obd II,obd 2,OBDII Codes,auto diagnostic tools

First and foremost, the tool you purchase must support the vehicles you anticipate working on. Although it's true that OBDII is a standard, there are five different types of hardware communications used by obd II vehicles. Some tools support all five and some are manufacturer specific. Not all scantools are equal. In fact, some aren't even close. As part of the obdii standard, the US Environmental Protection Agency mandated that a basic set of emissions related readings be supported on all auto diagnostic tools. The SAE specification J1979 defines these legislated parameters. Many low-end tools only support these emissions related readings, giving you access to only a dozen or so truly useful parameters. While these give you some basic vehicle information, they are just a small set of the vehicle information available through the OBDII port.