first of all, i am totally new to this world of prom burning, which is what im TRYING to get in to. my current problem is just using winbin. i HAVE read the begginers intro at the top of this page, and most of the links within it. My current problem is that when i get into winbin under the folder labled flags, it has the check boxes, but there is nothing written there so i know what im actually changing. I've had this problem with most of the things in winbin, i just dont understand what its changing, is winbin just not the best program? please help. thanx in advance.

 

You might take a peek at WWW.Tunercat.com at his site there are examples of what all the software looks like, and what things are editable in each application. It's commercial, but reasonably priced.

 

or, for free, gmecmedit.markmansur.com. (man, what do *I* have to do to get Grumpy on *my* side?!!)

And, to better answer your question, what you need to do is find a *good* definition (ecu) file for your application. Unlabeled flags generally shoudn't be touched.

Even beyond the intro article, you have lots of reading to do to get up to speed (so to speak) on what changes affect what and so on.

There are lots of things that can go wrong, and many that can be set straight when burning your own chips. You should spend as much time as you can searching and reading through this forum, and do so while you have a clear, defined, goal regarding what you'd like to achieve by burning your own chip.

 

Dont bother with any of that. I have been examining the various hacks out there and they explain everything. I dont feel that any software is better because they are just as good as their definition files which can be created from scratch if you study the hacks. Another thing is try to understand hexadecimal language as thats what most of the changes in the prom are defined by. Open up all those ecus in notepad you find because you can cross reference and get a better understanding whats going on in the bin files. In my opinion the user friendly software (ie tunercat winbin or whatever) are just that to make things easier for you to change things. I think in the end if you study all these things then programming your own chips will be a breeze and you can be confident in yourself that your making the correct changes. If your just plain lazy and dont feel like trying to figure it out then pay someone like tunercat or what have you to figure it out for you by buying the software. As far as getting the hacks is another story. Lucky for me the hack I needed was available at ecmguys website.

 

Read the stories on various lists and forums about guys who've just slipped up a little with code or hex and you can see why you should use an editor.

I'm planning to buy a TC Romutator at some stage, and I use Winbin when I want to see a 3D map surface, but you can't go past Mangus' GMECMEdit- it's easy to use, and clearer than Winbin, the compare feature is great, and he's developing it at a furious pace. I almost forgot, it's free! A fantastic free kick for the DIY PROM community.

And thanks to all those who labour over ECU files.

My $0.02 worth.

John

**edit. Sorry, went off at a tangent from your original question. It sounds that you need PROM tuning help, not Winbin help. The value of Shaggy56's response is that he's telling you that you need to know what you're changing before you change it. None of the editors is going to help with that.

If you are changing injectors, you need to know how these are specified. With cams, you need to understand the impact these have on the motor and what to do to compensate for it. There's no substitute for reading. And you need to ask specific questions- e.g. "how do I change the .BIN file after upping my injector size on my '165 with ARUP cal- I'm using XX ECU and Winbin".

 

Work for TunerCat

 

That explains it. Thought there was an affiliation there...