I try to be very direct and straight to the point when I make comments. So this is MY take on what information has been posted here on this forum. I believe the comments I have quoted are accurate. If any of this information is inaccurate, I would hope that the "official" Autel Support members will clarify or correct my comments as needed.

I just wanted to put this information out for others to read so they do not have to dig around and read casual comments about the  MaxiDAS DS708 life cycle. Hopefully this will help others from being caught off guard or not aware of the tools production and support or status on End Of Life.

Comments about the MaxiDAS DS708 has been mentioned in many different threads here on this forum. I feel that Autel has been less than up front about the tool status and support as there has been random bits of information provided in many posts in the Support Forum, but not enough clear and concise information in a single thread or location or even on the primary official Autel product section on their web site.

Based on comments from "Support" in this Forum, the MaxiDAS DS708 production has stopped sometime before April 18, 2016 and the current End Of Life support target for the tool is 2020. The claim is there will be support for the tool until 2020, however, exact updates and improvements seem to be vague and questionable. It is unclear as to how the annual updates will keep up with newer model year vehicles/features, and/or include bug fixes and enhancements for software that was released up through the end of the tools production.

I say this is information is "unofficial" because comments have only been posted via someone from Autel here on the Support Forum under the user name of "Support". I have to assume this user "Support" is in fact a Autel employee that is authorized to make the statements that have been posted. I have yet to find any of this information on the main Autel web site and as of this post it appears that the MaxiDAS DS708 is still a "current" product based on the Autel web site, no mention of the tool being discontinued or the planned End Of Life in 2020.


See these comments below from "Support" to some of my direct questions about the MaxiDAS DS708 current status.

Quotes from a few recent thread replies that outline the MaxiDAS DS708 status:

support

2016-04-18 06:42:54 (Reply to:jfoj)

 Sorry that engineers currently do not have plan to renew BMW software on DS708.

taly

2016-04-18 08:04:25 (Reply to:support)

well that says it all they are obviously stopping support and updates for DS708 a lot sooner than they said they were as since paying for my updates 6 months ago there have only been several updates and some of these have only been language updates, this is what they said but will they stick to this ?

support

2015-02-26 03:25:10

Dear Customers, 

DS708 will be discontinued on 2016, however we still sell it in 2015. And we will continue to provide the software update 

for 5 more years during 2016 - 2020 and hardware service for 2 more years during 2016 - 2017.

 

 

 

support

2016-04-18 06:29:11 (Reply to:jfoj)

 Hello Sir, we had stopped manufacture of DS708, that means, you may not be able to buy it from dealers, and we won't have so frequent updates as Maxisys series. However, some dealers still have DS708 in stock, and many customers are still using DS708, they need product information for it, that's why we have DS708 information on our website.

See these 2 links for the discussion leading up to the above comments:

http://pro.auteltech.com/autelsupport/Diagnostic%20System/21155.jhtml?logoTypeId=95&typeName=MaxiDas

http://pro.auteltech.com/autelsupport/Diagnostic%20System/20993.jhtml?logoTypeId=95&typeName=MaxiDas

One additional issue is with SD card problems. A word to the wise, remove the SD card from your tool NOW and make a copy of the card and save it to a file on your computer, then buy 1 or 2 additional SD cards and make Backup copies. There appears to be more and more users having the tools "brick" because of flaky or faulty SD cards. I cannot say this is an Autel problem specifically. I have seen a lot of corrupt Micro and regular SD cards for many different products over the past few years. I think there are a lot of substandard Micro and regular SD cards in the market these days. This should save you a lot of headaches moving forward because it appears that Autel does not have a simple mechanism to get a replacement file image without you having a current Update Plan or buying a new Update Plan.

 Its been 2 weeks and no disputes, comments, corrections or updates, so I am assuming the information about the MaxiDAS is reasonably accurate.

Read and heed!