i am curious... as i read through some of these threadsi see people saying i have a fault code, or somthing of that nature... im wondering if the car itself gives a code on the screen in the car or if these codes are what people get when they use their vag com??

 

Anytime your car has a check engine light (and sometimes when it doesn't) and there is something wrong with it there is a code that can be read. You can take it to an autozone or schucks or wherever and they can tell you what that code is (its a number) and that corresponds to a certain problem.

Example, I am new to audi's as well but on older Honda's the ECU would actually blink a certain number of times and that was the code. It is a bit more complicated than that now but same thing overall.

 

vagcom is a program for your laptop. you hook your laptop up to the car via a cable from ross-tech, or the ebay one that's much cheaper but can't log data. you can still check and clear codes tho. you can download the program from the ross-tech website

 

oh and you get codes when you get a check engine light. tho sometimes you can get a code without triggering a CEL

 

easiest thing to do is use autozones code reader and they let you use it for free.

 

hmmm alright thanks guys!!

 

yeah but the one's around here won't let you clear the codes. and the ebay vag cable is 20 shipped, you'll save that much in gas alone in a few months

 

really, the ones at the autozone here clear the codes, i guess it all depends on what scanner they have.

 

nah they're able to, its just a legal thing. some guys are willing to do it, but others won't. but now i dont gotta worry since i got the vag cable

 

so you only have to have the vag cable? for 20 bucs... what about the program? how much does that run