Diagnosis/Anaysis cards any good?

[sparker1]

Hi, I was thinking of buying one of these to help with my hobby of (sometimes) repairing laptops. I'm not much good with schematics or tracing voltages so I thought one of these things might help pinpoint the problem area for me. Do any of you guys use these? Some are cheap enough on ebay but there are different types being sold and the range in price is quite big. Are they any good? Any recommendations?

[Bisketti]

Re: Diagnosis/Anaysis cards any good?

They are basically useless in my opinion. I had one and it displayed a code so I tried it on a working laptop and it displayed the same code. I contacted the manufacturers/sellers and they said yes that is correct. I then tried it on about 5-10 different laptops over a year and it was basically the same or gave a clock error code which when read in the instructions basically told you nothing other than check every clock signal and voltage.Maybe it was just the one I bought but I think they are useless compared to a good Oscope and a schematic.

[sasser]

Re: Diagnosis/Anaysis cards any good?

i also buy about 2 or 3 type all useless. no signal for southbridge, no signal for shorted component what u the device can detect is no ram and no cpu just that.it very easy to trace without the device . forget about it

[sparker1]

Re: Diagnosis/Anaysis cards any good?

That's a blow. I was hoping for a magic bullet.

[lezsimply]

Re: Diagnosis/Anaysis cards any good?

I would not get one if I were you. Bought 2 different models last november and guess what?? For 30 laptops not a single diagnosis correct, or maybe only works on laptop 2008 and beyond

[sparker1]

Re: Diagnosis/Anaysis cards any good?

I think I'll spend my hard earned dollars on something else. Thanks for the information people.

[momaka]

Re: Diagnosis/Anaysis cards any good?

I've tried using one as well. The results were meaningless. Heck, even PCI post cards for desktops are hardly useful. Don't waste your time. Schematic + multimeter method runs circles around these useless post cards.

[kikkoman]

Re: Diagnosis/Anaysis cards any good?

I wonder if manufacturers still stick to the port 80 standard (if they ever did).
The only useful thing in that direction I ever had was an Epox Socket A mobo that had the thing integrated, with a small 7-segment display. 8RDA3I+ I think it was.
It was helpful a few times.
MSI had something similar where the combination of 4 LEDS on a bracket would light up with the boot sequence.
The Epox was way better IMO. I put in a cheap port80 card for comparison - useless. Garbage.
Too bad they went down, they made good boards.
(one could argue that that port 80 thing was overkill for a consumer board - it probably was. Still neat, though. Like the compass in some Nissans).