FAKE sandisk cards floating around in Clubsnap

[airforce1]

greetings all,

i started a thread for MO on one of the 2 MO for "oem" sandisk cards.

Kindly allow me to explain the situation please. i chanced upon a china supplier who claimed that they purchase sandisk flash chips, produce the cf cards using their own facilities & called it oem.

as a non-IT guy or one who works in the semi-conductor industry, i thought that the deal sounded quite satisfying. before i ordered the cards from the said supplier who claimed they were third party manufacturer too, i did a quick check at SLS on the retail packing & price.

after realising that the ones sold on retail was far too expensive from the ones supplied by the china supplier, i figured, why not try a MO for this particular card that may help csers members save some money too?

so i posted the MO translating everything that was told to me by the china supplier. they had pictures emailed to me & without any indepth experience on how to spot fake vs original, i thought they looked the same, backed up by them consistently saying that these are oem cards.

when the cards were delivered, after a couple of hours later, i discovered some of the MO buyers started complaining about speed, authenticity & quality of the cards. i was surprised, shocked & disaapointed naturally. because my main intention was not to cheat any of the buyers.

however, some buyers also said they are not particular about the speed or quality, they just are happy with the capacity. for a moment, i thought, which one is this? is it fake or is it real oem?

then after noticing that there seems to be so much heat going around regarding this discussion, my worst nightmare started. the thought of me actually unintentionally selling these 'fake' cards to innocent buyers who supported the MO, just made my heart sank.

i then said contacted my supplier to see if i can get a refund or replacement & said to them that they had cheated me by claiming the cards were oem. their reply? ("sorry we sell only & we dont do any refunds. we tested all the cards before shipping out to you & they were all ok. perhaps you want to try asking your customers to format the cards ?")

wahhh...i was so confused & naturally the next right thing i thought was right to do was to think of a way to compensate my poor buyers. attempts & actions on my end made was calling some of the buyers who were reachable & asking them if they had anymore problems with their cards.

at the same time, while all this was going on, i had already began my 2nd MO selling the original adata cf cards, which i got in touch directly with adata taiwan manufacturing office, spoke directly with adata export sales manager & wanted to verify originality of their cards. they supported me with sufficient answers that i was convinced they were real makers of the cards, also by verifying their company official adata website.

from there, i had posted all details of the 2 adata cards i am marketing by gaining direct info & pictures of the cards direct from manufacturer. but to play safe, i wanted these cards to be tested first which was why invitation to potential buyers was opened to test the cards & post open field reports in the forum.

with the new samples coming in, since this is the original adata cards, i offered some form of mutually agreed compensation with affected buyers who approached me. from what i can afford personally, i refunded quite a few of the affected buyers from my own pocket.

however, as i cant afford to offer refund for those who were affected, my other alternative was to offer them to get the new ones, exchange for the old ones & just top up the difference. in this manner, they still get their CF cards which they set out to buy in the first place, & as for myself, i had to be on the losing end, forking out $$ too for purchasing the 2nd group of cards from adata for a new MO. in fact for those affected, you only pay about 20% of cost, where i fork out the rest. trust me, i am paying for the loss in this manner too bros.

sincerely from the bottom of my heart, i didnt intend to cheat anyone out of this 1st MO. i felt cheated too & theres no way of turning the clock to avoid it. now that it has gone to this stage, i hope my apology to everyone or anyone who felt they were cheated / shortchanged or mislead, please accept my sincere apology.

during the course of reading posts with different undesirable attacking remarks towards me just didn't help the matter & in some ways i felt that no one understood the whole situation before directing all arrows towards me. that sparked me to defend myself & unintentionally fired back remarks to those who condemned me baselessly.

however, again, i am really sorry if my words kinda offended you guys if at all it did. i hope my efforts in compensating or offering the affected buyers has somehow calmed down the storm. again, i am so sorry for what happened & i didn't plan for any of these to happen, in the first place, its just my bad luck.:cry:

thanks for sparing time to read csers...

Bravo brother ,it's take gut and courage to stand up and damaged control is the next best thing to do now. Wish you all the best in your business.

 

[surge]

Actually, this is also quite rampant in SLS and is not restricted to memory cards. Even RAMs are OEM. And to add to our consumer woes, even other brands such as Kingston are not spared.

I was at SLS and noticed the rather significant price difference, so I asked my regular PC guy why this was so. He mentioned that several shops have been fined/warned and had removed the OEM cards/RAMs from their shops after being complained. For this case, Kingston actually sent someone down and found that the RAMs were OEMs. There is a holographic sticker to differentiate the originals from the OEMs. Also some other manufacturing marks.
Just remember. If it's too good to be true, it usually is ....

the last time i went quangzhou, pass by a shop that can help you make holographic stickers...so that is not a good gauge of real/fake too.

 

[D60D60]

Bravo brother ,it's take gut and courage to stand up and damaged control is the next best thing to do now. Wish you all the best in your business.

hey bro,

thanks so much for the comment.........God bless you.:angel:

 

[jhs2669]

Did Ultra II also hv fake ?
I going to buy this Friday.. from here

 

[junniee]

when there is real, there is fake.

1. Do enough research before purchasing. this benefit u

2. not to get fake card, simple way, go to sandisk authorized shop and make purchase.


when u see sandisk card selling WAY to CHEAP, then u have to use your brain la

Did Ultra II also hv fake ?
I going to buy this Friday.. from here

 

[slaam]

In all fairness, I have edited my earlier post so as not to accuse Cathay.

Well, if I could make it, I will drop by Cathay tomorrow with the card and box and receipt to see what they have got to say. And I will certainly update the posting here.

BTW, my Casio QV-R41 camera is like 3-4years old with a 4Mp sensor. Dunno if it can support the 2GB card or not. Or it could only support up to 1GB. :think:

that's a possiblity have u formatted the card in camera or using ur PC?
if a not SDHC compat camera format it it might be 1gb only.

 

[slaam]

I understand your sentiment. But in all fairness, it doesn't look right to accuse a large retail shop of selling fake without verification with the local agent or shop. I would suggest that you verify with local agent or Cathay and update your posting here.

yeah very true.
not to mention the legal ramifications ..
basically u have put yourself in a situation where CP can take legal action agst u for possible slander.
there was a case like that in HWZ.
its abit bohua esp if the whole was a misunderstanding.

even if ur case is genuine. posting the details here provide the other party with details and stuff that might work agst u in legal proceedings or potential settlement claims.

 

[vince123123]

Well with the post as I currently read it, I don't see much basis for legal action given that it is easily proven that (a), card was bought from cathay (b) card only shows 1GB.

yeah very true.
not to mention the legal ramifications ..
basically u have put yourself in a situation where CP can take legal action agst u for possible slander.
there was a case like that in HWZ.
its abit bohua esp if the whole was a misunderstanding.

even if ur case is genuine. posting the details here provide the other party with details and stuff that might work agst u in legal proceedings or potential settlement claims.

 

[rvxing]

BTW, my Casio QV-R41 camera is like 3-4years old with a 4Mp sensor. Dunno if it can support the 2GB card or not. Or it could only support up to 1GB. :think:

Did you still keep your camera manual, check to see if it supports 2GB

 

[smallaperture]

Went to Funan Vector Magnetics ytd. Got a 1-1 exchange on the spot. That chap told me that there might be something wrong with the FAT. And he remarked that I am a very "lucky" chap to have encountered this kind of problem. Well, the proof is that he didn't encounter such a thing for the last month or so, selling so many cards, thumbdrive and other stuff.

His advice - to get only from authorised dealers. And then, check that there is a white sticker with Vector Magnetics on it. I will try to post a pic of it later for all to see.

Well with 6Sigma kind of quality assurance and quality management these days, especially with electronic stuff, the chances of getting a defective item is really very, very small. I would say, touch 4D is easier than getting a defective item. Well, maybe, I will buy $10 worth of 4D today with the serial number.:bsmilie:

I have been to Acer, Sony, HP service centers. My last experience at HP was that there was a long queue, wait like 1hr or so with something like at least 6 counter staff working there. But at Vector Magnetics, well, immediate service.

From my observations, Sandisk seems to be everywhere, with Kingston coming up as second. Well, my first encounter with Kingston was a RAM upgrade - about 4years ago. And I dun mind getting Kingston as well.

 

[smallaperture]

Did you still keep your camera manual, check to see if it supports 2GB

Well, got the new 2GB card into the cam, switched on and I saw 988shots remaining from the virgin card. Another lucky number. :bsmilie:

This 4Mp cam averages about 1.8Mb per shot, so, should be able to get like 1100 shots or so.

BTW, I love this old cam - my friends remarked that this is like a grandfather digicam liao. This cam with 4Mp sensor at 1/1.8inch size, very low noise all the way to ISO500. Just cannot understand why no one makes 4Mp sensor cam anymore. :think:

 

[chngpe01]

Went to Funan Vector Magnetics ytd. Got a 1-1 exchange on the spot. That chap told me that there might be something wrong with the FAT. And he remarked that I am a very "lucky" chap to have encountered this kind of problem. Well, the proof is that he didn't encounter such a thing for the last month or so, selling so many cards, thumbdrive and other stuff.

His advice - to get only from authorised dealers. And then, check that there is a white sticker with Vector Magnetics on it. I will try to post a pic of it later for all to see.

Well with 6Sigma kind of quality assurance and quality management these days, especially with electronic stuff, the chances of getting a defective item is really very, very small. I would say, touch 4D is easier than getting a defective item. Well, maybe, I will buy $10 worth of 4D today with the serial number.:bsmilie:

I have been to Acer, Sony, HP service centers. My last experience at HP was that there was a long queue, wait like 1hr or so with something like at least 6 counter staff working there. But at Vector Magnetics, well, immediate service.

From my observations, Sandisk seems to be everywhere, with Kingston coming up as second. Well, my first encounter with Kingston was a RAM upgrade - about 4years ago. And I dun mind getting Kingston as well.

Well I guess it is not fake afterall. And I hope you do not forget to mentioned that Cathay Photo did not sell you a fake sandisk, which you have implied earlier they did.

 

[smallaperture]

Well I guess it is not fake afterall. And I hope you do not forget to mentioned that Cathay Photo did not sell you a fake sandisk, which you have implied earlier they did.

Now, Confirmed, Certified and Verified that Cathay Photo has sold me a True, Real, Genuine and Authentic Sandisk card.:thumbsup: Defective but not a Fake.:thumbsd:

 

[smallaperture]

Don't mind take a pic of the card and package box 1st?

Well, here it is, the Sandisk box with the Vector Magnetics sticker. Snap shot taken with my Casio QV-R41 at the Funan foodcourt, without flash.

Just note that this is a very rare case of defective product if you go by the 6Sigma Quality System.

 

[CS TAN]

I may be very lucky as I have to go to IOI vector's office to exchange 2 items in the past year. The first time it is a faulty multi-card reader. The second time, I bought a 4GB SDHC Ultra II card from ActivePhoto and was unable to format it in my camera. After a while, I realized that the write protection tab was not there (this is brand new card). The guy in the Vector's office has a strange look on his face (the one like he was thinking the card is a fake one). Later, he went to the office for over 10 minutes before returning with a new box.

 

[madmacs]

Well with 6Sigma kind of quality assurance and quality management these days, especially with electronic stuff, the chances of getting a defective item is really very, very small. I would say, touch 4D is easier than getting a defective item. Well, maybe, I will buy $10 worth of 4D today with the serial number.:bsmilie:

don't be too caught up with all the 6sigma hype. i used to work for a company that preached 6sigma but looking at the number of defective products returned, i get the impression it is anything but 6sigma. ;p

 

[goon]

Hi all,
i'm one of the victims of the Sandisk Extreme IV 8GB CF card MO 'scam'. When i got home to use it only 2 days later,the 1 st thing that made me suspicious was the storage case. It was very filmsy compared to the real mc coy ( which i bought from John 3:16 a year ago) .
The next tell tale sign was downloading was quite slow but everything else worked out alright. Since i have gotten it i have decided to swallow the lesson n keep it for the time being.

The question now is ,how much of a difference other than packaging n slow downloading time the fake one is compared to the real thing. I mean does the image get affected in any way or have anyone done a thorough check on reliability?

So far the fake card is holding out OK...just pray it won;t fail me in those emergency moments. Any folks who had bought a fake CF card had any problems so far????
Thanx for reading

 

[rvxing]

Hi all,
i'm one of the victims of the Sandisk Extreme IV 8GB CF card MO 'scam'. When i got home to use it only 2 days later,the 1 st thing that made me suspicious was the storage case. It was very filmsy compared to the real mc coy ( which i bought from John 3:16 a year ago) .
The next tell tale sign was downloading was quite slow but everything else worked out alright. Since i have gotten it i have decided to swallow the lesson n keep it for the time being.

The question now is ,how much of a difference other than packaging n slow downloading time the fake one is compared to the real thing. I mean does the image get affected in any way or have anyone done a thorough check on reliability?

So far the fake card is holding out OK...just pray it won;t fail me in those emergency moments. Any folks who had bought a fake CF card had any problems so far????
Thanx for reading

I don't think your should call it a 'scam', the 2 gentlemen who ran the MO are victims themselves, I guess they lost more than anyone else. They both had posted that they will do their best to help those who brought in their MO, so why do you contact them and see what can be work out. Good luck

 

[wildstallion]

Hi all,
i'm one of the victims of the Sandisk Extreme IV 8GB CF card MO 'scam'. When i got home to use it only 2 days later,the 1 st thing that made me suspicious was the storage case. It was very filmsy compared to the real mc coy ( which i bought from John 3:16 a year ago) .
The next tell tale sign was downloading was quite slow but everything else worked out alright. Since i have gotten it i have decided to swallow the lesson n keep it for the time being.

The question now is ,how much of a difference other than packaging n slow downloading time the fake one is compared to the real thing. I mean does the image get affected in any way or have anyone done a thorough check on reliability?

So far the fake card is holding out OK...just pray it won;t fail me in those emergency moments. Any folks who had bought a fake CF card had any problems so far????
Thanx for reading

Yup, fake card failed after a shoot, day after I brought it, lost everything, first heads up that it was a fake card!

 

[Yappy]

Anybody know the agent for Adata CF card?