How to install VAG Tacho 3.0 on Windows 8

Got my vag tacho 3.0 cable on Saturday afternoon; spent a ton of time on research and trying to get the cable (usb to iso/usb to serial) drivers to work with windows 7 (took almost all night) and today, I got them to work in Windows 8. I was able to successfully. If you want to program the immo, you need both VCDS and vagtacho. Vagtacho will get the skc for the key, vcds will allow you to match the key. 

After spending all afternoon and into the evening working with Vagtacho; I was able to accomplish some things, that I needed to do. 

1. got it to run on Windows 8:

Getting a driver; that works on your system, is trial and error, so try different versions until you find one that is compatible with your particular setup (e.g.: windows version, 32/64 bit etc.). The drivers on the disk that came with the cable; would work with XP but my laptop is windows 8. Sites, all over the web; say that it is more stable and XP for the 3.01 version of cable. 

a: you need to download drivers from FTDI website (they are the makers of the chipset in the cable). I am running a 64 bit version of Windows 8; latest driver didn't work but I found a older version 2.08.28 to work (CDM 2.08.28 WHQL Certified): look at their website page at the bottom, under "no longer supported":

http://www.ftdichip.com/Drivers/D2XX.htm 

b: When running vagtacho, it requires you to turn off windows defender and any virus software; otherwise, it will treat the app as a virus, remove it from your computer. So, when I turned it back on; WF removed it and this required me to re-install Vagtacho and the driver, every time I wanted to use it again. 

2. pulled skc/pin out of both clusters: you need both to do the cluster swap and programming/matching in VCDS.
 

3. Unfortunately, I was not able to change odometer setting, button and feature, is grayed out. Sorry to metion that my Beetles 2002 was not included in the vagtacho 3.0 list. I may try to do some more research on this but I'm assuming, not all features work all every vag dash out there.

4. Another option; seems to be Super VAG K+CAN hand held scan tool or the VAGDASH cable/software combo, looks like SuperVAG is a nice little tool though (reads pin, claims to reset odometer, airbags, read codes, program new keys, etc.). 

Reference:

vagtacho 3.0 USB cable list:

(This means: VW Passat B6, Bora/Jetta, Polo to 2004 year, Golf 4, Sharan to 2003 year,Skoda Octavia/Fabia to 2004 year , some Seat dashes up to 2004 year ect...)
VAG Kombiinstrument / Immo box eeprom programmer... via OBD connector!

Latest update: VW Polo ,Seat Ibiza Cordoba 2001 - 2005, Fabia 2004 ect.

http://obd365.jigsy.com/entries/general/how-to-set-up-vagtacho-vag-tacho-3-0-on-windows-8