Just wondering whether the millenium bug is an issue with the stock ECU? More worrying is the effect on the after-market chips. I am going to send them a e-mail on it.

Why would a car care what year it was? Would it be worth Audi's time and money to set the car's internal clock correctly on the production line? And if they did, why does my analog clock need me to set it for daylight savings? There is no reason for a car to know the time, day, month, or year. Therefore, Audi wouldn't have wasted money on letting the car know the time, day, month, or year. Therefore, I cannot imagine in my wildest dreams how the year 2000 could effect the car that doesn't even know what a year is.

Well, it's suppose to affect all computer, right? And I thought all computer has an internal clock. Just to make sure.....

I am sure the ECU has an internal clock. That way, technicians can see what was happening to the engine at a given point in time.<p>Mike

There's actually a proposal in Congress to give the OCC (Office of the Comptroller of the Currency) the right to seize assests of banks that are not compliant by mid-99 and auction them off to banks that are in compliance.<p>Of course it hasn't been voted on cause they're busy impeaching, but I digress.<p>My point is that just cause companies have known about it for years doesn't mean all products are good to go.

The ECU doesn't track the date. It DOES keep track of the number of days going by, so it has a clock in that sense. It uses this information for the service indicators and probably other functions. When you get a new ECU, the date IS NOT input into it (and neither is the time of day). If the thing kept track of the date, that would have to be done. (There is no internal battery in the ECU).<p>Your Audi will have no clue when the year 2000 arrives.<p>Just for laughs, some of the dumber things I have heard will fail on January 1, 2000:<p>Flashlights. (after all, they are electrical, right?)<br>Batteries, car type, AA, and others. (Your car wouldn't start for this reason alone!)<br>Home water heaters (I'm not even talking about the ones with timers attached).<br>Sprinkler system timers (even though they don't have the year programmed into them!)<br>But it doesn't matter, because space aliens will be coming to destroy us on that day anyway. Obviously, space aliens from other stars are tracking, and care about, our earthly, arbitrarty, date system. Since all of this is established fact, and our A4s won't work anymore, anyone want to beat the rush and sell their A4 real cheap right now?<br>

Lock the doors and hold onto your wallet. It might be helpful to buy a shotgun also... =)<p>Stu Koch

nt<br>

Just because a device was recently manufactured it does not mean it is assured to be compliant. I am an IT professional and a Year 2000 Project Manager. I have seen it first hand... without mentioning any names of course...:)<p>The truth is out there!<p>TGB

I am not speaking of cars exclusively but devices with potential Y2K issues in general.<p>TGB

My family owns and operates a CUSTOME SOFTWARE company based out of (read carefully) DETROIT. Some of our largest clients, of course, are the automobile companies. If that does not qualify me to answer this, than I don't know what does...<p>The Y2K problem has most certainly been ratified post 1997 within the automobile industry concerning ECU's. If a cars is to be sold in the United States, it has to be certified. For it to be certified, Y2K has to be corrected. <p>Thats it...

There is a whole hell of alot (this is not directed towards you, Dale) more concerning the Y2K than people think. Now, I'm not saying that the Earth is going to stop spinning, or flashlights aren't going to work. I just primarily want to address the basis of the problem. No computer really knows what day it is, all it knows is that it's counting. The problem is sequencing, the computer can't place zero after nine. It dosen't perceive time they way humans do. If you really thought about it, time is only counting. We just put stoppers at 60, 60, 24, 7, 30(31,28), and 12. And thats all time is to a computer...<p>Now to relate it to your ECU. Yes, it is counting, and yes, it is in relation to our calender. See, it contains software. That software has to have patents and copyrights. Software patents and copyrights are time limited. Especially, for software that is utilized by control units for machines. The patents and copyrights contained within the Ecu's software is counting current time...<p>I know this is short and a little ambiguous. But, I hope that fact that my family owns and operates a custom software company which vendors to the automobile companies offers some credibility...

While I agree with pretty much all of what you said, I still disagree that our A4's know what year it is. Yes, they count days/time, and I said that in my post. But they won't know when the year flips over to 2000. I even have the Audi service manuals, and have looked through them. There is no procedure to tell the existing or a replacement ECU the date, so how does it know the date? If you unplug the ECU, it would forget the date eventually, right? There aren't any batteries to keep power connected, and capacitors or other electronics could keep it going for a short while. At best, a date-tracking ECU would remember when it was unplugged, and resume counting from there. I can't really tell from your post if you were saying that the A4 knows the actual date or not - like you said it seems ambiguous. Maybe you just didn't interpret my post's title like I meant it. By saying that there is no date-tracking clock, I literally meant DATE, like knowing it is December 15, 1998. I didn't mean day counting, or time counting, because I know that is there. <p>Yes, the ECU is counting, and it is conceivable that there could be a problem when it hits a certain number, like 10,000 days as an arbitrary example. So, after a 10,000 day life (somewhere short of 30 years), it might quit. Assuming that A4's lasted that long, everyone's A4 would quit at a different time depending on when the ECU started counting. But this is a long ways from saying that there will be a problem when the year clicks over to 2000.<p>You are saying that the Y2K problem is a serious one, and I agree. It isn't something that can or should be ignored where it applies. (Examples: financial industry, air traffic control computer systems, utilities). But I guess my point is that the general public is taking this problem and exaggerating it to where it makes no technical sense at all. (Examples: flashlights, toasters, etc.). A lot of the problem is that people assume that people are so stupid/incompetent that they won't be able to resolve even a minor Y2K glitch when it occurs. One example based on something I heard: Store's automatic opening front doors won't open, so customers just stand out in the cold not thinking that they could just go through the manual doors, or the store staff can't figure out how to disable the system and push the doors open. Cash registers won't work and clerks/management won't be able to figure out how to accept cash and give change without a cash register working.

:-p

While some of the Y2K problem is software related, from what I understand, the other half of the problem is hardware related. There are supposedly a lot of embedded chips which do track date/time that must be replaced versus reprogrammed. If the ECU had one of these chips in it, then it could potentially affect the rest of its operation. Personally, I don't think there will be an issue with the cars, but you really never know for sure.

Once again, Dale, you present a good argument. Unfortunately, even with my daily exposure, this isn't my area of expertise. In the past few years our company has shelled out mucho denairo to correct these problems. I'm going to leave it in the hands of the poeple who get paid to go indepth into this problem...<p>Maybe, the real problem is that there is only a handfull of people who really know where the problems lay, and how to correct them...<p>All I know is, New Years 1999 is going to be one hell of a party!!!