It's on Amazon for $19. I don't know much about these things, but I figured it would be nice to see what the check engine light was complaining about myself. Would this one work? Also, would I be able to reset the light with this one? I'm thinking about pulling the trigger on it anyways since I'm sure it will work with my other 2 cars.

I had just read that Mini's are a little picky on ODB tools, but this one does list 'Mini' on the list of cars it supports(But it doesn't list the year).

 

hard to say. I know the one I sell (napa) does. I've used it a couple of times.
BK 700-2539

 

I'm pretty sure OBD is OBD*, the difference in price is usually in the ease of use.

That unit will probably spit out a number that you'll have to look up in a book, and may require clicking up and down through several menus to clear codes. More expensive versions are easier to use but who cares if you only use it once a year?

* Obviously there are some cars that have very different added 'features' that require special tools. The MINI isn't really one of them, regardless of the year.

 

I have that one. It seems to work fine on my R50. My car threw some heinous codes when I had the transmission out, and I cleared them once the car was all buttoned up and everything seemed fine. You only have to go through two levels of menus to work it, so it's not difficult.

The Peake Scan Tool claims it can read special BMW-only codes that other tools can't. I don't know of that's true. Seems like any tool can read the *number*. Maybe the Peake tool knows what the number means and that's special. But the Autel MaxiScan doesn't know what *any* numbers mean; it just tells you the number. Then you decode it yourself with Google or your manual.

So really, it seems like the Peake tool is competing against the appendix of the Bentley manual. Or the Internet. My money is on the Internet FTW.