How-To: Review and Usage of the SuperScan II Test System

J.E. Robison of Robison Land Rover Service provides an interesting article that discusses the pros and cons of the the SuperScan II Test System.  It begins:

ROBISON ON ROVERS
The SuperScan II Land Rover Test System

A few months ago, I wrote a review of the two principal Land Rover test sys- tems – the factory T4 / RDS / IDS and the independent Autologic. While both of those systems will meet the needs of any Land Rover service profes- sional, they are costly. After that article came out, there was quite a bit of talk in emails and the forums about Land Rover testing. People asked if there were any less expensive testers that would do 90% of the job for half the price.

It sounds like a reasonable question. After all, the Honda Element has all wheel drive for half the cost of an LR3, and a third the cost of a Range Rover and won’t it go 90% of the places?

Well, not for me it won’t. I’ll keep my Discovery and my Defender, thank you. But there seems to be a real demand for a $2,500 product that would do most of the things the full-feature Land Rover testers do, for a more affordable price. I began asking around for products that might fit the bill.

The $200 OBD II scanners you can buy in parts stores and online will read fault codes from engine management com- puters of 1996-newer Rovers. But they won’t communicate with any other systems on a modern Land Rover, and all they give is codes. $200 scan- ners don’t explain what the codes mean. I figured there must be some test product whose functionality lay between the $200 scanner and the $10,000 full-capability system.

Read the full guide here.