will the display continue to read say.. digital rpms after the key is turned from accessory to ignition?

yes

i just did it .. my speedo is off by 1mph and i have code 5284 oil pressure switch failure... is this a sensor, mechanical or a problem with the computer

EDIT: this code doesnt go away while the motor is running. reads oil pressure as 0

What gear ratio do you have?

I have the same oil pressure switch error and 0 reading. [] The gauge on the dash looks fine though.

Of course the digital speedo is wrong. It's getting the same signal that the mechanical one that you normally use does.

I wonder if I have to disconnect my battery for a while to reset that? I am still confused at why it was wrong.

[ But the mechanical one is right, I have a tuner to reset it.

This thread is a great example of a littleinformation being a dangerous thing :-)[/align][/align]The instrument cluster diag mode grabs a snapshot of certain things when it's first initialised, I.e. after you have pressed and held the odometer reset button, turned on the key, and then released the odometer button after 5 seconds--when tEStis displayed--and provides realtime monitoring of other values.[/align][/align]What this means is that when the snapshot is taken the o/p sending unit has not cycled and appears dead to the computer. The sending unit is not repolled so the "error" remains; it's not a real error and does not mean the o/p sending unit is bad. This is explained in a TSB that I can't find just now, along with further explanation of other "gotchas" and what the cluster diag mode is useful for.[/align][/align]The oil pressure itself is monitored, however it's represented as a value from 0 to 176 indicating > 6psi of pressure; and > 176 indicating < 6 psi or no pressure--usually only 0 or 255 will be displayed. The sending unit is just a pressure switch, closed when there is < 6 psi pressure, open when there is more than 6 psi...[/align][/align]As for the analog gauge units themselves, theyare as near as I can tell multiphase or pulse driven servos,are all (fuel/temp/speedometer/tach/voltage/oil) physically and electrically (as far as I can tell) identical--see the photo below,They are (must be) driven by digital to phase/pulse converters by the PCM and cluster electronics. There is no "mechanical" speedometer or tach in the classic sense--the speedometerpulse is generated by a sender on the tranny and manipulated by the PCM to a digital count, the tach is driven by the PCM coil trigger circuits and digitised. [/align][/align]What the digital displays in the cluster diag modeshow are these digital counts, the gauges show the analog conversion of the counts and may bewrongwithin tolerancesdue to digital to phase/pulse to mechanical sweep conversion errors.[/align][/align]Speedometer, ECT, and Fuel guage "motors"[/align][/align][/align]

so what you basically said, is the error code is normal. all of our info on our gauges comes from digital signals that is represented by "mechanical" needles so there is bound to be some error....

ok.. so how does our oil pressure gauge work.. if it only sends 2 (0 and 255) digital signals to the pressure switch.. that means our gauge wont show our oil pressure falling until it gets to a dangerous point, or the opposite.

and for your arrogant comment... a little information isnt a dangerous thing, whats dangerous is when i get a pompous *** like yourself around me when i have a weapon. because you know something about this topic, you should share it with us.. but the attempt at being "witty" should be left out. everyone on this forum is here to learn as we DO NOT know everything (including youself) about these cars. when i have info that someone else asks for, i explain it as clearly and politely as possible. try it once and see how it goes over.

Thanks Cliffy - nice detail.

For the record, when I stated "mechanical speedo" I was referring to the fact that it has a mechanical indicator. [:-]