Fake and Re-used Electronic Parts and Components

RE: Fake and Re-used Electronic Parts and Components

koudelad — Mon, 19 Jun 2017 20:26:30 GMT

One more thing I just remembered, since FTDI was mentioned: FT232RL real vs fake device after putting them into an acid . Lots of beautiful images of other devices on the website.

RE: Fake and Re-used Electronic Parts and Components

koudelad — Mon, 19 Jun 2017 16:41:16 GMT

Hello,

I'd like to share my fresh experience with a purchase on eBay.

I wanted to buy a NEO-M8N GPS/GNSS module from u-blox. It is hard to find a ready made module and a distributor to send it for a reasonable price to the Czech Republic.

So I found quite a lot of modules with a breakout board on eBay and ordered one.

Two weeks later, I got the module, connected it to a PC and used the original u-center software to verify its function. The signal was good, the module seemed to work OK. Then I tried to upgrade the firmware and it failed. I started googling for more information, got to the point how to read some device information data. This part of memory was inaccessible. Hmmm, strange. I googled again to resolve the upgrade problem.

I ended up on an official u-blox forum, finding out that I am not the only one with this problem and I probably bought a fake part. You can see there both original and counterfeit part - I didn't want to copy someone else's photo without a permission. (You may say I was naive, but I bought the module for about a price that it really costs.)

I am attaching the images of my module below and if you scan the QR code (which is also fake), it shows a description to an older module. This means I got a corrupted clone of a cheaper module...

[View:/resized-image/__size/620x465/__key/commentfiles/f7d226abd59f475c9d224a79e3f0ec07-6face1ac-4323-4a34-9474-84be6a85d99a/8831.contentimage_5F00_184696.jpg:620:465][View:/resized-image/__size/620x465/__key/commentfiles/f7d226abd59f475c9d224a79e3f0ec07-6face1ac-4323-4a34-9474-84be6a85d99a/7345.contentimage_5F00_184697.jpg:620:465]

I contacted the seller, who was "surprised" and said that he will do everything possible, bla bla bla. Nothing happened, so I escalated the case to eBay. They sent me an email stating I mentioned that the part is not genuine, so I should fill in some forms they sent me, destroy the item and provide them some declaration of destruction or confiscation by authorities. Two days later (I didn't do a thing as I was on a holiday for a few days) I got a full refund from the seller, so eBay closed the case automatically saying they don't need anything from me now.

Lessons learned: buy only from official distributors. Sellers in China have an incredibly large warehouses and can ship things for low prices and quite fast, however, most of the things are just some recycled of cloned electronic waste.

I can't find it now, but there is a famous ca. 50 slides presentation on the internet, full of pictures about how this counterfeit industry works.

RE: Fake and Re-used Electronic Parts and Components

fvan — Thu, 15 Jun 2017 06:36:45 GMT

Useful post! I buy a lot of stuff in bulk from eBay, but it's for projects / prototypes, and mainly basic through hole things like resistors, pushbuttons etc ...

It'd be interesting to know what to look for on various types of components.

RE: Fake and Re-used Electronic Parts and Components

rachaelp — Thu, 15 Jun 2017 06:31:34 GMT

I once bought what was supposed to be an Arduino compatible Nano v3 which allegedly had a genuine FTDI chip on it. It was suspiciously cheap and I could never get communication to work properly so I suspect it was not actually a genuine FTDI chip at all. I did check out all the connections and make sure everything was connected to where it should, it just didn't work.

Best Regards,

Rachael

RE: Fake and Re-used Electronic Parts and Components

kas.lewis — Thu, 15 Jun 2017 03:42:28 GMT

I get a decent amount of things from ebay or other such sites. So far it's ether been a compte dud or its worked. If you are looking for interesting knockoffs or fakes you can try bigclivedotcom on youtube. He does a pretty good job of going through odd products from ebay and the like and giving you the inside scoop.

Kas

RE: Fake and Re-used Electronic Parts and Components

ntewinkel — Thu, 15 Jun 2017 01:47:16 GMT

I buy a lot of little bits and pieces off eBay, but for anything mission critical I would definitely use a better, trusted source.

Most of my hobby parts aren't critical, so that's fine.

I've bought parts from a trusted supplier too, and the difference in quality is easy to see.

No specific part comes to mind, but generally the eBay parts do look a little more worn.

Cheers,

-Nico