the ECU. Anti Lag, NLTS, Launch Control. And its cheap! A TON cheaper than DSMLink/ECMLink. And Requires Less modification if your not a Native H8 guy like me. My car is a 97. However did not come with an ECU regardless so I needed to buy one. I got my ECU For 70 bucks. Just picked up another one for shipping costs! Since I'm a 97 all I had to do was make a flash wire which was easy as hell, that connected directly to the ECU Plug and connects to the OpenPort. This isn't required on Native H8 Cars. You just plug and play!

Freshly opening the OpenPort 2.0 Box you can tune the ECU every single way you can with DSMLink. There is no differences in tuning.
However by downloading the CeddyMods_1v9Cb.rar from Ceddy's website you get all the functionality of ECMLink V3 including Speed Density, MAF Scaling, Anti-Lag, Launch Control, NLTS and you can tune up to 11,000rpm! On top of everything, it has stand alone data logging to an SD Card! No computer needed. Plug in the OpenPort2.0 and drive. Make runs, drive to work, drive to school, Race that Mustang while living your life a 1/4 mile at a time... sorry.... It logs everything. And the program can use the logs to scale your MAF Sensor, and tune for MAP/IAT Sensor.

ECUFlash Software is easy to use:

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The whole setup of the OpenPort/ECUFlash/EvoScan/H8 ECU in my honest opinion is 10x better than ECMLink and 100x better than DSMLink. If your a 96-99 car, Especially if your a 98-99 car, DSMLink/ECMLink doesn't even compare. If your a 95 car, I say socket your stock ECU, and run Link. You'll still spend more for Link.

I honestly can't say a thing about the Evo ECU because I just don't know, but guessing it would be hard to locate an Evo ECU over an Eprom or H8 ECU. Think of all those 98-99 DSM's that are using Link and don't want their stock ecu's?

I hope this was useful.

/thread

tagged that as helpful. great info

 

[Silver2GST]

Explain yourself.... Cause this statement is 100% false...

How many Evo's you seeing handing over their ECU's? How many 98-99 DSM's? The Ratio is more like 10 DSM's to every 1 Evo. Think of the past 10+ years 98-99 DSM owners, going the DSMLink Route. No need to switch to ECUFlash, they can keep what they have now. So they have their stock ECU Laying around...

It is not 100% false. You acting like a fool. Buddy, once DSMers found out the the 98/99 ECU was flash-able, the price went up.

--- anyways ---

The evo VIII ECU is cheap. I got mine for $50 on eBay. And Keydiver (Jeff-O) sells 1.3M FLASH cables for $70. That is $120 total I paid for an EVO ECU + required harware. I also got EVOSSCAN for $25, but you have many options as far as logging. ECUFlash is free and you don't need EVOSCAN at all.

The H8 ECU is still young. It has a limited community working on it and they do a great job. Guys like Ceddy have really opened it up. I tried my hand at disassembling the H8 code 5 years ago and the community was non-existent. Anyone who knew anything just wanted to make a buck, like the subby community. The EVO community is great and very much alive. Most of the main coders have moved on to the EVO X platform, but 6 years of hard work on the VIII ECU has really paid off.

I have had my EVO 8 ECU for over 2 years. As soon as the beans about RRE putting a EVO ecu into a customers car hit DSMtuners I was on the boat Thanks RRE and company for sharing that gem. I have to say its one of the threads I respect on this site (my name is acidikjuice on Talk).

ECMLink is only expensive if you own a DSM. Most tuning options as nice and platform specific as ECMLink cost twice as much or more for any other car. DSMers have one heck of a product for the money, hands down one of the best. DSM owners just tend to be cheap, and think ECMLink is expensive. They lack experience with other platforms and don't realize how hard other platforms have it; we are spoiled DSMers Not hating, just saying. I'm cheap too, .

Socket 95 ECUs are cheap. I can't even sell mine for $120 these days, been sitting on my desk since I swapped (3 years!).

The EVO 8 ECU has so many beneifits, I'm not going to list them. Its crazy. The downside is your going to have to put plenty of time into it to get the most out of it. ECMLink is very easy and doesn't require so much time.

As an engineer, I make good money per hour. If I add up the hours I spent reading up and playing with the EVO ecu, I have spent 1000's of dollars in time with it. With ECMLink, I might have only spent a few hours here and there to get a good tune. So, it really depends on how you add up the TRUE cost.

The H8 is somewhere in the middle. Cheap, but not as feature rich as the EVO 8 ECU. For what you can do with it, you really don't have to learn or read as much as the EVO 8 ECU owners do. It is simpler because it has less features and less install issues.

---- the final word ----

ECMLink: More expensive upfront, cheaper in the long run and less fuss. Very user and tuner friendly.

EVO 8 ECU: Less initial cost, but more costly in the long run (time==money). I think its more fun to play with and explore this option. So if your a tweaker/hacker/engineer ... you WILL enjoy this! Tuner friendly too, but steeper learning curve.

98/99 H8 ECU: Somewhere in the middle. Less fuss but less features. Less to learn. Can be cheap as hell upfront, and might cost more in the end then ECMLink.

** Feel free to ask any EVO 8 ECU questions. I know it inside out.

If you want to argue my point that ECMlink is cheaper in the end, lets do it. But your going to have to admit your time is worthless (Taco Bell?)

 

[m_0ney_pit]

the price still hovers around $125-150 for that ecu. and since 2/5 of 2gs have this ecu I'd say its pretty common and not in danger of going up further.

 

[onefast2gdsm]

** Feel free to ask any EVO 8 ECU questions. I know it inside out.

If you want to argue my point that ECMlink is cheaper in the end, lets do it. But your going to have to admit your time is worthless (Taco Bell?)

I just recently bought an h8 Ecu. What benefits does the evolution ecu have over it? I want to know before I buy the 170 dollar tactrix 2.0 cable.

Sent from my PC36100 using Tapatalk

 

[Tanro]

ECMLink/DSMLink:
Requires very expensive (unless you have hookups) Eprom ECU if not stock to your car (95 people only)

ECUFlash/H8 ECU
Requires More Common, Most likely Stock To Your Car ECU called the H8 ECU, AKA Black Box.


is 10x better than ECMLink and 100x better than DSMLink.

You try to find a 98 or 99 on a junkyard. Well I have never seen one or I would pull the ECU and sell it because I know its a very good. ECU. And you can run basically free tuning with it.

Now go the same yard. Your likely to see 5-6 95-96 cars. Of those say half are 95. At least one will have an ecu. Pull it out, pay 20$ and your out the door.

ECM and DSMLink are the same thing....

I would go with DSMLink unless you allready have a blackbox ecu/evo ecu. Or can get one for free. If your in a 1g and want a plug and play eprom its a bit more difficult to come upon one. But basically every 95 I have pulled an acu from had an eprom. I love looking for 2ga turbo cars on junkyards because I have a 50/50 chance of making a hundred or so bucks in 10 minutes worth of work.

The price for the someone who isn't very good with a soldering iron (I am miserable at soldering) and I really hate any type of electrical work. I am sure there an many out there that are the same way.

ECUFlash/Evoscan are the DIYer Tuning setup. You just end up having to do so much more work to make/convert stuff that the oppurtunity cost end up not being worth the 100-300$ you might save.

 

[gst96spyderman]

so here's whats going to be bought to run evoscan w/ my 99 ecu. What am I missing?

EvoScan 1.3D USB OBDII/MUTIII/SSMII Datalogging Cable

Mitsubishi Reflash Connector I'm not sure if i need this.

and

Tactrix Openport 2.0 with reflash adapter. Shit. I hope there is something I don't need to tune and datalog