Make your car a smart one!
On-Board Diagnostic (OBD) devices help in reporting and diagnosing a vehicle’s overall health. It comes with a lot of features which can be very useful to keep an overall check on your vehicle. If you ask around, there are very few people who know about OBD devices, where the OBD terminal in their car is located, or even know of its designed purpose. Amongst all this, does your car actually need one? Let’s start by learning its features and types of devices which are available.
AutoWiz
AutoWiz App connects with AutoWiz OBD GPS device and makes your car a smart car and you, a smarter driver. It is jam-packed with features like real-time tracking and gives you destination notifications. It helps you to ensure safe driving by monitoring instances of over-speeding, engine idling, sudden acceleration, hard braking and over-revving. This device generates your car’s health report and helps you to save fuel. Anti-theft alarm notifies you if your car is started or towed which makes it a wholesome device. There’s a new version of this OBD device which gives you 4G speed WiFi hotspot in the car.
Drivemate
It comes in two variants Drivemmate and Drivemate Pro. It provides you with driver behaviour notification, car care, helps you plan your trips with an estimated time of arrival feature. You can also share location, track points, live location data, SMS & email alerts, over speeding & idling alerts, insurance & service renewal alerts, geo-fence alerts, find your car and do a lot more with Drivemate. However, Drivemate Pro comes with some additional features which provide information regarding engine light, engine coolant temperature, vehicle RPM, no. of DTC codes and kms run with engine light on.
Fleet Management
It is launched by Tata Tele Business Services. It is more of a commercialised tracking software which helps you to track your fleet. It notifies you about real-time tracking, route replay, geo-fencing, over-speeding alerts, SMS alerts, 24x7 help-desk and what not. It comes in two segments, standard and advanced. While the standard is enough for normal business, advance comes with some additional features like idling report, panic button, fuel monitoring, temperature monitoring and additional sensor integration. Advance completes the whole package.
Jio Car Connect
Jio has stitched a partnership with Reno, US-based AirWire Technologies Company to manufacture a cheap OBD device. Which Jio is expecting to go mainstream with by 2020. Reliance Jio Car Connect app which will show you various vital statistics like fluid levels, distance traveled, speed information, battery information etc. You can also switch on your car’s AC. Some other features include door alert, anti-theft alarm, speed limit, harsh braking alert and fuel alert, etc. It will also create a WiFi hotspot and will allow you to make free voice calls. It will also help you to gauge the overall health of your car.
As you might know, OBD devices add to our car’s functionality. And the answer to my question is, yes! OBD devices are often worth their weight in gold in the eyes of responsible car owners. If you believe there’s a fault on a specific component within the motor, such as anti-lock braking system (ABS), electronic suspension or even the steering, you’ll have a nifty tool that will allow you to confirm and identify it in moments. Plus, it can be attached to most cars and turn them into ‘smart cars’. The latest generation of OBD devices is worth investing in. We’ll keep coming back with more interesting things. Till then, stay tuned and keep reading on Decode.
