News - Intel acknowledges sale of counterfeit Core i7 CPUs

[HEXUS]

Chip giant investigates as US consumers receive counterfeit boxes containing fake processors.

Read more.

[shaithis]

wow....I wonder if this was a case of an intel warehouse employee swapping boxes of CPUs or newegg being offered a deal "too good to be true"?

I would give a lot for a montage of the first reactions from people as they opened these

[Stringent]

Either that or these are dummy boxes... but then spelling mistakes?

Someone had better check eBay for cheap i7 CPUs...

[CK_1985]

So hang on, are these 'demo units' as the statement from Newegg claims, or are they counterfeits? Seems like a pretty fundamental distinction to me - if they're demo units then it's just a shipping mistake but if they're counterfeits then someone out there is deliberately producing illegal products and somehow introducing them to the supply chain.

Maybe not such a problem to the consumer that buys through a large retailer (as they should have enough genuine stock to cover themselves) but as Stringent says, if these get onto eBay then it becomes much more dangerous for the consumer...

[shaithis]

The way I read it at least.......newegg either assumed or lied to customers that they were demo units......Intel later confirmed they were counterfeits.

[aidanjt]

........... Shouldn't someone have noticed the weight difference? I mean the retail boxes are fairly hefty compared to a bunch of plastic. 300 of them is heftier still and would have effected the the freight costs.

[tickedon]

........... Shouldn't someone have noticed the weight difference? I mean the retail boxes are fairly hefty compared to a bunch of plastic. 300 of them is heftier still and would have effected the the freight costs.

When I worked in a warehouse (many years ago!) as one of the IT guys, everything was on pallets and the company we mainly dealt with simply had a few weight bands - the precise weight didn't matter, just whatever band it went into. Another of the company's we dealt with simply had a max weight and charged us per pallet. We were shipping electronics products all over the world (mainly to Africa / Middle East, but, some stuff from USA as well) and our main concern was how much we could fit on a single pallet or in a single shipping container, not the weight. For something like CPU boxes, I imagine the consideration would be the same - the package is quite light considering the volume it takes up.

Taking account of the fact that the fake CPU's include a chip, a manual, and a "plastic fan", it wouldn't be too much of a stretch to think that the weight is approximately right either.

[aidanjt]

When I worked in a warehouse (many years ago!) as one of the IT guys, everything was on pallets and the company we mainly dealt with simply had a few weight bands - the precise weight didn't matter, just whatever band it went into. Another of the company's we dealt with simply had a max weight and charged us per pallet. We were shipping electronics products all over the world (mainly to Africa / Middle East, but, some stuff from USA as well) and our main concern was how much we could fit on a single pallet or in a single shipping container, not the weight.

Fair enough, that could absolve the shipping company, but not the distributor or new egg for when they passed them on to the customers. Trust me, between a chunk of solid copper and aluminium that is the i7 stock HSF, and a moulded piece of plastic, you'd notice the difference. With 300 of them that difference is considerable, I'd estimate at least a 200kg delta unless it really is counterfeit and the plastic 'HSF' was loaded with lead or some other dense/cheap metal.

For something like CPU boxes, I imagine the consideration would be the same - the package is quite light considering the volume it takes up.

You'd think so wouldn't you? But the HSF is actually quite heavy. The i7's IHS is deceptively heavy, but the HSF far surpasses it and makes up most of the mass of the package.

Taking account of the fact that the fake CPU's include a chip, a manual, and a "plastic fan", it wouldn't be too much of a stretch to think that the weight is approximately right either.

Except it's all fake, just plastic and stickers. While the package, at-a-glance is very convincing, if you lifted up a real one before, and the fake one, you should easily be able to tell the difference.

[OilSheikh]

Bloody hell.. Looks so good for a counterfeit!

[tickedon]

Fair enough, that could absolve the shipping company, but not the distributor or new egg for when they passed them on to the customers. Trust me, between a chunk of solid copper and aluminium that is the i7 stock HSF, and a moulded piece of plastic, you'd notice the difference. With 300 of them that difference is considerable, I'd estimate at least a 200kg delta unless it really is counterfeit and the plastic 'HSF' was loaded with lead or some other dense/cheap metal.

You'd think so wouldn't you? But the HSF is actually quite heavy. The i7's IHS is deceptively heavy, but the HSF far surpasses it and makes up most of the mass of the package

You aren't the only one to own a Core i7 processor - I know what the fan/heatsink is like

However, the weight of a single Core i7 retail package is less than 1KG - Amazon says 900g, Insight 760g, eBay sellers similar figures. That kind of weight isn't really that hard to make up, and I doubt the delta would approach anything like 200kg if we're only talking about 300 or so CPU's.

[aidanjt]

It would if the counterfeits weigh next to nothing, as it appears to.

[mercyground]

something smells as the Distributer is sueing HardOCP. They broke the story on front page and then Newegg came out with the "Demo" units. They arent demos. They are obvious fakes.

Someone is skimming chips and getting rich.

http://www.techeye.net/business/comp...el-cpu-reports

[nickp8]

http://hothardware.com/News/Newegg-S...-Reporting-It/


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TQrAOQ4TzQc

[moosely]

wow, fake processors! I suspect we will be hearing of fake graphics cards next!

[mercyground]

with woodscrews? I heard a rumour about that...

/tongue Fermi in cheek.