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The global chip shortage is creating a new problem: More fake components

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Re: The global chip shortage is creating a new problem: More fake components

#51

Post by jtbayly »

kzrdude wrote: post #49
jtbayly wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why does “lost money” need to be recuperated? That doesn’t sound necessary at all. What does sound reasonable is that supply and demand change the prices of things.

Supply and demand example: governments have created a lot of money to pay for extraordinary expenses in 2020 and 2021. Supply of money is now greater and this leads to rising prices (i.e. inflation). What I mean by recuperation: We don't create more value just from creating money. So if there is more money to go around but the same amount of goods produced, that leads to inflation. We're talking about inflation to ad…

Yes. Inflation happens.

So you think everything should cost 10x what it cost last year? Doesn’t seems reasonable to me. Seems like some things are up that much because of supply and demand.

Re: The global chip shortage is creating a new problem: More fake components

#52

Post by squarefoot »

sandworm101 wrote: post #20

counterfeit /= fake. A fake chip is a chip that isn't physically what it claims to be. It will not work properly. A counterfeit chip is one that was not made under appropriate licenses. It might be exactly the same as the legit chips. It might even come from the same factory line that makes the legit chips and have been tested right alongside legit chips. The only difference between a counterfeit and legit chip can b…

It's not just about licenses. Fake chips, as Lego bricks with pins, do exist (seen them decades ago on cheap PC mainboards), but there also are grey areas made of discarded lots that didn't pass testing, lower specs parts relabeled as higher ones, for example consumer rated parts rebadged as industrial if not military, etc. Those are harder to spot, unless they're tested almost one by one. That would be unsustainable save maybe for the military.

Re: The global chip shortage is creating a new problem: More fake components

#53

Post by deelowe »

catern wrote: post #14
deelowe wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is no way to be certain that those chips will comply with the specs and they will taint the supply chain. Traceability is extremely important in the hardware business.

That may be true - I'm not a hardware engineer. But it's interesting that that sounds exactly like the propaganda that proprietary software vendors used to use to warn against open source software - you don't know what you're getting, you have no guarantee it will work, etc.

There’s a difference between open source and counterfeit chips. If someone wants to make alternate parts with similar specs, that’s fine and a normal art of business. The issue here is chips that look genuine but aren’t.

Re: The global chip shortage is creating a new problem: More fake components

#54

Post by makomk »

tyingq wrote: post #33
neilv wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This one (it's the first break-the-counterfeits/knockoffs that comes to mind)? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/FTDI#Driver_controversy

It happened both with FTDI and PL2303 chips. FTDI bricked the clones, Prolific just made it hell to use them.

As I understand it, Prolific didn't just make it hell to use the clone PL2303 chips but also the older revision of their own chips which was being cloned - their newer drivers disabled both just the same. Which suggests that using any chip from Prolific is risky no matter where you source it from.

Re: The global chip shortage is creating a new problem: More fake components

#55

Post by aluminum96 »

sandworm101 wrote: post #20

counterfeit /= fake. A fake chip is a chip that isn't physically what it claims to be. It will not work properly. A counterfeit chip is one that was not made under appropriate licenses. It might be exactly the same as the legit chips. It might even come from the same factory line that makes the legit chips and have been tested right alongside legit chips. The only difference between a counterfeit and legit chip can b…

I don't think it's quite so straightforward from the end user's perspective -- if you get stuck with a counterfeit, even a functionally identical one, you're still missing valuable "features" that aren't part of the die, like a warranty. And that's assuming the counterfeit is made to the same tolerances, and won't prematurely fail because it was a reject that didn't meet QC and got siphoned off for resale.

Re: The global chip shortage is creating a new problem: More fake components

#56

Post by tyingq »

makomk wrote: post #54
tyingq wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It happened both with FTDI and PL2303 chips. FTDI bricked the clones, Prolific just made it hell to use them.

As I understand it, Prolific didn't just make it hell to use the clone PL2303 chips but also the older revision of their own chips which was being cloned - their newer drivers disabled both just the same. Which suggests that using any chip from Prolific is risky no matter where you source it from.

Ah, I wasn't aware of that. The CH34X was released some time after all that drama and always worked and was dirt cheap.

Re: The global chip shortage is creating a new problem: More fake components

#57

Post by ksec »

Fake or Counterfeit Chip has been a thing for a very long time. So chip shortage didn't create this problem.

More people are discovering it because they are desperate for chips and they have to take a bet from unknown supplier. Normally you get like 10 box of solid chip with 1 box that are either counterfeit or fake. Now may be two or three.

Some Manufacture are willing to bet because even if the chip cost 5x or 10x as much, it is still relatively small increase from their total BOM. Think Car as an extreme example, who cares if you pay $100 for chips that used to cost you $10 or even $5 when your car is worth $10K+? Not to mention your operation cost losses when you have no cars to sell.

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