Licensed a customer's TCM in FlashScan and now I need to license it in Autocal too?

[whypave]

I did a full reflash for a customer's T43 to go to the corvette tune and get tap shifting with no BCM. Now the customer has the TCM installed and the shift points are off when letting the TCM shift on it's own. The customer has a Mast M90 ECM with L92 engine.

So I purchased an Autocal to be able to send this customer (and other similar customers) a new tune to try and so far I am less than impressed. If I save more than 1 .ctz to the autocal it doesn't have enough space to also read a TCM or ECM.

More importantly even though I've already licensed my own TCM to my flashscan (and the customer's TCM to the flashscan) the autocal is asking me to allocate another license at 62.50 a pop (half of the 125 total fee) to be able to tune my own TCM. Presumably it will do the same for my customer's TCM. What is the point of this expensive device if it needs to be linked to the Flashscan 2 but yet it has it's own license fees? It would be cheaper to send the entire flashscan to them and then leverage a deposit to hopefully get it back from them.

Is there a way to link licenses between the autocal and Flashscan and not just whatever junk the main "link" provides?

Also why are three different pieces of software for the v8 software required just to edit the files/settings for the Autocal. It sure would be nice to open just one piece of software, be able to write 5 tunes or so with space left over for some scans and reads and then have all the licenses linked that I've already paid for in the Flashscan II.

[Blacky]

So I purchased an Autocal to be able to send this customer (and other similar customers) a new tune to try and so far I am less than impressed. If I save more than 1 .ctz to the autocal it doesn't have enough space to also read a TCM or ECM.

Use the *.coz file format instead of the *.ctz format. The *.coz format only stores the calibration data (not the operating system data) so it can only be used for calibration-only flashes. *.coz files are very small compared to the full sized *.ctz files.

To save a *.coz file, use the V8 software and select the drop down option as shown in the image below.
13446


More importantly even though I've already licensed my own TCM to my flashscan (and the customer's TCM to the flashscan) the autocal is asking me to allocate another license at 62.50 a pop (half of the 125 total fee) to be able to tune my own TCM. Presumably it will do the same for my customer's TCM. What is the point of this expensive device if it needs to be linked to the Flashscan 2 but yet it has it's own license fees? It would be cheaper to send the entire flashscan to them and then leverage a deposit to hopefully get it back from them.

AutoCal devices are shipped with one VIN license included in the purchase price, one slot for an ECM and one for a TCM. You do not need to purchase additional licenses for AutoCal. You do however need to activate the license that ships with the device.

Although you may purchase additional licenses for an AutoCal device, it is not and never was intended to be used on multiple vehicles. It was designed and is sold primarily to be used on a single vehicle (or possibly on multiple vehicles at the same location by purchasing extra VIN license). If you want to support multiple remote vehicles at different locations then you really should purchase multiple AutoCal devices. If you would prefer to ship your FlashScan device to/from your customers you are free to do that, but I think using one AutoCal per customer is far more convenient albeit more expensive. You get to decide how you deliver your tunes.


Is there a way to link licenses between the autocal and Flashscan and not just whatever junk the main "link" provides?
Not sure what you mean, you MUST link the AutoCal to a master FlashScan device. That protects our investment in providing AutoCal devices and provides you with peace of mind that no other tuner can undermine your ability to deliver their own tunes to your customers using the AutoCals that you supplied. Prior to flashing a controller your customer MUST activate the included VIN license. Once for the ECM and once for the TCM.


Also why are three different pieces of software for the v8 software required just to edit the files/settings for the Autocal. It sure would be nice to open just one piece of software, be able to write 5 tunes or so with space left over for some scans and reads and then have all the licenses linked that I've already paid for in the Flashscan II.
See previous comment about trying to support multiple vehicles on a single AutoCal - it is not designed for that.

Also see this page for an explanation on multiple software versions: http://www.efilive.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=48&Itemid=133



Why are there two versions of EFILive's software (V7 and V8)?

We are currently in a transition phase from the current V7 software to the new V8 software. The new V8 software supports the standalone features: BBL (Black Box Logging), BBR (Black Box Reading) and BBF (Black Box Flashing) collectively known as BBx. V8 will eventually include new and improved Scan-Tool and Tune-Tool software. However, until then you must continue to use the current V7 software for pass-through logging and tune file editing. Even if you don't intend to use the BBx features of the V8 software, you must still download and install it because it contains the FlashScan and AutoCal firmware updates.Those firmware updates are required even if you are using the V7 software exclusively.
Its not an ideal situation and we are working on the V8 software to bring it up to speed as soon as possible.

The requirement to copy files using the program EFILive_Explorer is being built into the V8 tuning tool. When the V8 tuning tool software is available, you will be able to choose to save tune files directly to your AutoCal device if you want to.

Regards
Paul

[whypave]

Close to $300 seems like a lot of extra money to build into the price of tuning for a customer. I am doing this as a side gig so I haven't built out a full business around this but if a 5 pack of these is $1495 and you should only use them for one customer, wouldn't you then have to add $299 at least to the price of each job?

I purchased a single autocal from one of your resellers and my understanding was if I had already licensed the customer's TCM and or ECM via the FlashScan I could use the autocal (on up to 8 devices) to remotely update their tunees etc. But now I understand what sounds like EFI Live's official position that you intend this device to be shipped to one customer and the only reason you'd add more licenses/devices programmed to the Autocal is if that one customer had multiple vehicles.

I would really rather use the autocal so that I could initially tune the customers ECM and TCM local to me and then tweak the tunes if needed remotely without using more licenses. It sounds like this is only possible if I do the initial tune via the autocal and then send the autocal to them for further tunes and get it back from them. Most of my tunes include full reflashes of T43 escalade TCMs to use the Corvette OS and I'd rather do that locally so I can control the process.

Thank you for the information on the more compact .coz file. It still seems pretty limiting to me that there is only 6mb of space on a $300 dongle but maybe the competitions devices are similar.

thank you for the detailed answers!