ALLDATADIY Review
Monday, April 23rd, 2007Alldata is a well known repair and service reference used by professional automotive shops all around the country. A good friend of mine uses Alldata for his auto garage and loves it. They reference every imaginable vehicle, show all the parts, diagrams and have all the references, part numbers and even include repair times.
AlldataDIY is aimed at the non-professional. The home mechanic working on his car or truck. It’s touted as having all the same information, the same bells and whistles as the professional version. The DIY version is Web only where the PRO is now Web or DVD. The appeal is that the AlldataDIY manual is supposed to be tailed to the specific vehicle you need ,one vehicle per subscription. TheY ask you all the normal questions, year, make model, 4wd or 2wd, etc..
So far so good. I needed a better manual than the paperback version that I picked up at my local auto parts center which covered about 10 years and several other models. I’m sure everyone has had the experience of trying to find something specific, only to have to wade through pages and pages of useless, non-relevant information only to find a vague reference to what you’re really after.
Anyway, I’m working on a new vehicle and was having some problems that my paperback manual couldn’t answer. I ordered up my new subscription to AlldataDIY, entering in my specific vehicle information, only to find out that it was, at best, an incomplete manual. Don’t get me wrong, there’s a LOT of stuff in the manual, some of the procedures even have diagrams and drawings to help but, for the need I had, there was NO information included and what information came close WAS WRONG!!!
The problem I was trying to fix had to do with my ‘85 Ford F150’s front I-Beam axle. First, the AlldataDIY manual didn’t include any repair information (install/remove) regarding the axle and the diagrams it did offer where either of a 4 wheel drive truck (why did I choose 2wd then?) or of a much older “king pin” connector design. TOTALLY USELESS!! I then did some other checking and there where some more areas that didn’t exist. Want to adjust your 3 speed manual transmission linkage? Don’t bother, according to the manual it doesn’t exist.
I’m still working through the manual but so far I’m really less than impressed. For something that is supposed to be vehicle specific and updated often, the amount of information that I’m finding on my new online manual prevents me from throwing out my paperback version. Even through I chose specific vehichle information for my subscription, I’m still wadin through 4 wheel drive diagrams and procedures (once or twice they even omited the 2wd version) and I even came across several Bronco and 350 references!! That, in my humble opinion, is pretty pathetic. It costs more and provides less. I’m sorry but HOW CAN YOU NOT INCLUDE WHOLE SECTIONS ON HOW TO REPAIR YOUR VEHICLE?????
2 OUT OF 10 STARS