here is a breakdown on what lead up to the disaster

about a month ago my key fob stopped working so I ordered a toyota smartkeymaker off ebay (the orange unit) which is supposed to reprogram the car and key to work.

a couple weeks ago one day the car wouldn't even start with the fob over the start button but a new car battery fixed that issue.

so today I got the key programmer in the mail. I plugged it in and performed a program sequence but the key still didn't work unless I had it over the start button. So I performed an "all keys lost" initialization but that didn't work either.

few hours later my wife had to go to work so I went out to start the car and put the key up to the button green light came on, pushed the button and the car cranked for 10 seconds then stopped the following messge was displayed under the speedo "check VSC". Tried it again same result. told her to take my car. I tried to start it again a few more times and same cranking without starting.

I hooked up my scan tool and it did not detect any codes. unplugged the tool and tried to start it again but now the start button is totally dead. if I press it nothing happens, no radio, no dash lights, nothing regardless if the key is over it or not. the door beep works and overhead lights. Got my volt meter out to make sure the new battery is still good and it is 12.65 volts so no issue there.

disconnected the battery for 15 minutes and reconnected it. start button is still not responding.

at this point I am not sure if the start button is faulty or if the programmer or scan tool damaged the ecu (not likely but who knows)

what would you guys suggest I look at next? is there a way to bypass or test the start button to determine if it is bad or not? I will be inspecting the fuses in the morning. is there a way to verify if the ECU has been corrupted somehow aside from going to the stealer and forking out a paycheck.

Thanks for the help if any

 

Figured it out, somewhat. What happened was that when I did the lost all keys function I forgot to program the key back into the car. I programmed it back in and it's now able to start however I can't lock/unlock the doors or open the trunk with the FOB. it lights up under the mirrors when I get close and starts up with the fob in my pocket but the buttons aren't working. I will do some research and figure it out not sure if it could be a bad fob or the way it was reprogrammed into the car.