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Remarked Celerons Sold As P4s
Lam1969 writes "Sumner Lemon reports that a Chinese company, Shenzhen Chuanghui Electronics Co., is remarking Celeron chips as Pentium 4s and supplying software to mask the chips' real pedigree from operating systems. From the article : 'The remarked processors Chuanghui sells are actually 1.7-GHz Celeron chips and are currently available for $78 each, including a motherboard, in quantities of 100 or more, said James Zhan, a company representative named online as a contact for potential buyers. By comparison, Intel sells the real thing for $401 in 1,000-unit quantities without a motherboard, according to the company's most recent price list.'"
> Zhan defended Chuanghui's sale of remarked chips, saying the company makes no attempt to hide what was done to the chips or to pass them off as more valuable processors. "I tell them the truth," he said.
> But Zhan acknowledged that Chuanghui has no control over how its customers represent the remarked chips when they resell them.
Maybe I can help him out with an argument there. Obviously, the "remarked" Celerons are more expensive, since he is selling the service of remarking. The chip itself is not changed: it is still as dead slow as it always was. Charging a premium price is obviously only possible if you trick your customer, which of course means selling the "remarked" Celeron as a P4. So by setting the pricing structure of the product he makes sure that the product can only be resold using fraud.
Claiming ignorance is not going to help there, it remains a big scam. Remember the empty cache ICs in 486 boards? This is no different.
"I'd probably buy one of those combos at 70US$ regardless of their fraudulent business practises, though."
Then you are also part of the problem.
Consumers supporting known businesses which have no ethic drive the good businesses with ethics out of business. Why don't you just see what hardware Microsoft has to offer you for your evangelical services?
How many people really have "half a clue?" First, go out on the street and randomly ask people about current events, a few historical figures, a couple of science questions, and geography. Almost too many news programs to count have found that most people are pretty ignorant of the world around them and history. You'll get the same result. Next, ask them what's the difference between a Socket 478 and an LGA775. How long would it take until someone on the street can answer this?
Make love, not reality television.
This is an example of "Free Trade" and "Free Markets" in action!
No, this is exactly not an example of free trade. Fraud is not a component of free trade. A market economy depends on the customer's ability to actually get what's purchased. Scam artists like the Chinese company in question are parasitically abusing a free market's expectation of consistency and reliability in a brand (Intel, in this case), and the only people who call such BS examples of a free market are those who don't want a free market.
it sure shows one of the limitations of outsourcing to the cheapest source
No, this is not the cheapest source. It's a person lying about being the cheapest source. That doesn't show the limitation of bidding out your purchases, it shows the problems inherent in dealing with "businesses" in a country that, at the highest levels, encourages rampant copyright/brand scams.
You get what you pay for!
No, you get what's delivered to you. If what's delivered is fake, then you did not get what you paid for. In most western countries, one of the things we do pay for is a law enforcement framework that doesn't much put up with the fraudulent sales of such items. Since that's not being paid for in China, people doing business there frequently get exactly what's not being paid for.
I wonder who will be checking the authenticity of those upcoming Olympic medals?
Don't disappoint your bird dog. Go to the range.