Hi, I am wondering whether anyone else encountered same situation as me. Previously, I was able to connect to my car's TPMS ECU using techstream and view the TPMS ID, tire pressure etc, could even have the option of registering a new sensor if I wanted. However, today when i connected techstream, it was unable to communicate with the TPMS ECU, on the display on techstream, it had an asterisk to it. Connection to the VIM was no problems, ran the health check and there was no DTC error codes, no nothing and tire pressure displays fine on the vehicle's information cluster. What gives? All other functions of techstream works fine and I can do the available customizations.

 

Since the OBD II has several pins, only a couple are used to access the TPMS ECU.
If the vehicle is functioning normally, and by all accounts the TPMS system is functioning normally, then the most likely issues are the cable that connects to the OBD II port, or the port itself.
Chances are the cable and port are physically ok, so I would look at the male pins on the end of the cable and make sure they are ok, and the female pins on the port also.

 

I was not able to register new TPMS id's using a friend's techstream. We were able to read the existing id's and start the process for registering new id's but it was never able to complete. I wound up purchasing the ateq quickset which has not failed me yet.


(it does go on sale occasionally and I picked it up for $99)
But I do get the frustration about techstream. I'm not very experienced with the software but the one thing that I thought was simple, turned out not to work. Unfortunately, now I have another "tool" that I have to store for use twice a year... It would be nice if the 3IS saved two sets of id's like the 2IS does.

 

Yeah, tried rubbing alcohol, sprayed compressed air to "clean" the pins, male and female, which are as straight as can be, but still no go... going to find a windows XP laptop and reinstall the techstream to see whether it is helps.

That will be my next course of action, going back to dealer for this is too expensive.

 

The other possibility is that it's the cable itself.
The Techstream software may be functioning properly, but not all OBD II cables are the same.
I recall reading a thread years ago about what cables to get and what cable to avoid as not all the functions worked.
I use a Mongoose cable with my Techstream...the cable is old as dirt, but I've never had an issue. Of course at the time it was a really good quality cable and there were not many options on the market...now there are tons of cables available, so it's hard to tell good from bad.

Like PJSnow mentioned, the Altec unit worked fine, which means the issue was either the Techstream (software/laptop) or the cable.

 

The pirated version of techstream is very temperamental to install. It is made to run on 32bit systems. There is some tricky crap to do to get it to work. There are tutorials online. Took me about an hour to get it installed correctly.

 

I run mine off an Acer Aspire 1 Netbook with Windows XP. They are dirt cheap (probably worth nothing) now and if you only use it for Techstream it's not too bad...it's definitely not the fastest machine out there.