Im looking at getting a programmer for my truck. I originally had my mind set on the diablo sport trinity, but when i went to price one out it was over $800. The guy there said to consider one of the handheld one's from superchips, they were on sale for $350, does anyone have any suggestions on these or another brand?

 

My suggestion is the SC and pay the extra for the Transmission programming feature. This has really made my truck fun to drive and is very useful when adjusting the shifting schedule for hauling my 30' travel trailer. I cannot comment on the DST since I have no personal experience with it.

 

The DSB handheld is all the tuner the average individual will ever need. It supports engine and trans functions, has some very good tunes and also is custom tunable. The only thing I ever see on here is that some people think the shifts with the diablo arent hard enough. I have had one for around four years now, and have no complaints. They also have the MDS delete function which I would personally always use. I see no advantage to running on 4 cylinders for power or gas mileage. SC also makes good handhelds. I originally had a SC but it did not have the MDS delete and I hated the fact that my truck was always trying to go to 4 cylinder mode, so I sold it and bought a DSB. My shifts are not as hard as the SC programmer, but crisp enough for me, and at WOT I see no difference in the hardness of the shifts. Both would spin the tires at a WOT shift. You should be able to buy a DSB handheld in the 300.00 range

 

Your comparing top of the line Diablo "goodies" package to Superchips basic tuner.
Diablosport Predator handheld tuner is ~$300-$330
Superchips Flashpaq handheld tuner is ~$325-350

Trinity is comparable to the Vivid that Superchips offers.
Also, Pretty sure HemiFever offers a trinity/Custom tune package for $599. Look in Vendor Classifieds.

For a stock engine(no heads/cams..etc), go with Superchips. Buy the Advanced trans tuning package for $40(I think??)
Diablo only offers half the trans support as Superchips does.

 

Thanks for the input, so I guess the biggest difference between them is one comes with better trans tuning and the other has the msd cut out option. I'm sort of leaning towards the sc tuner, especially since the prices are pretty similar.

 

I would go with SC, I think the majority of people on here would agree with that, especially for mainly stock trucks. The trans tune is good, get that.

 

If you found a Trinity for 800 you need to run away

They dont cost that much from Diablo themselves

I have a Trinity and love it as it has been the best tuner Ive ever had. Before it I had a Superchips 3815, then the 3865, then the Diablo U7137.

You can find a used Trinity all day for 400-550

 

I'm not saying to buy either, but when I got my Diablo it came from KRC performance in Florida, and Marty suggested to use it rather than the SC tuner, because of more functions and there had been some transmission issues from people running the SC. This was about four years ago and I'm sure a lot has changed since then, but I did have a friend that had run a SC for a few years and he had to replace his transmission. Whether or not it was caused by the tuner no one knows. My truck now has 107,000 and no transmission issues at all using the Diablosport, for around 80,000 miles now. Whatever you choose, enjoy.

 

Dirtydog, yep $599. I also have a 10% Christmas sale going on right now using coupon code Christ. My 599 pricing also includes additional custom tuning (pcm and trans). With my 10% off right now, the Trinity is a very good buy. I'll make some nice base settings that have better ability than SC and then you can do some alterations to it if you want, or I'll work with you on how you want it to be.

Cool thing about the Trinity is its universal so if you ever sold it, you could sell it to Dodge, Chevy or Ford folks (if you ever sold it lol)

 

BOTH tuners have the option to disable MDS.
Diablo has some trans tuning built in. Partial upshifts, BUT it lacks Partial downshifts which is the biggest benefit of the transmission tuning. You would need to have a custom tune to alter the Partial downshifts which makes it a limited feature.
There's lots of other features not discussed such as 0-60, 1/8th ETAs, datalogging..etc
You can pull Chrysler specific DTC codes that a standard handheld cannot.
Lots of good stuff with these tuners. WELL worth the expense if your into that sorta stuff.



Theres nothing wrong with a SC tuner. It's the user not knowing how and what to adjust that is the problem. Provide a handheld that can do everything and people will start blowing things up. It's just what happens. Everyone thinks they know what they are doing.
Superchips trans tune has safety features to prevent any cross patterns in shifting.
I think the problem your referring to was when they FIRST came out, there was hard clunk on 2nd and 3rd downshifts which had nothing to do with the advanced trans tuning. That was with their standard programmed tune. That was right after Beta testing finished. That's been corrected and is old news.

Diablo doesn't offer partial downshifts via handheld, so to me, it has less user function. Stock engine crowd need not to worry about fuel trim and timing as that should be for engine modification and knowing what your doing anyways, so the Diablo does not have more useful features to average tuner crowd than SC. The otherway around. I've had both.

When you need customized tuning. Diablo is the only way.