Hi guys, you may all know all this stuff but.. to set the scene I'll give you an insight:

I recently went onto ebay and saw a wonderful bargain - It was a Sandisk Micro SD card, 32GB Class 10 etc, for about £10. I ordered it and it arrived in it's little jiffy bag... Opened it up and realise the word 'sandisk' is no where to be found... the packaging looks generic, no words relating to size of the card etc...

So I did some research feeling peed off that it wasn't a sandisk and came across an article mentioning how many memory cards for sale online are hacked so that they show a greater size than they actually possess. So I came across a program which was recommended:

http://www.heise.de/download/b177dd2f0124caa396ba6241fe12fd02-1409080724-223582.html

What it does is it writes files onto the memory card you've selected and then tests the files...

So I ran the program on the card I had and the results were quite frightening:

The media is likely to be defective.

7.3 GByte OK (15484599 sectors)

23.7 GByte DATA LOST (49830217 sectors)

Details:0 KByte overwritten (0 sectors)

0 KByte slightly changed (< 8 bit/sector, 0 sectors)

23.7 GByte corrupted (49830217 sectors)

0 KByte aliased memory (0 sectors)

First error at offset: 0x00000001d88d6e00

Expected: 0x00000001d88d6e00

Found: 0xcc2fe3e537ad8574

H2testw version 1.3

Writing speed: 6.32 MByte/s

Reading speed: 12.2 MByte/s

Anyone that understands the above probably knows what they're doing, but to us layman, basically what it means is that 7 GB of my "32GB card" was real and the rest is bogus BS - so ~ 23% of what I paid for works the rest is rubbish...

What it also means is that I could be there snapping away photos and I'd be able to keep 23% of them!

So as I said, run this on anything you buy, especially if you're using a dashcam, what happens if someone rolls back onto you and it's not included in the 7.3 GB's?? = your fault!

Good luck

Step by step for those who need help (I did!)

Download the program.

- Open up the h2testw_1.4zip folder

- Double click h2testw.exe

- Click Run

- For me I had a security warning - again click run..

- Select English

- Select your target - The memory card

This next bit is up to you, initially I ran the entire card (so all 32000MBytes)...it took a couple hours so if you have a bigger card it'll take longer. What I have read is that the majority of cards are around 8GB that have been hacked, so in theory you could just run 10000MBytes and see what happens (I did this the 3rd time and got the same results after the 7.3GB of GOOD data!)...

Anyway, choose whichever, all or less than all, and click "write and verify" and just wait for it to finish!

Excellent advice mate,

I didnt know they could make it display like a larger memory.

Thanks for sharing this info

good thing to share with fellow members so they dont get caught out

paul

I'd heard about them misrepresenting the class of cards but not the capacity :O

Might just have to have a check of my cards at some point!!

Just to add, when I stuck the card in the computer I clicked on my computer and it showed the memory card and it even said 32GB FREE!

So it completely fooled the computer!

Happy to share this info with anyone and everyone. Nothing worse than finding a 'bargain' only to find out it's a complete waste of money!

Still working with ebay to get my hard earned pennies back!

Great advice. Hope you gave the seller hell!

They had a bit about these fake cards on fake Britain of whatever the program is..

One guy had bought a cheap solid state hard drive.. Didn't work properly so he decided to open it up to find it was a case with bolts glued inside it

I think the lesson is beware of who your purchase from - that said amazon took a pounding for it aswell as ebay.

Nice info. I'd heard about fake card from ebay but didn't realise they were faking the capacity too! :o

Where was the item located? I never buy anything from Ebay claiming to be a UK seller but items located in China / Thailand etc there are a lot of items on there like this.

Where was the item located? I never buy anything from Ebay claiming to be a UK seller but items located in China / Thailand etc there are a lot of items on there like this.

UK seller.. also came from the UK.. Well no doubt it originated in the orient somewhere, but as far as I could tell by the original listing it was all good to go...

Was it a power seller? Report it as fake and send ebay the read out from the program and get his account closed out and IP blocked, they hate people selling fake dodgy crap, about the only thing they do care about.

I do this for every device I get off ebay, memory card, USB Pen or for that matter hard drives! its always worth it, and you cannot argue that the hardware you have sold is not the right capacity!

For the sake of a scan that could run for a day (or two depending on size) its well worth it!

I was going to put a guide together many moons ago but forgot, so good job for bringing it back up!

Latest:

- They told me they'd refund me £1 and I could keep the card if I left positive feedback.

Opened ebay case

- Then went up to £3 and again keep and leave positive feed back.

Told them to go screw themselves (more or less)

- They offered a full refund and keep the card IF I left POSITIVE feedback.

Talked to ebay chat, was informed that the seller was carrying out 'feedback extortion' and they have started their own investigation but they couldn't tell me what they were doing to the seller... told me to escalate the case.

- Left negative feedback... and now the waiting game..

I had that recently told the guy in no certain terms to go to hell and I wouldn't leave crap feedback when it's not accurate and left negative told him not to contact me again

ONLY EVER BUY MEMORY DEVICES FROM A PROPER REGISTERED BONA FIDE FIRM AND MAKE SURE IT IS NEW, IN ITS ORIGINAL PACKAGING AND SEALED.

Sorry for the caps but this is extremely important. Not just the memory size but they can come infected with malware which can silently load stuff onto your pc.

To make matters worse it has now been proven to be able to install malware that fools the pc into thinking it's another device and start using your internet/phone etc to dial premium phone numbers etc etc. You are risking installing all sorts of crap onto your pc by buying off unknown traders on Ebay.

It's just not worth the risk to save a few quid. Only ever buy from proper bona fide computer firms or use the high street.

Unfortunately until you get the actual card in your hand no amount of reading will ever tell you if the card you'll receive be real or fake.

Amazon has also had issues with fake cards. Even sealed cards in what appears to be original packaging can be fake

Unfortunately until you get the actual card in your hand no amount of reading will ever tell you if the card you'll receive be real or fake.

Amazon has also had issues with fake cards. Even sealed cards in what appears to be original packaging can be fake

+1

Couldn't reach an amicable decision; they kept telling me to leave positive feedback and then they'd refund me. I won't do that in case someone else gets gets unfairly conned!

Escalated the case and I got a full refund!

Thank you ebay!

Well done mate, have you left bad feedback ?

Well done mate, have you left bad feedback ?

Too right! And left a follow up reply to their reply of "communication can solve everything"

Sent via carrier pigeon using Ford OC

Oh what !Removed! heads trying to make us you didn't communicate with them, they can't go on selling these knock offs surely!

Hopefully ebay will bin them for selling fraudulent goods.

I once had some plum message me offering £25 for a Ford Sony radio with a £75 reserve and got prissy when I politely said no.

He reported me to ebay for being abusive :d and thought they would side with him.

I sent ebay a copy of all his messages to me and my replies.

Strangely enough ebay sided with me and binned him, what a pity.

I went on to sell the radio for £150 to a very nice guy local to me and I ended up going around and fitting it for him too.

Gotta love these plums really!

1 of your 5 a day!

Though, I dare say you get more than at in a typical day at work Stoney :p