A customer learnt the hard way that saving an extra few pounds can end up costing a lot more.
Mr Jones (name changed) decided to purchase a Kingston SSD (Solid State Drive – a faster hard drive) on Ebay as it was around £20 cheaper than a reputable supplier. When installed there was no noticeable improvement in speed. At this point Mr Jones came to me. On first inspection the hard drive appeared fine although the holographic labels weren’t very shiny.
First, I performed a basic set of tests and the SSD appeared to be legitimate. But alarm bells rang when it wasn’t recognised by the official Kingston Software program, so I compared the weight of Mr Jones’ SSD and one I had here. Mr Jones’ was half the weight of mine.
Next, I ran a speed and performance test. Lots of confusing numbers to the untrained eye, but you can clearly see in the test results Mr Jones’ SSD (right) scored badly.
Mr Jones’ had bought a fake SSD on Ebay. We checked the reviews for the seller and whilst they had lots of positive reviews you shouldn’t necessarily trust these as they aren’t expert reviews. Recently they had received a lot of negative feedback. I would always advise searching for the most negative reviews as a guide to the worst case scenario. Although this drive looked legitimate on the outside the internals were from a much cheaper device.
It is always important to make sure you purchase products online from a reputable trader. Faking computer components is more common than you would think. With prices rising due to the falling pound it is tempting to go for the cheapest option. It’s a case of buyer beware and remember to use a reputable firm who purchase from legitimate sources and whose work carries a guarantee (like me!).
Happy ‘Putering
