Zeefour said:Its not the oils that have gotten better its the motors, fuel injection and ECM have made it possible to monitor and change the engines efficiency every second that its running, you the owner will never notice all the checks that ECM program executes. Thus the motor is always operating effieciently and under the lease amount of stress given the situation, and when somethings not right even a vaccum hose you get a "check engine" light. All of this contributes to better gas mileage, cooler running motors, less wear on all parts, and the oil doesn't work as hard. Remember oil regardless of how dirty will still lubricate surfaces, its the additive packages that get dilluted, and synthetics have higher amounts of these additives which is why they perform better. i recommend you contact BMW and request their technical report on extended oil change intervals, or go one step further and conduct your own by simply having 2 oil sample analyzed one extended and a shorter duration, its been done many times and the results indicate that the oil and additives are well within safe parameters and could still be used for a few thousand miles. I have always maintained my vehicles per the Manufacturers instructions without any major issues, i once had a BMW 535i that blew a seal in the tranny at 103K miles, the seal was $30 and labor was over $600, BMW pick up the tab since i proved that the vehicle had been maintained per BMW recommendatons which was every 30K miles (back then), so BMW will stand behind its products.
These are standard technologies found in all current automotive vehicles today. The techniology really isn't that new as the OBDII ECU was created in the '80's. Yet, not all automotive companies perscribe to that extended oil change policy. Also, as I stated before. Audi and VW just recently (Past 2000) have experienced oil sludging issues and those vehicles have those same ECU's and readiness codes that you are mentioning.