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隨著新一代百萬像素照相手機以及MP3手機的陸續登場,聯騰 T-PRO記憶卡家族的新成員-手機記憶卡系列,也已經正式在台灣市場與消費者見面了!從Motorola手機最先採用的超微型記憶卡 - TransFlash, Nokia及Siemens手機的最愛 - RS-MMC, Sony Ericsson手機專屬的MS (PRO) Duo, 到BENQ與日系大廠全力支援的SD新規格 - miniSD,聯騰國際再次展現高品質的堅持,為消費者提供收藏一切美好時光的全系列記憶卡規格。 聯騰國際有限公司創立於2002年11月1日。主要產品為數位儲存產品如: CompactFlash, SmartMedia, MultiMediaCard, SD, MemoryStick等記憶卡。另有讀卡機, 轉接器, 存取磁碟機等高度可攜性產品。聯騰國際主要營運宗旨為提供快速, 高品質的服務, 國際化反映市場需求。 期望能與各廠商及各位親愛的消費朋友共同成長。 總經理 郭曜焜

Saturday, June 23, 2007

General info on how to spot a fake memory card

As fake memory cards have now proliferated throughout the marketplace, it is important to be able to spot a fake. This page includes methods to spot fakes, and examples of fake cards.

Why should you care?
  • Inferior quality card - you're not getting what you paid for
  • No warranty - when the card fails, you're out of luck
  • Fake cards sometimes have invalid partition sizes, making it likely to fail
  • It will drive costs of genuine cards up
And of course this is why we work very hard on building our T-PRO brand name :)

Please check out the excellent article released by OCAU's Wiki: http://www.overclockers.com.au/wiki/Fake_Memory_Cards

Spotting a fake

Unfortunately there is no software which will test the card, and ensure that it's genuine. You must manually scrutinise your card, (both visually and by testing it's performance), to get some idea of it's genuinity.

Presentation quality and differences

First thing to look for is poorly printed labels and material; most fake cards have slight differences from the real deal. Most manufacturers have a page where you can download high resolution pictures of their cards. Below is a list of manufacturer image page links:

Example of fake 1GB Sandisk SD Card

Image:Disk fake vs real thumb.jpg

(Click here for high resolution image)


This particular card was also missing a notch, making it quite easy to spot:


Image:Disk fake vs real notch.jpg




Example of fake 2GB Sandisk CF Card - courtesy of mpot's Fake SanDisk CF article

Image:Sandisk front.jpg


Note the faded red print on the back, and the "TM" next to "CF" at the top right side on the fake:

Image:Sandisk back.jpg


Note there is no serial on the bottom of the fake (serial blurred on the real one):

Image:Sandisk bottom.jpg

Note the fake box has no hologram:

Image:Sandisk box.jpg


Another example of Sandisk 2GB CF Card - courtesy of Mark Tranchant

Note the poor print and alignment of label:

Image:Fake sandisk back.jpg
Note the poor quality workmanship on edge, print quality and alignment of text:
Image:Fake sandisk edge.jpg


Fake Sony Pro Duo 2GB

Image:Fake 2gb sony.jpg

Note that the fake card has poor quality printing and does not have the same various extrusions and intrusions as the genuine card. With the number of lips and dips on the genuine card it isn't difficult to spot the fake.

Fake Sony Pro Duo 2GB Ultra II courtesy of OCAU forum user Slugoid

Note there is no hologram sticker



Image:Fake 2gb pro duo ultraii box.jpg

Note the incorrect serial number

Image:Fake 2gb pro duo ultraii card back.jpg

The SanDisk card manual was different to the real thing as well (note that the manual on the right hand is from a Sandisk Ultra II, wheras the manual on the left is for a 'flash memory card'):

Image:Sandisk paper.jpg
can you tell which country it is from?

Performance issues

The second thing to look for is performance issues. Sisoft Sandra is a suite you can use for testing, with our example card, we got a less than stellar performance:

Image:Disk speed.jpg

The fake 1GB SD Card card is a green line, and the red lines are similar specced cards.

Disk capacity and formatting

With most faked cards, the capacity is overstated by the disk being prepared with incorrect parameters, when partitioned. It is quite difficult to detect fake cards, by just the size of the partition, but sometimes the card will fail, if we do a format from the command line. The sandisk card from above failed thusly:

Image:Disk format.jpg

If you try this, and your card fails it will be unusable. To reformat it with the original parameters, you could try and put it in your camera, as it will not do as thorough checking as the format command does, (of course this won't make a fake card good).

There's a large thread in OCAU's Photography Forum here with more info about memory cards.

If you're a Digg member and you like this article, please Digg it!

And, thanks again for OCAU's good info!

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