Benifits of advancing timing and how to save logs

[leveil22]

How do I do these?

[sohfast94]

The benefits of advancing the timing can be expressed quite easily. Basically what is happening when the piston is coming up on the compression stroke. The degree of the crankshaft before top dead center or BTDC is what is used to describe timing advance. Basically you want to fire the plug right before the piston gets to the top so you will harness the best explosion and flame speed thus netting the best torque. If this is done too soon then you will lose flame control, and control of the combustion event result in drastically reduced torque and normally is severe enough causing an audible "ping" that can be viewed with your dataviewer.Knocking or detonation is known as "Knock or KR" in dataviewer. This is the amount that the timing is being retarded due to having knock.
Now advancing the timing Can sometimes be beneficial if you have a higher octane fuel or modifications done to your vehicle however conditions govern this quite a bit. So it's better to monitor you specfic vehicle to see how it reacts to the tune. We have found on a dyno where the best torque is made although sometimes this will have to be modified due to engine wear, fuel used, elevations etc...
I hope that answered your question I tried to keep it somewhat short. Ignition timing theory and application can get really in depth.
As for saving you logs once you open them in dataviewer just click on the little toolbar icon that looks like a disk and will say Save current log data as.

[Jected]

If you have to ask, don't touch IMO. The common mistake people make with tools such as this is adjusting one parameter but not compensating for other areas (for example fuel).

There is no benefit to advancing timing if it does not ultimately need it. Do you have a reason for wanting to do so? What conditions and areas have you logged data to determine this need?