So, I'm thinking about getting an Ostrich so that I can emulate and tune my car a little bit, but I'm a little confused as to the hardware setup required. I was hoping that someone out there who has used an Ostrich Emulator (or ostrich 2 or whatever it is that is current) could answer a couple questions.

1. How is the Ostrich connected? Does it take the place of the ECM and PROM, or does it connect to the ECM in the place of the PROM either directly or through a cable? If it connects in the place of the PROM, should I put a ZIF socket on the ECM so that I can easily remove the Ostrich? From looking at pictures and what I've read, it appears as though the Ostrich plugs into the PROM socket on the ECM, but I'm not for certain.

2. What is the documentation like that comes with the Ostrich? Is it decent or is there a lot of trial and error just screwing around with it?

3. How does the Ostrich allow you to read a stock chip? Is there another adapter that is needed?

Thanks!

 

1. The Ostrich plugs into the ECM, in place of the EPROM. In the case of a '7730 style ECM, use a G1, and plug the Ostrich in where the EPROM would be installed. You don't need a ZIF socket, but it does make swapping between the Ostrich and an EPROM easy, and with less chance of damage to either the emulation cable or an EPROM.

2. The Ostrich doesn't come with any documentation, or rather very little, in that it does come with a CD, with the FTDI drivers, and several programs for tuning various vehicles, along with general tuning information. There's really not much to it, especially when used with Tuner Pro RT. When you open TP RT, it is set by default to detect attached hardware, so it will auto connect to it. Then using the upload button in TP RT, you can upload the current opened bin. There are other things that can be set to communicate with the Ostrich as well, but depending on the program you use it might be different than what I'm used to. There is also a program called EMUtility, that will allow you to upload and read raw bins.

3. The Ostrich is an EPROM Emulator only, and does not have capability to read EPROMS. You need a programmer to read EPROMS.

 

Thanks for the info!

I'm considering what the next step is; I'd like to be able to emulate so that I can play with my programming on the chip, but I also want to be able to read the two stock chips that I have and eventually burn as well. Since I already have the ALDU1/CABL1 combo that is used for datalogging, I could just buy the ostrich and the BURN2 chip burner instead of getting the whole APU1. Are there any advantages offered by the APU1 over getting things piecemeal, especially since I already have my investment with the cable?

 

The only advantage I see with the Auto Prom, is that it has a few extra 0-5V inputs that can be used for logging vitually any other signal in the car, such as WBO2 sensors when the code/mask you using doesn't have a WBO2 patch, second NB O2 sensors, clutch pedal operation, transbrake activation, etc.

The disadvantage to using the Auto Prom, and I can speak from experiance here, since I don't have one, is that from reading several forums, there seems to some difficulty to getting both emulation and logging working con-currently. I don't know why this is, but seems to be a common question or thread topic on forums.

I also prefer the seperates way, just incase one part, say the emulation side of things fails, you can still, datalog and program EPROMs, without the emulator. With an Auto Prom, you'd need to send the entire deal back, if that ever happened, and lose the ability to log (except you'd have your other cable still), and no way to program or read the EPROMs.

 

That's a good point. Since I'm already invested in the separates, perhaps I'll go with those and not worry about the autoprom. Thanks!