Tuning M2/M235i N55/S55 — iPhone/Android and Bootmod3 Wi-Fi on Raspberry Pi

Bootmod3 is one of the most practical ways to flash a N55 or S55 based BMW.

It’s a cloud-based solution with a web app and Android/iOS app. The cloud connects to the “agent”, which can be running on a laptop connected to the car’s OBD2 port or on a standalone “Wi-Fi Agent” also for sale.

This agent is simply a Raspberry Pi 3B (not 3B+).

A **great thread by JaredG_F30 on Bimmerpost goes into the details of how to use off-the-shelf Pi hardware to perform the same job, however, if you are familiar with Linux and/or Raspberry Pi, it consists of downloading [the latest firmware](https://bootmod3.atlassian.net/wiki/spaces/BCS/pages/363631/OBD+Agent+Hardware+Device+-+Firmware+Update) **and putting it on a microSD card.

Warning: dd’ing the wrong drive could delete all of your data, please understand the command before performing it or even better learn to use it on a machine that is unimportant and well backed up.

sudo dd bs=1m if=path_of_your_image.img of=/dev/rdiskn conv=sync

Changing the SSID / Password Used by Bootmod3 Agent

The way the agent (custom or purchased) accesses the Internet is by looking for SSID “bootmod3” with password “bootmod3”. As you can imagine, this is quite a dangerous password to use on your phone’s mobile hotspot. Do not use the default configuration.

Instructions to change it are available but are deep into the support site, in a PDF. Again, if you are familiar with Linux and SSH, the steps are very simple.

Boot the Pi/Agent with Ethernet connected to a computer with a self-assigned IP in the 169.254.0.5–10 range. You should be able to ping the agent on 169.254.0.2.

If that works, SSH into the device using any SSH client (openssh, PuTTY) using username bm3 and password bootmod3. You should consider changing that SSH password if you ever connect the device to a network where it can be accessed. In my case, it’s only used over Wi-Fi to my phone, and ethernet is used to access OBD2 using a Ethernet to OBD2 cable.

ssh bm3@169.254.0.2

Edit the Wi-Fi configuration

sudo nano /etc/wpa_supplicant/wpa_supplicant.conf

Edit the SSID name to your phone’s name, as well as the password. Save the file, reboot the agent, and it should now connect to your properly secured personal hotspot, so your phone is not at risk whenever you turn on the hotspot on it.

Note: If you have issues, consider making sure your phone’s name does not have special characters, and favor a longer password instead of one with special characters as well.