What's the consensus on the "best" scan tool for your GT3? Any things to watch out for when buying one of these tools? Thanks in advance to all of you who own GT3s!

Toby

 

The best is Porsche's tool.

I have the Durametric, which does most everything I need on the GT3, not so well on my 2006 Cayenne.

 

Thanks Marv. Not really interested in trying to acquire a PIWIS tool - far too expensive by the time you license the software/updates. Good to hear it does everything you need on your GT3. Did you buy the Enthusiast or Pro kit?

 

I believe it was the enthusiast version. The downside is I need to run the software on my Mac using Windows running on Parallels. I'm using Win 11 and I haven't tested the software on that yet.

 

I can tell u that non of the autel products work for the 6-gt cars. They backward engineer their software instead of buying it and they have not (will not) build it for our generation dme. I have been trying for over a year so that my shop quality unit can read the car. I had to use my $6 amazon dongle and phone app to figure out my o2 issues.

I do know the snapon and matco scanners see the complete dme picture.

 

There is probably truth to that.
1. Third-party devices have no choice but to reverse-engineer the DME since it is Porsche proprietary.
2. Third-party companies focus their development on the low-hanging fruit of the market. There are only about 1,000 996 GT3s in North America and that is a much smaller market than Toyota, Nissan, and a host of other brands.

Snap-On and Matco probably license their tool's software from Porsche, tool.

 

I use a Chinese clone PIWIS III setup. It’s on-par with any other scan tool from a cost perspective and if you own any other p-cars especially anything with PDK it’s probably more versatile.

 

Ryan, please provide information on where to source your PIWIS III clone. Thanks

 

I bought an old refurb Lenovo ThinkPad S1 Yoga 12 off of Amazon, and bought the VAS5164 clone dongle + PIWIS III software image from a collective that goes by the username "Belauto" on GarageFourm.org. I re-imaged the hard drive on the Thinkpad with the Belauto software to get a full working system. The route I went requires familiarity with technology. You can also get turn-key systems (laptop pre-installed with software and a clone dongle), but the software is usually locked to the laptop and the "support" can be iffy if you run into trouble. Belauto has been responsive to any questions I've had. If any of this is intriguing, there is lot's more info in this thread including places that sell turn-key systems: https://rennlist.com/forums/panamera...piwis-iii.html