Bosch 3945 ADS 525x Professional Diagnostic Scan Tool with Wireless VCI - Extreme Flexibility | Extreme Speed | Extreme Access | Most Advanced OE Level Vehicle Coverage Available

subscription is hard to get and expensive

This is the proper scan tool used at my college. It has the OEM Factory access software whereas other tools attempt to reverse engineer access, or do not contract for sufficient vehicle makes/OEM's or subsystems' access for all makes. We do not cover commercial truck diesel diagnostics, so are glad for the value of the price to exclude that. ***This is very easy to use!!*** Bosch has done a superb job in eliminating many challenges that the older generation scanners were unable to technologically handle. Accuracy is as exacting as it gets. A recent shop owner/student at my college had his 3 year old Dodge truck in scanning class, and was ready to go on a very long business trip. The ADS 525X had his Datastream Parameters up on the screen, and we selected all electrical data items for his 3 year old truck. (Which looked like new, of course.) We pressed the data expand button on the screen, and the compressed data graph of his alternator output showed that the brushes were dropping out (worn down), the voltage was dropping down, and the down-spike surges were occurring every 5 seconds. I pointed this out to the shop owner/student that he needed a new quality alternator before his trip. I asked how many miles were on his new truck. He said 158,000. *This Bosch scanner is intelligent.* At another student/shop owner's class, the owner reported that a customer had a vehicle with a spongey brake pedal. We know that most likely there is air in the system. During the scan, the scanner presented this fault, then brought up onto the screen 12 tests available, but from the block of available tests, it separated "Brake Bleed Procedure Run". After running the procedure with the brake pedal being automatically run down and up while pressing firmly and continuously, it then finished with "Bleed Brakes in normal procedure". He then brought the scanner over to a hybrid vehicle to scan the hybrid drive motor high voltage battery, and the scanner showed 10 processors all indicating that the hybrid battery had matured wear and was worn out. Other scanners might have two or three modules indicating matured high voltage battery wear, but when the customer needs certainty to know that a significant expense is due, the customer needs to hear that certainty 10 times as well to commit to the replacement. So again, the quality and thoroughness of Bosch diagnostics in having access to all those factory modules does indeed provide far more than the other scanners, so this extensive functionality is worth far more than the cost of the scan system. It does pass through reprogramming as well. Dan Petit/Petit Technical College ASE L-3 Certified Education.

Do not buy this scanner! Within 8 months of having it I needed to update the software which I did but after it did that it wouldn’t work and said internal error. I sent it back to them and they fixed it. 4 months after getting it back same error code and now they want over $600 to fix the internal error that happens when you update it. Worst scanner ever!

So far it does everthing I want it to do. I like the auto ID feature. Mostly fetch codes with descriptions and data streams. Have used it a few times to reset maintenance lights, key FOB's and keys. Took a while to figure out though, instructions info is very generic or nonexistant. Online support is weak unless you pay for annual subscriptions (start at around $400).

Been using this scan tool for a couple years now and I don’t recommend it at all. Bosch wants you to pay $1k for a year software subscription that they don’t buy all the licensing to specific manufacturers to get all the special functions available. Countless times I have had issues with this scan tool where they don’t have access to PIDs or Special Functions that are basic diagnostic functions required for an automotive tech. If it wasn’t for the J2534 actually being useful to do reprograms, this would have been a one star. TOPDON or Autel or Launch or even the Icon series scan tools have faster and better functions.