Does a knockoff issue exist with 5 € to 10 € microcontrollers? - Page 1
Forum section: electronics / general

author: eudocimus
author_rank: Newbie
timestamp: August 26, 2024, 02:25:29 pm
content: HelloI'm a computer engineering student, and we had a course centering around NodeMCU ESP8266. I bought myself one from a local parts supplier to do my own experiments near the course's end and paid a bit less than 10 €. A few other guys in the course found that funny, because you can order the same thing for half the price from Aliexpress, Temu and such places.My question is, 1) are these the same parts from the same factory line? Or are the cheaper ones perhaps recycled or under spec parts or pirate runs? And 2) is there a real quality difference? What I am in effect asking is that if I pay more, do I also get better quality or some kind of assurance, or am I just paying for the brick and mortar of the local store? And the fact that I can walk away with the part today, instead of waiting for a couple of weeks.

author: brucehoult
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: August 26, 2024, 03:12:31 pm
content: If you buy from the official Espressif store on Aliexpress then you can hardly go wrong, right?https://www.aliexpress.com/store/1102014060It's even linked from Espressif's own web site ("Buy from AliExpress"):https://www.espressif.com/en/contact-us/get-samplesThe same is true for I'd say most Chinese manufacturers. They have official stores on Aliexpress, which are perfectly safe, with genuine products.

author: janoc
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: August 26, 2024, 03:34:09 pm
content: Quote from: eudocimus on August 26, 2024, 02:25:29 pmNo, you won't get any better quality or assurance - that brick & mortar store is likely ordering the parts from the same AliExpress store and you are only paying their markup because there isn't really any other source for them. You may get some sort of warranty - but good luck trying to RMA a non-working module like this where it could well been you who has fried it, e.g. by ESD. Are you going to complain and argue with the store over a 10€ part? How much is your time worth? And if you won't - what did you gain by going to the physical store instead of ordering it online?Physical brick & mortar stores are a dying breed for electronic supplies - they can't compete with online stores neither in sortiment and neither on prices. They are really mostly useful only when I need that componentRIGHT NOWregadless of price and it can't wait a day for overnight delivery from a distributor. Hopefully they have it in stock (they mostly don't ...)Where it makes sense to make a distinction is when buying things from official/reputable distributors vs places like AliExpress. I.e. don't buy mosfets from AliExpress, eBay or Amazon instead of ordering from Mouser/Digikey/Farnell/TME/LCSC because you are guaranteed to get relabeled fakes sooner or later. Unlike Espressif, manufacturers of those components don't have AliExpress or Amazon stores - which should be a strong indication that the stuff you are buying could be dodgy. You will save a few cents at first but it will cost you hours and days of wasted time, torn gray hair and you will need to buy the component from a serious distributor again anyway.

author: pcprogrammer
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: August 26, 2024, 04:15:59 pm
content: It depends on which store you buy stuff from. Check the reviews on a product you are looking to buy and if there are none or to many bad reviews you might want to skip buying it. Aliexpress for me has good service in the sense then when you think it is fake and can proof it they will give you your money back and often you can just keep the item.I have bought STM32 boards with cloned MCU's and got my money back. I could still use them but you're not sure you can trust them for the real stuff. It still is a clone. But I also got plenty of real ones. And for the Arduino clones the prices are so much lower that I would risk it every time.Just make sure to check what you get and if it is bad start a dispute and get your money back.With the bundeldeals and choice items (spend >10 euro) shipping is free and often within less then two weeks on your doorstep.For a hobbyist even loose parts are worth the risk. Maybe not fully up to spec (B grade parts) but still good enough for simple projects.

author: Nominal Animal
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: August 26, 2024, 04:48:20 pm
content: Quote from: eudocimus on August 26, 2024, 02:25:29 pmIt depends on the exact seller, as others have mentioned. As others have mentioned, EspressIf has their own AliExpress store, and those are as genuine as they get. I've bought BuyDisplay/EastRising display panels and modules (I can recommend the ISP panel ones!) from both theirown site, as well as from theireBay store. Exact same stuff. The components LCSC sells are the same Mouser sells and the same PartCo sells, it's only the selection they have available that differs. (And it's not always LCSC that is cheapest of the three either, by the way.)However, there are a lot of sellers that just buy in bulk and sell on eBay/Aliexpress/Temu/whatever, without knowing the details of what they sell. Some of them are rejects and the stuff swept off the factory floor, some are fakes (as in ICs with old markings sanded out, and new markings for a more expensive chip lasered on), and some are genuine. Those are the difficult ones to tell.There are some open source designs, like ATmega32u4-based Pro Micro clones (originating from SparkFun Pro Micro) and ADuM3160-based Low-Speed/Full-Speed USB 2.0 isolators (1 Mbit/s / 12 Mbit/s, not 480 MBit/s; originating from the ADuM3160 datasheet) that are perfectly okay even when you buy the cheap clones. For the latter, it is only the isolated DC-DC converter you need to check; it's typically a very common 1W (so max 200mA output) one you can find datasheets online for.EspressIf sells modules with castellated edges that gets integrated on many different (but more or less compatible) development boards, so there are many genuine vendors. There, the important thing to check is the vendor support for their boards.Olimexis an example of a company that designs and sells quite interesting variants of various ESP boards, and is also a company that does Open Source Hardware right, if that matters to you.Quote from: eudocimus on August 26, 2024, 02:25:29 pmIf you buy from a proper seller, no. If you buy from some random person or seller, possibly.Quote from: eudocimus on August 26, 2024, 02:25:29 pmYou are paying for the brick and mortar local store to be near and have stock, yes. Usually, they also know what they're selling, and have at least somebody in the store who knows something useful.Personally, I do often pay the "premium" for example atPartCo(it's the one closest to me), because I simply want such a store to exist here, and even with my minuscule hobby budget, I think the "premium" is worth it. (Actually, in PartCo's case, usually their cut isn't that big, especially compared to what we habitually pay at grocery stores versus what the same stuff costs for the stores themselves.) For cast aluminium project enclosures,Uraltonehas an excellent selection from Hammond (including Eddystone) and others, for very affordable prices.As a fellow Finn, I'd say your friends are short-sighted. How you use money and where is one of the most powerful ways to affect your surroundings; much more so than voting, for example. My own hobby budget for electronics is under 50€ a month, and yet, I don't always choose the cheapest option.

author: SiliconWizard
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: August 26, 2024, 08:12:45 pm
content: What knockoff?There is no clone of ESP8266 that I know of. (But who knows.)I don't see how prices would be funny. Resellers have to make a profit. Amazon and eBay are full of goods bought from Aliexpress and resold for 2x, 3x, sometimes 10x the price. That's how people make money selling stuff. And obviously with a physical shop, there are additional costs. Actually a 2x "only" markup in a local shop for some item compared to Aliex prices is a relatively good deal.

author: westfw
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: August 27, 2024, 02:26:51 am
content: QuoteIndeed. One of the things I've noticed is that what "they" tend to be somewhat circumspect when it comes to "cloning" "western" chips and boards, the cloning of "each other" is really rampant.(I have no idea how many different actual manufacturers there are of "Nano v3, compatible with Arduino" boards. But I'm pretty sure it's a significant number. I mean, there are at least 4 different board versions.)

author: brucehoult
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: August 27, 2024, 03:20:23 am
content: Quote from: westfw on August 27, 2024, 02:26:51 amYou are aware that Arduino themselves publish the design under a permissive license?https://www.arduino.cc/en/uploads/Main/Arduino_Nano-Rev3.2-SCH.pdf

author: westfw
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: August 27, 2024, 04:22:42 am
content: QuoteOf course. That explains the original clones.But someone re-spun the board for the cheaper and smaller CH340 USB/UART chip, and someone converted that to a single-sided design, and someone respun TAT to use the 10-pin CH340E (all rather nice bits of cost-reduction engineering, IMO. The kind of thing one LIKES to see happen with open source hardware!) And the assorted CH340 boards are available from many vendors, and I have no idea how many manufacturers, or whether they're all clones of each other or other "similar designs."(and lately, it seems that boards with possibly "counterfeit" CH340 chips have appeared :-( )

author: RoGeorge
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: August 27, 2024, 06:14:10 am
content: Quote from: eudocimus on August 26, 2024, 02:25:29 pmMost often yes, same thing from the same manufacturer, but you have to look carefully at the Aliexpress pictures posted by the clients, and read the feedback, too, the feedback left for the product you want to buy. Sure, once in a while you might get a really bad item, but in my experience that was only once, with a 37 in 1 Arduino kit that I've bought from the most possible cheap dealer on Aliexpress. Many other modules and devboards were all fine.Most drawback when buying from ALiexpress for me was the delivery time, sometimes as big as 1-3 months, and the most delayed order I think it was about 6 months. It might worth paying a few extra $ and have the devboard now, rather than waiting for months. Plus, there might be some hassle with paying import taxes (which might be between zero and total nightmare procedure, depending on the local laws).Never been scammed, only once or twice had to open issues, solved amiable. Pay attention to when the protection buyer expire for each order, and open a conflict a day before expiration (so the seller will extend your buyer protection for another months or so), or else you won't get a refund if the package never arrives.As for ESP8266, I've bought ESP-12E by AI-Thinker for $1.79/pcs (USD) and free shipping (from Aliexpress). Though, that was about 8-10 years ago, don't know the price now. Beware that some ESP8266 boards have more flash than others, buy the biggest, and some models have more I/O pins exposed.

author: pcprogrammer
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: August 27, 2024, 06:40:01 am
content: Quote from: RoGeorge on August 27, 2024, 06:14:10 amThat was before the inclusion of VAT. Now it depends on if you choose bundeldeals or choice items how long you have to wait. These are marked with how many days it will take. You see 5 up to 12 day delivery based on my experience and get a coupon for an euro when it arrives late, which not often happens.Items from shops that are not choice can take much longer, but that is also listed on the item page, so no surprise there.The import taxes do not apply in Europe anymore, for as far as I'm aware, not with the VAT being already handled by Aliexpress.

author: Phil1977
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: August 27, 2024, 06:53:43 am
content: Quote from: SiliconWizard on August 26, 2024, 08:12:45 pmI always thought chinese goods are only good if someone clones them. Maybe it´s the Chinese review system: 5 Stars somewhere: that´s paid advertisement... Many reports in social media like: "Be aware of unauthorized clones!" - must be good!

author: ArdWar
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: August 27, 2024, 01:12:43 pm
content: Simpler explanation is that patents and copyrights, filed in China, by Chinese companies, are actually enforced in China.The one they ignore are foreign patents and copyrights since they technically don't automatically legally bind outside of the filing jurisdiction.

author: janoc
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: August 29, 2024, 06:04:38 pm
content: Quote from: ArdWar on August 27, 2024, 01:12:43 pmThat's maybe true but completely irrelevant to the debate. There are plenty of copies and clones of even Chinese parts around. Chinese companies aren't patenting everything and suing each other as a business model, as is common in the west.We just rarely see those cloned parts because most people aren't buying Chinese components (plus datasheets in English are often non-existent and few distributors outside China carry them in the first place). They want a cheap ST, TI, Analog Devices, etc. part - and then they, of course, get what they pay for when they order some AliExpress special.And the other reason is purely economic - why would someone counterfeit (vs clone, which is legal) a Chinese component when anyone who wants it can get the original for peanuts from Taobao, LCSC or directly in Shenzen? Vs relabeling that cheap Chinese chip as a 10-20x more expensive ST or TI part and flipping it on AliExpress or eBay to some naive western doofus that thinks they are getting a deal of their life.

author: Kjelt
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: August 29, 2024, 08:04:47 pm
content: Quote from: janoc on August 26, 2024, 03:34:09 pmThat is how I thought till I encountered this new concept store in my own town.It does not have a counter with personell, it has a website, warehouse and ships or you can go to their warehouse address and pick your order up from electronic lockers.It usually takes 2 hours between ordering and able to pick up, the extra in price is very reasonable compared to aliexpress , like +10-15% but sometimes they are even cheaper.They also sell western brands like olimex.So I do see some light for these kind of "physical" stores.https://www.tinytronics.nl/en