Thread: 1999 Saab 9-5 OBD, and more

I have browsing the net for a few months now, and I'm still not quite sure how i should go about this. I'm looking to get the most connectivity though my laptop to my 1999 Saab 9-5 SE 3.0 turbo. At first i thought having a connection to/with the OBD was neat, but i have learned you can do much more though the I-Bus and P-Bus.

Like i said i relay want to do it all or as much as this Saab will allow me to do, like reprogramming the ECU on the fly, check gas level, and find what my 0 to 60 time is. While I'm at it i might as well add a connection to connect to audio from laptop.

I know this sounds like a big project especially for some one posting a newbie section, but i think i can under take this during the summer, and finish up on some programs to take advantage of this.

My first problem i see, is that my OBD connector does not have pins for the CAN protocol (6 and 14). So what is the recommend solution? I was thinking about taping into the I-bus from audio head unit, climate control system, ore even the memory seat, and re rout it back to the OBD cable.

I have read about getting the I-bus signal from CD changer(have not found that connector yet in my car), but where can i pick up P-bus? Since pin 6 and 14 on the OBD connector is for CAN (which i want to use for I-Bus). Is there a way to tie in all the CAN protocol buses together, to read them from a single point?

Like i said I'm a newb to this car thing and may sound like I'm talking out of my ***. And that may be true, but I'm willing to read learn the proper way to connect my laptop to my car.

Hardware: I have noticed that the several OBD cables uses a Serial Port(RS-232) the problem with that my laptop does not have that connection. (How ever does have a 1394 FireWire, USB and Ethernet) I also looked at CANUSB dongle but those seem a bit pricey. Then i came along this http://www.obd2allinone.com/sc/details.asp?item=obd2usb
it seems perfect. Any thoughts?

Software:
I'm not yet worried about, after all i have a little programing background, and i have ran across some open source tools already.