warning!!! newegg selling fake intel cpu's!!!

[deadrats]

edit:newegg has replaced the fake cpu's with legit units; intel and law enforcement are investigating the origin of said fakes, there's a bunch of newegg fanboys in this forum, the only place for new eggs is in a frying pan, D&H was exonerated, it was discovered that i am hung like a bear (a teddy bear) and newegg is now tea bagging it's customers, sorry i mean they still don't sell tea bags.



thank you.

p.s. i have tried changing the title to: "newegg (was) selling fake intel cpu's" but for some reason the changes don't stick.

[edDV]

How does one fake an i7-920?

Are you saying it was OEM, not retail?

[jagabo]

From the link:

Newegg is aware of a shipping error that occurred with certain recent orders of the Intel Core i7-920 CPU. After investigating the issue internally it appears one of our long term partners mistakenly shipped a small number of demo boxes instead of functional units.

[lordsmurf]

That's not the same as fake.

[HotDamn!]

Newegg is always the site for me, this little mistake shouldn't be held against them and I'll for sure continue to buy from them.

[MOVIEGEEK]

If they were selling an AMD with an Intel sticker on it then it would be fake.
This is not Newegg's fault, it's the supplier's fault.

[Noahtuck]

From the link:

Newegg is aware of a shipping error that occurred with certain recent orders of the Intel Core i7-920 CPU. After investigating the issue internally it appears one of our long term partners mistakenly shipped a small number of demo boxes instead of functional units.

And right under that the author wrote,

For the record, I am not buying that story.

Me thinks more than one person forgot to put on their aluminum foil hat
LOL!!

[deadrats]

How does one fake an i7-920?

Are you saying it was OEM, not retail?

i'm saying it's a mock up, check out the screenshots, it's a non-functioning cpu with a plastic cooler.

[deadrats]

That's not the same as fake.

when i say fake, i mean fake, it's not a real cpu, not that it's miss branded, it not even made of metal, look at the pics of the cooler and cpu:

http://hardocp.com/image.html?image=MTI2NzgyMzM4OFJyeXphUllhYmRfMV8xMV9sLmpwZw==

http://hardocp.com/image.html?image=MTI2NzgyMzM4OFJyeXphUllhYmRfMV8yX2wuanBn

they're pieces of plastic shaped to look like a cpu and cooler, ergo they are fake cpu's

[jagabo]

I find NewEgg's explanation pretty fishy too. I suspect what really happened is they bought a batch of CPUs from the gray market and got taken.

[deadrats]

Me thinks more than one person forgot to put on their aluminum foil hat
LOL!!

maybe it's because there's at least 300 plastic i7 920 replicas sold to newegg customers, so if i need a need foil hat so do hundreds of other customers.

personally i never buy anything online, i don't know if it will get damaged during shipment, if i'll get an empty box, whatever, i don't want to have to deal with it, i prefer being able to walk into a store and and buy something, at least that way if there's something wrong i can always go find someone to rip a new one.

[HotDamn!]

Who cares what story Newegg came up with.. they were pieces of plastic and they are dealing with it so obviously it was an accident. Get over it!

NEWEGG ROCKS!!!

[deadrats]

If they were selling an AMD with an Intel sticker on it then it would be fake.
This is not Newegg's fault, it's the supplier's fault.

it's not the supplier's fault, i really doubt that intel manufactures plastic cpu's and coolers, put them into intel boxes and shipped them to newegg for resale, as jagabo said, newegg probably found what they considered to be bargain i7 920's from a questionable source and no one probably checked to see what they got and they shipped out the faux processors to their customers.

[AlanHK]

It's not a "fake", implying a deliberate deception, it's just a screw up.
No one was fooled by it, NewEgg is going to have to spend a lot of money to make it right.

I got some fake RAM online, had the right stickers on it and it worked for a few months.
Ony after it died did I examine it in detail and work out it was really unbranded and relabelled.
That was a "real fake".

[Noahtuck]

I find NewEgg's explanation pretty fishy too. I suspect what really happened is they bought a batch of CPUs from the gray market and got taken.

I was thinking that also, but i highly doubt newegg was trying to rip anyone off by selling "fake" cpu's!!
As some seem to think......
LOL!!

And you never know, somewhere along the line from overseas someone in a warehouse could have made the switch.

But it seem's like an awful lot of trouble to go through producing those big fake pieces of plastic with a sticker on them to look like fans and all those "simulated" CPU's that obviously were made from some real parts & the fake book, you could have just skipped the "fake" or "simulated" cpu & booklet and just thrown in a rock for weight!!

I'm sure they were some sort of legit mockup for legit purposes and somewhere along the line some one goofed and they got added in with a shipment of who knows how many 1000's if not 100's of thousand units being shipped.

[budz]

This is old news....I read it at overclock.net many days ago where the original dude who got the so called "Fake Intel i7 cpu" posted his pics.

[MOVIEGEEK]

I have been buying from Newegg for years and never had a problem unlike some retailers *cough* Meritline *cough*.

[Constant Gardener]

The "fake" ones probably have novelty value on Ebay.

[Soopafresh]

Guess who isn't happy about this...

[budz]

http://www.overclock.net/hardware-news/684705-engadget-newegg-sells-300-counterfeit-core.html

http://www.engadget.com/2010/03/07/newegg-sells-300-counterfeit-core-i7-920-cpus-is-now-investiga/

[Noahtuck]

@ Soopafresh
LMAO!!!
That's pretty good!!

Some people have way too much free time LOL!!!


And that last post/video by Smoka_Cola
I think i smell a bit of a drama queen.....
Almost an 8 minute video to ramble on

I like where he said, no, im not gonna install that....
Ummm.... if you could that would be a hell of a feat considering there is no way to install it with NO PINS!!!!

Even if you did mount it down to the socket, what difference would it make....
THERE WOULD BE NO TYPE OF CONNECTION!!
Oi Vay

[deadrats]

just an update, intel has weighed in on the fake i7 920's and here's what they said:

http://hardocp.com/

Intel has been made aware of the potential for counterfeit i7 920 packages in the marketplace and is working to how many and/or where they are being sold. The examples we have seen are not Intel products but are counterfeits. Buyers should contact their place of purchase for a replacement and/or should contact their local law enforcement agency if the place of purchase refuses to help.

in a further development the D&H Distributing is now threatening a number of sites that broke this story:

http://www.techeye.net/business/company-threatens-journalists-over-fake-intel-cpu-reports

A company called D&H Distributing doesn’t consider it legitimate for the free press took umbrage to this. In fact, the legal beagles over at D&H Distributing got so worked up over the horrifying gall and chutzpah of Icrontic and HardOCP for daring to ask a question that the company slapped both publications with a “cease and desist” order.

something tells me these 300 fakes are just the tip of the iceberg.

[lordsmurf]

I fail to see the need for hysteria here. Clearly, these are "store props" (maybe even counterfeit props) that accidentally got put in with the legitimate items. Most of what I've seen written on this is very libelous in nature, and not fair reporting of any kind. It's just a bunch of loser keyboard wingnuts wearing tinfoil hats. Sites like Hard|OCP just make themselves look like crackpot writers with some sort of anti-Newegg hard-on.

Only a dumbass would call this a counterfeit product. Is a plastic banana a counterfeit banana? No, I think not.

Counterfeit ("fake") would be stamping an Intel name on an AMD or some other chipset -- i.e., a product that actually works.

[deadrats]

I fail to see the need for hysteria here. Clearly, these are "store props" (maybe even counterfeit props) that accidentally got put in with the legitimate items. Most of what I've seen written on this is very libelous in nature, and not fair reporting of any kind. It's just a bunch of loser keyboard wingnuts wearing tinfoil hats. Sites like Hard|OCP just make themselves look like crackpot writers with some sort of anti-Newegg hard-on.

Only a dumbass would call this a counterfeit product. Is a plastic banana a counterfeit banana? No, I think not.

Counterfeit ("fake") would be stamping an Intel name on an AMD or some other chipset -- i.e., a product that actually works.

not quite, let's look at the definition of "counterfeit":

http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/counterfeit

made in imitation of something else with intent to deceive

that is exactly what these plastic i7 920's and plastic coolers are: an imitation of something else with the intent to deceive.

now a fair question may be where do they originate from and what was their intended original purpose, but it certainly doesn't look like intel is behind them and in fact they themselves have called them "counterfeits", are you calling intel "dumbasses" as well?

these fakes were clearly made so as to deceive and defraud consumers, it looks like a deliberate and sophisticated new take on the old "bricks in an empty box" scam, maybe they were meant to be sold to customers at computer shows, maybe they were meant to be ebay merchandise, very likely that newegg had no idea what they were selling (though that does seem highly unlikely that no one bothered to take a second look at any of the 300+ fake i7 920 they sold to customers) and i also find it highly unlikely that no one at the distributor that supplied newegg with the fakes ever noticed that something was wrong.

but this is a scam, people have been ripped off and it is legitimate to shine a spotlight on the situation, whether any apologists wants to label a person a dumbass or in need of a tin foil hat.

i tend to be very strong pro-consumer and if customers are getting ripped off, i'm going to talk about it.

[AlanHK]

very likely that newegg had no idea what they were selling (though that does seem highly unlikely that no one bothered to take a second look at any of the 300+ fake i7 920 they sold to customers) and i also find it highly unlikely that no one at the distributor that supplied newegg with the fakes ever noticed that something was wrong..

So it's both "very likely" and "highly unlikely".
Glad you made that clear.

Newegg obviously screwed up. They are the only party that will lose out from this. They'll have to refund, replace and compensate all the customers. They're taking a big hit in bad publicity.

To keep imagine that they did this deliberately is beyond belief.

[lordsmurf]

Amazon shipped me a book with some pages missing, the hardcover all cut up, and loose binding. I don't believe Amazon intentionally sent me a messed up book -- that's just stupid. There's no conspiracy.

The minimum-wage warehouse workers just don't critique every item -- not that they'd know what they're looking at anyway. Some workers quickly pull an item, others quickly pack up the pulled items, and then move it down to the shipping lines. I can tell that some of you have NEVER been in an online vendor warehouse --- I have!

Buying from a local store isn't any better, stockers don't critique each item, they rip open a box and then move it onto shelves as fast as possible, and move on to the next task.

If there's an issue, that's why there are return policies.

[deadrats]

Amazon shipped me a book with some pages missing, the hardcover all cut up, and loose binding. I don't believe Amazon intentionally sent me a messed up book -- that's just stupid. There's no conspiracy.

that's not the same thing, if you had ordered a first edition copy of "the old man and the sea" and instead received a book full of blank pages and a cover the was a photocopy of the original, then that would be the same thing.

as far as newegg is concerned, they just keep digging their own grave, they are still trying to pass the buck, claiming it's intel's fault:

http://hardocp.com/article/2010/03/08/newegg_sticks_demo_boxes_intel_counters

It's been brought to our attention that you may have received a Demo Version of the Intel Core i7 Processor you recently purchased. We would like to first and foremost apologize for any confusion this may have caused you. Please take a moment to examine the product you received thoroughly to determine if you in fact received the wrong product. The Demo Version of these CPUs were purchased between March 1, 2010 through March 4, 2010

and here's intel's official stance:

Intel is getting samples to inspect and until then we can say that everything in the package appears fake. Some of the photos of the processor look like it is a casting and not even a real processor of any kind. Newegg has moved quickly to replace the suspect units.

Also, to be 100% clear, these are not any type of Intel demo unit or sample and we never saw or had anything to do with them until they surfaced in web photos.

and we also have D&H Distributing who instead of backing up newegg (as they are the source that newegg uses to get the cpu's), they just send out threatening C&D letters.

so the question becomes who do you believe, intel or the newegg/D&H tandem, i personally tend to believe intel.

[deadrats]

very likely that newegg had no idea what they were selling (though that does seem highly unlikely that no one bothered to take a second look at any of the 300+ fake i7 920 they sold to customers) and i also find it highly unlikely that no one at the distributor that supplied newegg with the fakes ever noticed that something was wrong..

So it's both "very likely" and "highly unlikely".
Glad you made that clear.

i guess english comprehension wasn't your favorite subject in school, reread what i said, it is very likely that newegg (as a corporation) had no idea what they were selling (as in it wasn't an official policy to defraud) but it seems highly unlikely that no one (as in the guys in shipping and receiving, that took delivery from D&H and then filled customers orders) bothered to take a second look at any of the 300+ fake i7 920's that were shipped to customers.

duh.

[neomaine]

I believe Intel and Newegg. No reason to actually group Newegg and D&H. Don't get me wrong I love a good conspiracy theory... but they're just that theories. This is just too absurd to believe Intel or Newegg had anything directly related to this from starting. And, the only reason I don't include D&H is that I've never heard of them. I'm with Smurf on this one. Someone got between Intel and D&H in the suppply stream.

Intel would absolutely never do something like this intentionally and I doubt that D&H would do anything to jeapordize a relationship to someone who's probably their best (and biggest) customer. And I really doubt Newegg would pull something like this intentionally. Waaaaaaay too much street cred.

My 2nd take, they're probably some mock-ups used to put on b&m hooks for customers to 'look' at. Then they go to the counter and say, "I"ll have one of them 920's back there". These CPUs are probably too hot a seller and too expensive to chance shoplifting to actually put on the selves.

This would be like plastic mock-ups of iPods selling by mistake as well. They look real on the outside so customers get that happy fuzzy looky at something and then buy the real thing at the counter.

My take, I believe someone was just a month early with their April fools joke...

[tomwil]

personally i never buy anything online, i don't know if it will get damaged during shipment, if i'll get an empty box, whatever, i don't want to have to deal with it, i prefer being able to walk into a store and and buy something, at least that way if there's something wrong i can always go find someone to rip a new one.

Sometimes buying at a brick & mortar is not safe either:

http://consumerist.com/2009/04/best-buy-sells-9-year-old-discontinued-hard-drive-as-br...es-refund.html

http://consumerist.com/2010/01/best-buy-sells-box-with-wrong-hard-drive-shrugs.html

I now open all boxes and check the contents before walking out of the store.