# ISTA+ Integration Level Update using ENET Cable



## Vyker (9 mo ago)

Hello, 

I'm running on F020-13 and it looks like it was never updated since it left the factory. I'd like to update it to the latest integration level using just an Enet cable and ISTA+.

I understand that I have to have the full psdzdata in my Rheingold folder, which I do. 
I ran the software "check" and it created a report of 68 items to update. 
I set the ISTAGUI.config to "true" for "enable enet program" 

I think I have everything to get going, but I'm still worried. 

Can someone shed some light on the best way to proceed please? Is there a way to run a test flash on just one to make sure it works ok? 

My laptop is old, will it slow down the flash longer than normal? I have no car charger, and I'll be running off the battery.

I've very excited to see what updates/changes this brings, and hopefully I'll have launch control now. 

The car is F20 M135i 2013


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## NotHere (Dec 8, 2020)

Do NOT do the update on battery. You need a power supply capable of at least 50 Amps and it will take several hours.


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## Vyker (9 mo ago)

NotHere said:


> at least 50 Amps


Sorry, did you mean 50? or 5? isn't 50amps like EV level of charging, most off the shelf car chargers are like 2amps?


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## NotHere (Dec 8, 2020)

50 at least! An off the self car battery charger will definitely not do...


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## Vyker (9 mo ago)

Ok thanks. I'll check for some deals on eBay. 

In the meantime, are able to comment on the other parts of my post, please? 

Thanks in advance for your help.


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## Vyker (9 mo ago)

I think I'm going to go with this approach. DIY PSU -


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## harveje (May 7, 2021)

I've been wanting to update my f10 with + and enet cable but so far chickened out.. following for updates..


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## Vyker (9 mo ago)

Hoping for some of the experienced guys to share their thoughts on the original post.... 🙏


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## NotHere (Dec 8, 2020)

My guess is you will fry your car. And for no good reason, as an I-Level update doesn't really add anything.

Go to a mechanic with a _good_ PSU and talk him into letting you upgrade the car there. Do it with an icom too, as the enet cable may take too many hours (I've never tried it). If you want to do it with an enet cable, use e-sys for the flashing and not ISTA.

The better option is to leave your car alone and if you want to do something/play, try retrofitting something.


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## couleurs (Mar 20, 2016)

I have a F20 125i with factory i-Level and have been researching this to update too!

As *NotHere* has mentioned, flashing ECUs using *ISTA* an *ICOM* is recommended but flashing using *E-Sys* with an *ENET cable *works fine.
I've done a 6WA cluster retrofit so I had to flash my KOMBI which took around 10-15 mins simply on (_good_) battery power. Anything longer than this is a risk of bricking your ECU.

If your laptop is old and can't hold a minimum of 30 mins battery power, *please* *don't attempt this!!*
Flashing all your ECUs at once can take anywhere from* 2-6+ hours* so you definitely need a stable power supply on both your laptop and car.
Anything recent (2-4 years old) that can run Windows 7 or 10 with 4-8gb RAM is fine, a faster computer won't speed this process up -- I've used a Dell with a Pentium/4GB RAM and a MacBook Pro Core i7/16GB RAM and it made no difference...

I've found that there's lots of 12v 50a-100a PSU's (incl. adjustable voltage) for sale on Amazon and eBay for around $80-120 (AUD) here which should be sufficient to power a stable 13.8v for flashing instead of hacking together a used DIY server PSU...

I'm thinking of ordering a 12v 66a 800W, adding some jumper cables to one of these: https://www.amazon.com.au/dp/B0986K2VXW/ and following this E-Sys + ENET tutorial:


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## Vyker (9 mo ago)

Thanks for your reply there...

1. I've seen that the general consensus is e-sys, but I've also read that BMW intend to move forward with Ista + enet for flashing. So despite the internet filled with icom and e-sys, that's not to say Ista and enet isn't going to work, right? (It just seems cleaner to use that combination) 
Is there something completely wrong with going through with Ista and enet? 

2. The laptop is old, but it's stable. 4gb ram and 500gb disk. The disk is the bottleneck as it hits 100% just reading the pszdata. When plugged in, it'll hold fine for days on end. (As tested recently when trying to download all the data)

3. I might not be experienced enough with power supplies but I thought we needed 14v? The one you selected is 12v? I found a similar one here in the UK for only £40! How did you intend to go from 12v to 14v? 

Thanks again for your help.


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## Atyn (9 mo ago)

I've just bought a 12v 30amp switch mode supply from Amazon Uk. The output voltage can be adjusted by about 10% - (upto 14v on the one I bought)



Amazon.co.uk



Check the specs for mention of voltage adjustment.
Remember to use suitable cable and alligator clips.

I also fitted a volt/ammeter to mine so I can keep and eye on the current and tweak the adjustment to avoid overloading the psu. I'm remaapping my 116i using MHD which doesn't really need a power supply as it is so quick but better safe than sorry.









KETOTEK Ammeter Voltmeter Digital DC 6.5V~100V 100A Volt Amp Watt KWh Meter Gauge LCD Display Panel with Shunt, Current Voltage Power Energy Monitor Tester Multimeter : Amazon.co.uk: DIY & Tools


KETOTEK Ammeter Voltmeter Digital DC 6.5V~100V 100A Volt Amp Watt KWh Meter Gauge LCD Display Panel with Shunt, Current Voltage Power Energy Monitor Tester Multimeter : Amazon.co.uk: DIY & Tools



www.amazon.co.uk





The requirement for a large psu is mainly in case the radiator fan switches on at full speed. I suppose it could be disconnected but this would cause a DTC.


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## couleurs (Mar 20, 2016)

No worries!

1. BMW dealers use ISTA+ and an ICOM as it's more user friendly and faster compared to E-Sys but for us DIY-ers it's not very feasible as you have to buy an ICOM unit ($150-200 for a clone) rather than using a cheap $10 cable. Personally I've only used ISTA+ for diagnostics and clearing codes if needed but never for flashing, it seems to work fine for this using an ENET cable so flashing should be fine too?

2. Full PSZData from 2021/22 is huge, the last time I flashed my KOMBI it was half the size but as long as your laptop is stable and can handle reading everything it will be fine.

3. Yes a *12v 50a+* rated PSU with voltage adjustment is recommended. Most of these are set to 12v out of the box but you can adjust the voltage higher (by 10-15%) to 13v-14v+ depending on the unit. I believe 13.8v-14.1v is the recommended "safe" voltage for flashing by BMW.

These units are really cheap, are easy to find compared to server PSUs and require less modding -- all you need is to attach a power lead, some decent quality jumper cable with crocodile clips and set the voltage ready for flashing. I would stay away from the _really_ cheap ones as they're probably fakes which can't deliver a proper stable voltage...


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## couleurs (Mar 20, 2016)

Nice work *IJO*! Good idea attaching a voltmeter to monitor the output levels.

It looks like theres so many clones of these 12v PSUs worldwide and most seem to work really well handling a 13v-14v load which is perfect for us DIY-ers who want to flash safely.


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## Atyn (9 mo ago)

couleurs said:


> Nice work *IJO*! Good idea attaching a voltmeter to monitor the output levels.
> 
> It looks like theres so many clones of these 12v PSUs worldwide and most seem to work really well handling a 13v-14v load which is perfect for us DIY-ers who want to flash safely.


I've just tested it on the car. 

I added a series blocking diode in case the psu didn't like being connected to a battery when it's expecting a resistive load. 

Max setting was 14.4v at the psu and 13.6 at the battery due to the voltage drop across the diode. Max current I saw was 12amps with the ignition on. 

The voltage remained constant regardless of the current - always a good sign!

A few years ago I used a 60amp 0-15v bench power supply so it was easy to adjust the voltage but these items are now very expensive.


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## Atyn (9 mo ago)

Successfully reprogrammed the DME using a MHD wifi obd adaptor and their app. 

Stage 1 tune has made a massive difference to my F20 116i and the power supply maintained the battery voltage at 13.5v.


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## BeeMmDoubleU (Mar 30, 2019)

I'd like to add my share of experience on this one. I used another BMW (that had the engine runnning) and hooked that one up to my car while I was flashing. First things first, put on driver's seatbelt. I used E-Sys and did 2 update sessions (about a month apart). First session I did ZGW, DME, EGS, DSC2, EKPM, HU_NBT, AMP_TOPLR. Second session (after a month) I did the remaining modules using the same method. Flashed each module one by one (though admittedly by the end I got a bit impatient and bulk flashed like 5 and it went by without a problem).

Refer to the video posted by the other member on how to flash with E-sys (I used that exact one for reference). I used E-sys 3.27.1.


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## Vyker (9 mo ago)

Thanks for your comment but I'm looking for guys that have flashed all modules using an enet cable through Ista. Plenty of e-sys stories already out there. Plenty of ista icom stories too.... But where's the Ista enet success stories? 🤷‍♂️


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## rorz12 (4 mo ago)

Vyker said:


> Thanks for your comment but I'm looking for guys that have flashed all modules using an enet cable through Ista. Plenty of e-sys stories already out there. Plenty of ista icom stories too.... But where's the Ista enet success stories? 🤷‍♂️


I'm looking for this too... Still no ISTA+ ENET programming stories? Even with the ISTA+ modification to allow for ENET programming.. ?

I have a modBMW WiFi ENET module, which is kinda like the MHD Black WiFi ENET module in that it's basically a mini router that connects to the car's Ethernet system and provides DHCP connectivity to clients. So I'm assuming its very similar to what an ICOM would do, as opposed to just using an OBD2 Ethernet cable. Plus the module has a port for an ethernet cable, so it will be DHCP + hard wire . Anyone tried this?


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## Vyker (9 mo ago)

It worked fine with ENET and ISTA+ 
It took ages though, and I did run out of battery, make sure you have a charger connected. All these stories about needing a power supply is overkill. The most the car did was put the windows down and sunroof, drawing amps that the battery was more than capable of doing - charger is all you need. 
I got a 12amp charger. Worked fine once I got the battery back up again. 
Had to pull a fuse for the NBT HU as it was flashing that when the battery died.


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## rorz12 (4 mo ago)

Vyker said:


> It worked fine with ENET and ISTA+
> It took ages though, and I did run out of battery, make sure you have a charger connected. All these stories about needing a power supply is overkill. The most the car did was put the windows down and sunroof, drawing amps that the battery was more than capable of doing - charger is all you need.
> I got a 12amp charger. Worked fine once I got the battery back up again.
> Had to pull a fuse for the NBT HU as it was flashing that when the battery died.


That's good to hear. So you were intially flashing without the charger? If you had started the process with the charger you're saying you probably would've been fine?

I only have 2 updates available, both for the combox. CBX-ECALL and CBX-MEDIA, which I'm hoping won't take that long.. ? When you say it took ages, roughly how long?

Oh, and I'm thinking of doing these updates with the car running and avoid having to worry about battery dying or a charger. What do you think?


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## Vyker (9 mo ago)

Yeah if I had the charger on, it would have been fine. I used another car as the charger and it didn't work, it just drained the battery. 

4.5hrs. Most of it was NBT HU manual files, just pointless gigabytes of data transferring at modem speeds. Was painful waiting. Most of the other modules just worked in a flash, very quick.

You can't do it while the car is running. ISTA takes control of all. You can probably get away with just using your battery for only two modules. 
I bought a 12amp charger. Worked fine.


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## rorz12 (4 mo ago)

Vyker said:


> Yeah if I had the charger on, it would have been fine. I used another car as the charger and it didn't work, it just drained the battery.
> 
> 4.5hrs. Most of it was NBT HU manual files, just pointless gigabytes of data transferring at modem speeds. Was painful waiting. Most of the other modules just worked in a flash, very quick.
> 
> ...


Awesome. I'll just get a charger then. I have a 6 series with a 105Ah 950CCA AGM battery so it's pretty powerful already, and just installed it few weeks ago.

Just wondering why it was modem speeds since Ethernet is 100mbps? Should be pretty fast no?


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## abdulhaih (24 d ago)

Hey, guys. I know there's a way to run a test flash on just one device. But you'll have to disconnect it from the local network. Also, you can try to do it through a virtual OS simulator. My programmer friend helped me with this since I'm not good at electronics or programming. But since then, I've found new pre-made integrations. I needed to find something that I could handle on my own. All employees of my company are good specialists. But their work doesn't require understanding complex software, so I found Planfix. With these integrations, everyone understands how to set everything up.


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