Your personal favorite tuning system
 

Hey, looking into getting a new ECU for an LS-vTACK in an EG series hatch. Willing to spend the money on s300...maybe AEM if i fall into a bit of money sometime soon.

I was wondering what everyone here prefers. I have used CROME and i'm a stupid jackass who can't get it right, so thats out for me. I've heard stories of people using and loving it though, its just not user-freindly enough for myself. I haven't used or been around the s300 but thats what im leaning towards. The AEM is of course the #1 choice, but money is a bit of an issue there.

I like the fact I can use the Hondata(s300 for anyone who doesn't know) on my laptop and tune myself, and don't want to burn like i would have to with crome. The s300 seems like the complete package to me, and i would like to go turbo somewhere down the road, and it would be the only Management i would need to buy. Any thoughts?

Re: Your personal favorite tuning system
 

If you dont understand crome you probably wont understand hondata, for the price of crome and an ostrich ( so you could tune in real time) it would still be cheaper than hondata.

Re: Your personal favorite tuning system
 

Neptune RTP :6

Re: Your personal favorite tuning system
 

Re: Your personal favorite tuning system
 

Im sorry if i sound stupid and dont flame me please.

So with an ostrich you can plug and play to a laptop with crome to instantly change your ecu settings? instead of the flashes or burns you would normally have to program into the ECU. So a crome with an ostrich would be the same as the hondata unit for cheaper. But what would the interface for the crome unit look like? Does anyone have pics of the crome unit versus the hondata unit as far as the tuning interface that pops up on your laptop screen?

The crome seems to me to require a lot more in depth knowledge of the codes and bins you need to program. Whereas the Hondata unit seems to be more of a "heres a box, check it if you want this, click here to change fuel delivery at this RPM" kind of deal. I could be completely off-base here but this is whats going through my head, so if I am wrong please correct me.

P.S.- Thanks for not flaming and actually giving input, its extremely helpful

Re: Your personal favorite tuning system
 

I dont mean to be rude, but it seems as if you don't understand some of the basics of tuning.

If you dont understand crome, and dont wanna take the time to learn, why dont you just use the money you were gonna spend on s300 and get a professional crome tune

Re: Your personal favorite tuning system
 

Because i dont want to have to get my car professionally retuned every time i need it to be. I want to be able to retune it when i add a new part. And i also want to go boosted somewhere down the line, so i want to be able to change boost/set-ups without having to get a professional tune every time i do it.

And no, you are not being rude, i do not understand crome as i said. But I do not see a point(and some may call me lazy here) in learning to use it if the s300 is a much more user-freindly system that i can learn to use relatively quickly. Like I said, the 500-600 dollars for the s300 seems completely reasonable to me when the engine management is the most important part of your system(i.e.-keeps it from blowing the hell up)

hope im making sense

Re: Your personal favorite tuning system
 

crome is pretty user friendly. If you don't understand how to use crome then you need to read some more....But reading posts and searching the wiki at pgmfi.org doesn't really compare to acually getting your hands dirty....I know Ive been reading and trying to pick up as much as I can for about a year now.. And Ive only been tuning on my car for about a week now...It takes hours of trying ---- and learning how to do stuff..The first couple off days I was playing with uberdata..That was pretty hard but I started getting better at it.

I switched to crome and freelog yesterday and it is way better. I put in some 510cc injector tday and it's already tuned pretty good. It's lean at idle like 16.5 A/f but everything else is good. I would have ot that worked out in a few minutes but my laptop died so I had to come in.
All I can say is get the tools and get started.....You don't want to wait until you have your turbo installed to learn to tune.

Re: Your personal favorite tuning system
 

thanks man

Re: Your personal favorite tuning system
 

You're not making sense. The most important part of the system is the tuner/user. I can get great results with a variety of systems. The same things have to happen with both Crome and Hondata - you can make the same mistakes with both, too. Don't think you're buying something that thinks for you in either case.

Re: Your personal favorite tuning system
 

i like uberdata. But ill most likely than not be switching to crome once i get my wideband back.

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I'm telling you man crome and freelog work great together. Freelog does map trace for you so you know where to make changes at and it give you the average A/F thats been logged in that cell.

It give you a lot of oter information as well.. Yesterday I changed out my stock injectors for 510's and crome worked like a charm. The fuel scaler got it really close on it's own. I spent about an hour this afternoon fine tuning with freelog and crome. A/f is 14.7 at idle and at cruise and it richens to about 13 when I stand in it.

My stock ecu would richen to about 11.5 while I was doing a pull. I have more tweaking to do yet but it's a lot of fun. I'm glad I decided to get into tuning. All the reading is starting to pay off....And for the record Blundar is the ------- man. Check out PGMFI.org.

Re: Your personal favorite tuning system
 

I know that it all depends on the user, and thats my point. I was asking whether it would be easier for a novice to use s300. And some people can get great results on many system, but the point im making is crome seems much more difficult to use than hondata. Im not saying it is inherently better or has more features, im simply asking whether it is easier to use. I know i will not be buying a system that tunes for me(although most system can automatically scale fuel for you to a safe operating standpoint). Am I off base saying that Hondata is more user freindly? I know good tuners like you and most of the other people on the site can use crome and have been using it to great success, but for a novice with a wideband, laptop, and an s300 it seems much easier, the question nobody has answered yet is; is it?

Re: Your personal favorite tuning system
 

YOU dont use it, unless you also buy the software.

Re: Your personal favorite tuning system
 

Used Crome, What I use now, I like it.

Never touches s300

Want to fondle Neptune!

Use AEM, PITA!!! You need alot of knowledge to set it up and work it. Really Advanced. Now I was using it on a Car that it wasn;t even designed for (Acura Legend using Acura NSX ECU, same stuff, but no vtec). Spent hours getting the car to idle because the fact you can adjust EVERYTHING you need to make sure every parameter of the ECU coinsides with the mechanical setting of the motor.

Re: Your personal favorite tuning system
 

Just started using crome (free) and I love it. Yes you should read as much as possible before you install in your car and start playing with it, but to a certain degree its going to be really confusing until you start playing with it in a car. I understood basic concepts in crome, but when I had to edit cells in the table I was a bit intimidated....then I installed it, and after playing a bit with minor adjustments its like the light bulb went off.

I am going to be using a combo of freelog/crome free in my build in a week or so, and I dont have any reservations about it.
Just try out crome on your stock setup and fiddle with things a bit to understand it more

Re: Your personal favorite tuning system
 

I havn't gotten to tune my car yet because the p06 is on my desk but i really like uberdata, mostly because it's free. I'll probably complain about the lack of adjustability of ignition timing through the rev range or something. I think somebody told me that crome is better for turbo, and uberdata is better for n/a. Or vice versa.
Haven't tried crome yet.

Re: Your personal favorite tuning system
 

cromepro=150
ostrich=175
burn1=85
chip kit=15
datalogging=30
install/shipping/misc=90
total=545

s300=600
install/shipping/misc=100
total=700

i use both often.

cromepro works very well if you've got it setup properly (com assignments, etc) and have the right plugins. you have to be willing to learn and work with it, but the interface is very user friendly and works well. it'll also save you $$.

s300 works very well without much setup (com assignments, etc) and has all the plugins you'll need. it has nitrous control and built in boost control with some setup (definate plus). has more sensors display in the datalogging. you are going to spend more $$.

the only thing easier with s300 is the initial setup of datalogging and real time programming. both come with basemaps you can use and there are plenty of crome basemaps for just about any setup out there between here and pgmfi.org. once you have cromepro setup and some good basemaps you're going to see tuning both just as easy.

is the savings of $150+ worth it to you to get crome set up properly on you computer and your time learning is the real question.

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yeah and for $450 you can get neptune which is the same or better than hondata s300 it all depends on the user, I just got mine from xenocron

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what makes you think hondata is more user friendly? granted i just started actually tuning a car tonight i have down loaded just about every tuning program i can find from bre to turbo edit and have seen hondata used befor and of all the free ones i think crome is the best. i have uberdata on my car right now and its sort of hard to use with the way its set up though i like the onboard datalogging. im going to get freelog set up with crome tomorrow and see what i can get out of my set up with it...i say get crome pro with an ostrich and have at it. also, do what i did and download a bunch of programs using different ones and just figuring out what different buttons do in different programs will help you a lot.

Re: Your personal favorite tuning system
 

obd1- crome, easy to use
obd0- BRE owns