jaribu wrote:@ Jason Hill.
That's a great idea but it simply can't work. There are so many fakes around which sometimes are hard to differentiate with original even to hawk eyed guys like me. (if u buy a phone and they refuse to give you warranty or simply give you one mnth and not one year, be careful, they are mostly fakes!) Another reason is that some goods are just smuggled in tons by big shots who evade all taxes, thus they can manage to flood the market at lower prices. Some retailers due to trust exploit their customers and sell sky high. I will give you a good example, try shopping for a 500GB external Western Digital Hard Disk in Nairobi. In well known outlets like Ebrahims, they go for 12,500/-, In other places like Bloomerg 4th Flr Kimathi St it's 10k for the same stuff. If you try Moi Ave, you can get the same stuff for 9k). What will shock you is that all these big retail outlets source locally @8k for that hard disk from local suppliers. That's just but one example of how innocent customers pay through the nose since they don't want to tarmac and shop around. Happy bargain hunting!
Hello Jaribu,
Thanks for the comment, but I could tell you in under one minute if I was handling a "fake" notebook or netbook, because it either wouldn't function at all, would not run Windows 7 (processor and RAM isn't what it should be), or would run so hot that it would shut itself down or freeze within 5 minutes. In addition, it wouldn't have the same chassis rigidity or would weigh a ton - quality doesn't flex too much, but still has a decent weight.
As far as hard drives and LCD screens, there are only a handful of factories in the entire world that make them, so "fakes" would likely be made along side genuine items.
At any rate, a 500GB external for $147 is highway robbery; I can get you a 2TB external for that and ship it to you from here for that price, so, again, it does make sense to track and index the prices, if for no other purpose but to keep downward pressure on the price because people could start leaning on the diaspora for sourcing if retailers are not operating in a fair manner.
I think that a lot of the fuss about fakes and "Shina" goods in East Africa isn't what it seems. What I have seen is that unscrupulous retailers are purchasing large quantities of broken or defective items direct from factory rubbish piles, refurbishing them in India and elsewhere, and then passing them off as new, without warranties. You have to remember that 99% of electronics are made in China- so how is a "Shina" phone or TV of any less quality? How is anything with a "US or UK brand" of any higher quality than what a Shina brand could be, as long as the functionality is there when you first try it out?
Some of the samples of "fakes" that I have gotten from the Nairobi marketplace aren't actually fakes, but have been obviously (and poorly) repaired by hand post-manufacturing.
The most important thing here is a warranty. Retailers need to stand behind what they sell- meaning that they need a physical address in which you can track them down if something goes wrong. Otherwise, "real" or "fake", you are on your own, in what they call the "grey market". Also, there needs to be consumer protection laws and institutions.
The whole "fake" controversy smacks of a way to scare consumers into paying more for "real" merchandise that is still "grey market", while not allowing prices to come
down to where they should be, in line with what the rest of the world is paying.
By the way, if you come across a "fake" hard drive, as in the drive itself (not the case) is printed with a major manufacturer, but is actually made by some no-name hard drive factory, I'll buy it from you, because this I HAVE to see.
Does it work? Is it warranted? Was it a good price? That is what is important. Don't pay for a
brand when that guarantees you nothing. Even they use the cheapest parts from the cheapest suppliers and factories (especially Dell, HP, and Sony). I've had more Dell notebooks and servers, HP notebooks and PCs, and Sony TVs and Monitors go bad than "generic" SuperMicros, turnkeys, Scepters and LGs
BY FAR.
Pay for initial functionality, some semblance of quality, which you can gauge in the store before you buy, and for the guarantee that you have some sort of protection or recourse if something goes wrong- meaning a retailer that will honor a warranty for a year.
Unless you are talking IBM or Canon... that's different. That's worth it. There's real, top-range quality in those two brands. Everything else is about at the same level, no matter if it says Sony, LG, LB, LT, Samsung, Supermicro, Dell, Acer, HP, TT, EE, BB, or even Cisco verus Huawei, whoever... whatever. It's all made just about the same- cheaply.
Best,
Hill