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Real vs. fake AirPods with industrial CT

lumafield.com

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Re: Real vs. fake AirPods with industrial CT

#111

Post by pimlottc »

SushiHippie wrote: post #52
keithxm23 wrote: post #13

This is the second time inside a month I've seen Lumafield portray Apple products engineering prowess. First time being when they compared the USB-C cable (unfairly because they compared against the wrong type of third party USB-C). Is this just happenstance or is there a connection between the two companies?

It would be even more interesting for me if they'd compare these things against "real" competitors, i.e. in the same price range or the same quality, and not just "here is the XXX$ apple product vs this XX$ counterfeit". Otherwise these scans are really cool

That would be cool but doesn't really serve their purpose, which is to promote their technology. Besides, once they start making comparisons between competitors, they run the risk of angering companies and their fans.

Re: Real vs. fake AirPods with industrial CT

#112

Post by jacquesm »

arghwhat wrote: post #104
Projectiboga wrote: post #91

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The main risk is fire with the batteries.

The energy of such fire is directly correlated to the battery capacity - airpods would probably just get hot and smoke a bit. The case could do more, but still limited in comparison to, say, a phone. So I'd say the main risk of putting those things in your ears is suffering the horrible audio quality.

Anything that has the potential to release hot gas and flames under pressure into your ears is a safety risk.

Re: Real vs. fake AirPods with industrial CT

#113

Post by jacquesm »

MarkusWandel wrote: post #45

On the real vs. fake Apple product front: I get a lot of my electronic bric-a-brac from garage sales. The little iPhone cube chargers are so cute and practical, but: Is it a real one, or a dangerously cost-reduced fake? By comparison, less cute chargers from other major brands, that aren't a target for counterfeiting, are therefore more trustworthy. This is another "why we can't have nice things" kind of problem.

Scales are a good way to tell the difference and still portable.

Re: Real vs. fake AirPods with industrial CT

#115

Post by tedunangst »

threeseed wrote: post #75
acomjean wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wired earbuds are back (Acording to some… and I’ve seen a few more lately out and about). I’m still using full over the ear headphones I bought 15 years ago. I had to get new pads but other than that they still sound great. https://www.wsj.com/articles/are-airpods-out-why-cool-kids-a... https://www.nytimes.com/wirecutter/blog/wired-earbuds-are-so...

Those articles from 2 years ago. And in that time I can't think of a single manufacturer who has brought back 3.5mm headphone jacks. Meanwhile Qualcomm recently announced WiFi-Audio which brings lossless audio.

Not to worry, they're still churning out such articles.

https://sports.yahoo.com/wired-headphones-are-making-a-comeb...

Re: Real vs. fake AirPods with industrial CT

#116

Post by rowanG077 »

> Our CT scans reveal an intriguing difference between the heat sinks in the real and counterfeit chargers. The genuine charger uses a relatively thin heat sink that wraps around most of the transformer. The counterfeit uses a heavier, but simpler heat sink design. Apple’s heat sink requires more manufacturing steps to stamp and assemble and likely provides more even distribution of heat. The counterfeit’s design is more likely to lead to dangerous hot spots—especially combined with its less sophisticated transformer, which would tend to generate more heat.

This just seems like wild speculation to me. It totally reads like we found differences between Apple and the counterfeit. Let's make up a reason why Apple is better. Instead of coming from a place where you give it the counterfeit benefit of the doubt.

Re: Real vs. fake AirPods with industrial CT

#118

Post by JCharante »

MereInterest wrote: post #64
JCharante wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It would be cool if they could put a chip inside the chargers and have the charger communicate over USB C whether it's authentic or not. Of course you could still use third party chargers that would lack this chip, but for people who like first party chargers or buying chargers from reputable brands (that would probably license this from Apple) it would be nice.

Anything that can be communicated by an authentic charger could also be communicated by a counterfeit charger. You may have raised the cost of the scam (e.g. by requiring another chip), or delayed the start of a scam (e.g. until the inevitable leak of hardward signing keys), but at the end of the day you're trying to validate a device through a communication channel controlled by that very same device. It's the same…

Couldn’t the chip have a HSM that signs requests to authenticate that it’s authentic? Data is already exchanged during the USB charging handshake, this could just be one extra step.

The key might leak, which is why you could have a new key everyday that’s signed by an intermediate key and these are internet connected devices (iphones and macbooks and ipads) that could easily download a key block-list for a kilobyte everyday.

Additionally, if the device has already connected to a charger in the past but then the key gets revoked, it could continue to show it’s authentic across their devices connected to their iCloud account, much like how wifi passwords and airpods just sync across devices.

Re: Real vs. fake AirPods with industrial CT

#119

Post by JCharante »

permo-w wrote: post #88
JCharante wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It would be cool if they could put a chip inside the chargers and have the charger communicate over USB C whether it's authentic or not. Of course you could still use third party chargers that would lack this chip, but for people who like first party chargers or buying chargers from reputable brands (that would probably license this from Apple) it would be nice.

they did this with PS3 controllers and it just made it an inconvenience to charge your remote that any counterfeiters could bypass anyway like great so I can't charge from the wall unless I buy a sony-branded charger at a huge markup?

Well, it would be optional in my vision. Just a different icon to show authentic charging versus unverified charging.

Re: Real vs. fake AirPods with industrial CT

#120

Post by permo-w »

JCharante wrote: post #119
permo-w wrote: post #88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

they did this with PS3 controllers and it just made it an inconvenience to charge your remote that any counterfeiters could bypass anyway like great so I can't charge from the wall unless I buy a sony-branded charger at a huge markup?

Well, it would be optional in my vision. Just a different icon to show authentic charging versus unverified charging.

your vision is sounder then

one true way to prevent counterfeiters from circumventing your verification would be to give each plug a unique code, then have the device send off to your manufacturer servers to check the unique code is valid, which the device then remembers. you'd also have to either permanently lock the plug to one device, or have some pretty invasive location data to ensure the codes were genuinely unique though. either way it requires network connectivity, servers, etc

alternatively, you could have a long and complex call and response behaviour, perhaps dictated by a deterministic neural net. this would certainly be hard to counterfeit, but not impossible.

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