PM'd a couple members...

[Chamberpains]

Meatbag do you have an inline5 or 6 or nexiq adapter and a laptop with Insite 7.6.2 or higher? Start off by acquiring those three things. You're going to need them if you can't travel across the country to see mr. hag or Gearhead. Plus any ISX owner should possess them and learn how to use them a lot. They will pay for themselves in just one repair that you handle completely by yourself.
You can easily purchase good hardware (comp and inline adapter) as cheap as $350.
When I built the laptop that stays with me 4 years ago I simply Googled
Toughbook windows XP or 7. There's a guy out of Canada that takes military surplus toughbooks and build them into what you want for a descent price.
Then I turned to China for my inline adapter and I also have a nexiq adapter. (Ebay)
This is just the route I took I am not even close to telling you which way to go or what product to buy. You can obviously spend a lot more for a lot broader range of quality. I'm just showing you for how little you can build really good stuff that will get the job done for years.

I don't want to hijack this thread but
barf hopefully you read this. I read in the introduce yourself section today how you got your handle. It's
hysterical!! I can't stop laughing everytime I think about it. It's so simple how things get put together. Hahaha