Как настроить автомобильный компьютер ActiSafeti A500

[tatiana]

,Купил автомобильный компьютер obd2 A500, а он на шевроле лачетти 2006 года ничего кроме заряда аккумулятора не показывает. Не знаю что делать.В китай возвращать не вариант.Не могу понять, настроить нужно или прошивка не подходит?Если кто знает,подскажите!  :'(HELP


,I bought an obd2 A500 car computer, but on a 2006 Chevrolet Lacetti it doesn’t show anything except the battery charge. I don’t know what to do. Returning to China is not an option. I can’t understand whether I need to configure it or whether the firmware is not suitable? If anyone knows, tell me!

[brucehoult]

С Рождеством!

The two most likely reasons are:

- dust in the port preventing a good connection, if it has not been used for a long time

- a blown fuse. Often the fuse is shared with something like the cigarette lighter, which can blow if something like a too powerful compressor or inverter is plugged in there.

[darkspr1te]

I bought an obd2 A500 car computer, but on a 2006 Chevrolet Lacetti it doesn’t show anything except the battery charge. I don’t know what to do. Returning to China is not an option. I can’t understand whether I need to configure it or whether the firmware is not suitable? If anyone knows, tell me!

I have the actisafety A500/A600 and A700 models, under settings the is a section on PID , you may have to set that to manual. These units only tend to work with common OBD2 devices (typical american cars/eu cars) but not with JDM/Asia market cars
Battery charge is not OBD2 but the device actually reads the 12v signal on pin 16 of the OBD2 socket.
Also actisafety do say that they only generally support 2019 and newer models.

darkspr1te

[Simon]

Please only post in English, as you can see google translate does a fine job.

[logger100]

Hi Tatiana. Do you still have that A500? I had it in the past and I remember it was very similar to my A401 which I use in my car now. I have not got that A500 working, and when I bought A401 it did not work with my car too, but I found a solution.

With ignition ON and engine working, connect your A500 do the OBD2 socket. Go to "SYSTEM SET" menu and find "COMD SEARCH" option. It sets OBD2 protocol to be used by OBD2 display with a car. By default it is set to "AUTO". You need to change it to other settings one by one to find proper protocol. Change it to the first available setting  (for example: 7E0) and confirm. The device restarts now. Wait one minute and observe if it starts providing data other than voltage. If not, try another option in  "COMD SEARCH" menu. Check every option this way. I can not remember if it is named the same in A500, I got this menu name from my A401, but as I said, they are very similar.

This way I got a401 working with my 1.6 BSE engine. And I found another problem. They update firmware in A401 from time to time and since year 2023 it stopped working with my car. They somewhat dropped support for my protocol or there is a bug in the new firmware. So even if the protocol is right, the car is right there may be another factor that causes a fatall failure.

[Refrigerator]

,Купил автомобильный компьютер obd2 A500, а он на шевроле лачетти 2006 года ничего кроме заряда аккумулятора не показывает. Не знаю что делать.В китай возвращать не вариант.Не могу понять, настроить нужно или прошивка не подходит?Если кто знает,подскажите!  :'(HELP


,I bought an obd2 A500 car computer, but on a 2006 Chevrolet Lacetti it doesn’t show anything except the battery charge. I don’t know what to do. Returning to China is not an option. I can’t understand whether I need to configure it or whether the firmware is not suitable? If anyone knows, tell me!

Usually these take their voltage measurement directly from their own supply voltage and this does not require a valid data connection to the vehicle.
If no other data is showing up then it means that it's not being transferred over the OBD connection.
What you need to do is check if your connection to the car is good and also check if your device is configured for the appropriate communications standard.
Communications standards are configured mostly in software and are different between vehicles depending on their year of manufacture and their make.

[MrAl]

,Купил автомобильный компьютер obd2 A500, а он на шевроле лачетти 2006 года ничего кроме заряда аккумулятора не показывает. Не знаю что делать.В китай возвращать не вариант.Не могу понять, настроить нужно или прошивка не подходит?Если кто знает,подскажите!  :'(HELP


,I bought an obd2 A500 car computer, but on a 2006 Chevrolet Lacetti it doesn’t show anything except the battery charge. I don’t know what to do. Returning to China is not an option. I can’t understand whether I need to configure it or whether the firmware is not suitable? If anyone knows, tell me!

Hello,

These devices usually have a list of compatible vehicles.  If yours is not on the list, it may not work.
If it does not have a list, don't buy it.  If you bought it already, your only option left may be to sell it.

[logger100]

These devices usually have a list of compatible vehicles.  If yours is not on the list, it may not work.
If it does not have a list, don't buy it.  If you bought it already, your only option left may be to sell it.

If I followed this or similar guide. I would never get OBD2 computers that suit my needs working with my car, because my car is usually not on a "list". At the beginning of my struggles  I tried several OBD2 displays which could not connect with the car at all. Here is my hardware:
Car engine is VAG made, 1.6L gasoline engine, codename  BSE.
ECU is Siemens Simos 7.1
ECU broadcasts obd2 data using specific obd2 protocol, which is ISO14230-4 (KWP2000) (5 baud init,10.4 Kbaud). The "init" means it needs a signal from OBD2 display to start a connection.

Here is the path I walked to get my OBD2 displays working:
KW681 diagnostic tool helped me to find out which protocol my ECU uses.
Then I saw on the Internet, on customers added pictures, that there is one OBD2 display that supports this protocol.
It was Autool X60 - mini, round OBD2 screen. When I tried it, it automatically recognised OBD2 protocol and set itself to use it every time. It tests every protocol at the first startup, displaying tested protocol, then remembers which one works and does not search for it later.
Another one I used with success was Actisafety A401, AKA AP-1/AP1, AKA P8 HUD, however it did not connect automatically. It required me to set protocol manually and/or set car make manually (I am about to determine the role of car make setting in this success, because Actisafety support told me  it is intended to solve car make-specific problems). I prefer A401 over X60 because it can be conveniently mounted at the top of windshield (for some reason they do not suggest this place but its the most ergonomic place in my opinion). I need it do display ECT (+ high temperature alarm), battery voltage (+ low battery alarm), and OBD2 vehicle speed, calibrated according to actual tire wear.

So to get given OBD2 computer working with a car, you need to know OBD2 protocol used by its ECU and know, whether the computer supports this protocol. Different protocols use different cable pairs. Some hints on this are in the attachment and under this link:
http://www.obdtester.com/obd2_protocols

[MrAl]

These devices usually have a list of compatible vehicles.  If yours is not on the list, it may not work.
If it does not have a list, don't buy it.  If you bought it already, your only option left may be to sell it.

If I followed this or similar guide. I would never get OBD2 computers that suit my needs working with my car, because my car is usually not on a "list". At the beginning of my struggles  I tried several OBD2 displays which could not connect with the car at all.

Hi,

Sorry, but this does not seem to make any sense.  That's because of the words "never" and "usually".
You are saying that you would "never" get an OBD2 device because your car is "usually" not on any list.  That means sometimes it is on a list
So, if you can never get an OBD2 device it can't be because you did not find it on any list.
The word "never" means something cannot happen at any time, the word "usually" means something can happen sometimes.  So which is it.
Maybe you can clarify that.

What is strange though is you did not seem to mention what make and model car you have.

However, it's nice to know you found something that worked.  I know sometimes it is not easy to find test equipment that works the way we want it to.

[logger100]

Hi,

Sorry, but this does not seem to make any sense.  That's because of the words "never" and "usually".
You are saying that you would "never" get an OBD2 device because your car is "usually" not on any list.  That means sometimes it is on a list
So, if you can never get an OBD2 device it can't be because you did not find it on any list.
The word "never" means something cannot happen at any time, the word "usually" means something can happen sometimes.  So which is it.
Maybe you can clarify that.

What is strange though is you did not seem to mention what make and model car you have.

However, it's nice to know you found something that worked.  I know sometimes it is not easy to find test equipment that works the way we want it to.

OK, I'll be strict. The car is Skoda Octavia II. I have never seen it on a list of compatible cars nor on an exclusion list. Does it mean none of OBD displays would work? No. Its engine (and the same ECU probably) can be found in other 2004-2013 Skoda models, as well as many other VAG makes (Audi, Volksvagen, Seat) and their different models. These lists are very general. They may say "works for most of cars after 2007" and there the "list" ends, so basically there are no useful lists.

I wanted to have D-Meter 2 with OLED display but I dropped the Idea as soon as I saw in its pictures it has not physical connection to pins in OBD plug, corresponding KWP2000 protocol, so it won't work for me for sure. An there is no list of compatible cars for this nice, expensive gadget. The sellers often don't know what they sell, they're not familiar with hardware specifications.

[MrAl]

Hi,

Sorry, but this does not seem to make any sense.  That's because of the words "never" and "usually".
You are saying that you would "never" get an OBD2 device because your car is "usually" not on any list.  That means sometimes it is on a list
So, if you can never get an OBD2 device it can't be because you did not find it on any list.
The word "never" means something cannot happen at any time, the word "usually" means something can happen sometimes.  So which is it.
Maybe you can clarify that.

What is strange though is you did not seem to mention what make and model car you have.

However, it's nice to know you found something that worked.  I know sometimes it is not easy to find test equipment that works the way we want it to.

OK, I'll be strict. The car is Skoda Octavia II. I have never seen it on a list of compatible cars nor on an exclusion list. Does it mean none of OBD displays would work? No. Its engine (and the same ECU probably) can be found in other 2004-2013 Skoda models, as well as many other VAG makes (Audi, Volksvagen, Seat) and their different models. These lists are very general. They may say "works for most of cars after 2007" and there the "list" ends, so basically there are no useful lists.

I wanted to have D-Meter 2 with OLED display but I dropped the Idea as soon as I saw in its pictures it has not physical connection to pins in OBD plug, corresponding KWP2000 protocol, so it won't work for me for sure. An there is no list of compatible cars for this nice, expensive gadget. The sellers often don't know what they sell, they're not familiar with hardware specifications.

Hello again,

Oh ok, well when you said "usually" that did not mean the same thing as "never" so that led to a bit of confusion.  It's probably just a matter of how we speak sometimes often being more casual.

The only other thing that might help is to find a forum for that particular car then.  If there is a forum you can ask other members, but if there actually is a forum I would bet that this question had come up several times already.
I actually had to do that with a Volvo I had in the past.  That car was the biggest pain in the azz.  I never had a car that troublesome in my life. 
It turned out that there was a host of different OBD2 options, including a whole software suite that was used with that type of car.  You may find something that helps providing there is such a site for your car too.

Good luck with it.