Those are FAKE !!!! ... No.. not Silicone.... Silicon !

[OWC Jamie]

Hmm. Somebody from Engadget reading the forum?

http://www.engadget.com/2010/02/24/the-s...roduction/

[OWC Larry]

Not much different than the counterfeit capacitor issue that even hit Apple a few years ago. And - it's not necessarily about there having been a lower cost for the enduser/manufacturer either. Someone in the line knows they have fake stuff - but once passed to a certain point, it's in a stream that subject to standard market dynamics - the fraudsters at the front of that line are who are pocketing the dollars to everyone's harm.

[OWC Jamie]

If you want less than half a bazillion of some parts you almost HAVE to go through a broker. Minimum orders from a manufacturer can be astronomically huge.

[ztirffritz]

The counterfeit capacitor issue hit almost all of the computer companies. Lenovo, HP, Dell, Apple, and Sony I think were the big ones. In my office Dell Optiplex 270GS computers had a 100% failure rate within a certain time frame. Dell's solution was to send out replacement defective parts that got them out of the warranty window. Technically they're allowed to do that, but it was a shady practice. I complained and they let me extend the warranty for token fee of something like $2/machine. I've replaced the motherboards on those things so many times now. I can almost do it in my sleep.

[lost in space]

HUGE problem in Silicon Valley/Fremont/Milpitas areas when I worked around there. There was a ring of workers at a chip plant in Texas that got in trouble with the Feds bigtime for stuffing boxes with fake chips then fencing the real stuff.

[Panopticon]

Explains why the govt. has their own {hush-hush} fab plants and only buys critical components from companies that produce same under govt supervision/inspection.

Bogus chips in a Predator might cause some problems :banghead:

[sekker]

OWC Larry wrote:
Not much different than the counterfeit capacitor issue that even hit Apple a few years ago. And - it's not necessarily about there having been a lower cost for the enduser/manufacturer either. Someone in the line knows they have fake stuff - but once passed to a certain point, it's in a stream that subject to standard market dynamics - the fraudsters at the front of that line are who are pocketing the dollars to everyone's harm.

I was remembering that story - which came right out of a mystery novel! The thieves that sold the magic capacitor formula (eventually) to a Chinese company forgot to include the preservative in the recipe - presumably that was on a separate page!