Sammy had Sweet Fanny Adams to do with Swiss Fanny madam's blast Last week's thigh-roasting "Samsung" smartphone battery has turned out not to be from Samsung at all - proving yet again the hazardous nature of cheap knockoff batts. When 18-year-old Fanny Schlatter's pocket went off like a firecracker the finger was quickly pointed at the battery in her Sammy Galaxy S3. But an investigation …
She may not even have known it was counterfeit. When I was buying a replacement battery for my Nokia, the warnings were not to check that it had a hologram sticker, but to actually check the hologram did the correct thing (right number of fingers on the hands, and that sort of thing)
Apparently, the fake holograms are now almost as good as the real thing and very hard to spot.
// too cheap to believe isn't reliable either -- selling off old stock at a discount as a new phone comes out, etc.
I was trying to buy a replacement for my wife's Motorola phone: I skipped ebay, expecting a high chance of counterfeit batteries and went to Amazon instead. (my worry was merely about poor performance, I hadn't really thought of explosions at the time ><)
I searched "MB525 original battery"
A load of adverts claiming to be original batteries popped up, strangely containing widely varying customer reviews. After quickly checking the overall ratio of 1 or 2 star reviews, I started reading, and a pretty high amount of reviews stated that there were indicators that the battery they received wasn't really original Motorola. Some of them were simply not recognized by their phones, refusing operation entirely.
I picked one of those sellers and sent an inquiry, if they could guarantee that the battery was not counterfeit... I haven't received a response yet, and I still don't have a battery ><
Sometimes you have to bite the bullet and buy from those nasty national and multi-national suppliers, as they are more likely to have direct supply deals with Samsung, Canon, Sony etc. and not be buying from Dodgy Dave's Discount Importers on the local trading estate.
Big retail chains are an easy target for trading standards and, in theory anyway, should be ensuring that Samsung batteries are from Samsung.
No guarantees of course, but if you buy a "genuine" replacement battery, and it turns out not to be, you can at least resort to taking the shop to court, if not the manufacturer. Chances of tracking down a Sunday market stall holder or car booter are a lot slimmer than a bricks-and-mortar retailer.
Thats a valid argument on an out of warranty camera but if you've paid 3k just for the warranty on your camera why invalidate it to save 50 bucks on a battery.
Personally I use oem batteries in my canon and phaseone gear, not because they're more reliable but because if theres an issue I don't want them to be able weasel out of the warranties. Does it cost a few hundred bucks extra, sure, but it doesn't cost 40k to replace a back or 6k for a dslr body.
Definitely , it's a decision that has to be made on a case by case basis. I found amazon a good place for non oem batteries, ones with 1000+ 5* ratings and an average 4.5 rating is usually a fair bet. I have some for a pm1 for underwater stuff. It was only 500 bucks with a housing so it gets 10 dollar batteries. If it dies its only 100 bucks for another one used.
I feel very sorry for her. I mean not only did she take a critical hit to the leg from an IED (read fake battery) but now she's not getting any payout from it. Unless of course she sues the person she bought it from.
On the other hand, you get what you paid for. I'm just glad the fake PSP battery I bought decided to die by not charging, rather than blowing up.
You pays yer money, and roll the dice for 3rd party replacement parts. Same goes for chargers.
I bought one off a well-know internet-based auction website which was branded 'Samsung' and boy did it get hot, I could smell superheated plastic. Since it was a penny less than a fiver I just stuck it in the electrical recycling bin at the local tip after snipping the cable in two. I shall have to pay over the odds for a 'real' charger but at least it won't set fire to the carpet.
An issue related to cost and originality is the vast range of different battery shapes deployed, I suspect to maintain a grip on the replacement market.
I've just been overhauling 4 laptops of 4 different brands --all are similar in shape and size, 3 have a strong family resemblance -- suggesting that they have come from the same factory in China. All use PSUs of 19.5 volts. The batteries are all about the same size.
But each is shaped differently.
Camera and mobile phone batteries, similar picture -- in fact some brands chip their batteries and design the camera to reject batteries lacking the chip.
I believe the EU has belatedly introduced rules to reduce the waste associated with pointlessly different phone chargers. Time we told the largely US, Japanese and Chinese manufacturers that if they want to sell in the EU, batteries should be more interchangeable between models and brands.
Agree.
On a certain website (name no names but rhymes with "Atherton") there were ridiculously cheap USB adaptors for the Samsung Tab. Thinking these to be beyond doubt of questionable value, I then fund s oem with a nice picture of the real deal and the words "Genuine" in the title and description. Fortunately reviews of said product made it quite clear these were not what they claimed to be but just a different knock-off from China.
Would bringing the misdirection of the seller to the websites operators have an effect - I didn't think it would.
Re; "Atherton" "Would bringing the misdirection of the seller to the websites operators have an effect - I didn't think it would."
And you are correct in that -- "Atherton" increasingly seem to be relying on outside suppliers and they do not really care about those independent suppliers' business practices. 30 day limit on defective returns, etc. I received a product that was considerably different from the image shown on their website (not in original mfr's package, but was shown as such in the image). "Atherton" showed a complete lack of concern when I pointed it out to them, vendor merely offered a refund.
"Outstanding!"
Or maybe not. I can't see the few female readers of the Reg being amused. Even I don't find it funny, and I'm a sexist old dinosaur in so many ways, and an appreciative reader of Viz.
And then they wonder why so few women go into tech. Wouldn't be the whiff of misogyny and flatulence that lingers over IT, would it?
FWIW I would never write a misogynistic headline.
"If you really can't see why women might take offence, then I'm not going to explain it to you."
My girlfriend didn't see anything wrong with it when I showed her after work. I recommend reading Caitlin Moran's "How to be a woman". Essential reading for feminists, male and female.
C.
"My girlfriend didn't see anything wrong with it when I showed her after work. I recommend reading Caitlin Moran's "How to be a woman". Essential reading for feminists,"
Thank you for the patronising advice. Re-reading my post, do you think I was claiming any moral high ground?
But regardless of what your girlfriend might think, I know my wife and female colleagues would be offended. You certainly can't please all the people all of the time, and a perusal of my output will show that I'm not above some gutter language but this came across as gratuitous and sexist.
An interesting challenge for you: The lady in question is quite pleasant looking. Would the headlines have been the same if she'd looked like Mo Mowlem?
Also, "madam" in Europe doesn't mean what apparently it tends to in the United States. In this context it might imply a young woman who puts on airs, or whose complaint doesn't deserve to be taken as seriously as she expects. But that is rather unfair if indeed she had a reasonable belief that she was using genuine Samsung hardware, because it said so.
In America, of course, "madam" means that you run a brothel.
"But regardless of what your girlfriend might think, I know my wife and female colleagues would be offended."
Well then perhaps your wife and your female colleagues should get their minds out of the gutter?
"Sweet fanny adams" to imply that there is no connection between one thing and the other, the pun here being that the lady's name is "Fanny"
"swiss fanny madam's" repeating her name and choosing madam (because, you know, she's a WOMAN and madam can be a form of address for a WOMAN) to create a rhyme, prefixed with "swiss" to help the cadence of the sentence.
If you have to twist that round into some sort of sexual overtones can I respectfully suggest that you take yourself of for some therapy you 21st Century Mary Whitehouse twit.
This post has been deleted by its author
"You are Adria Richards and I claim my £5."
Nice one, Steven! I had to check my wife hadn't turned into Ms Richards the other day when she went into a rant about a meeting where people had found the word "dongle" to be funny ...
I'm sure the decades from the 1979s onwards are going to be regarded as a later version of the miserabilism of Cromwell's time ... :-(
That's very kind but I'm afraid I can't take the credit. Most of our headlines (and all of mine) are written by a specially-trained team of sub editors toiling in a basement without light, water or (in some cases) connectivity.
I'll take credit for the copy, but the poetry of the headlines is a skill beyond my own.
Bill.
Those guys do important work! The sub editors here sometimes get a little bit of stick for the odd typo slipping through into articles but their headlines are always crafted to perfection - this ones a corker, it should be entered into this years Booker Prize for literature!
Paris because this headline's worth it!
Or does any news story with the victim called "Fanny Schlatter" where her ....ummm... fanny has been.....ummm...schlattered lose a certain amount of gravitas?
Sympathy to anyone who has had their nether regions roasted by technology, but it took me a while to decide that the news report was serious.
If she had been called Joan Schmidt then the question would not have arisen in my no doubt over trained mind.
That's why they are called "Fakes" and "counterfeit".
Most people are also not anywhere near technical enough.
Most people also have budgets. $40 for something the size of a business card puts most people off right away.
That said, tech fakes are a HUGE worldwide problem. Even top tech companies have been fooled to the tune of millions. What chance does the avg punter stand?
Ditto. Until a phones battery can last for 80% of its original runtime after 24 months of hard use they need to be replaceable. If they cannot then there needs to be a sanely priced and quick service for getting them replaced.
I don't believe all phones should be mandated to have user replaceable batteries, but the choice is good. I do carry an external power pack but its not always convienient to use it and you cannot charge whilst using mhl or usb otg at least as far as I know.
I like the look of the htc one and the new sony's but the battery \ lack of sd slot kills them and the sony only going to at&t is another nail in the coffin.
Hi, I've also had this problem.
I bought a T68I "Genuine Replacement" that actually had a Li-Ion coin cell badly soldered in place, instead of the expected LiPo, good thing I took it apart to check why the capacity sucked.
It even showed up on my phone as genuine, apparently the scammers "recycle" dead cells this way by the thousand to work around smart batteries.
Since then I've been sent numerous pictures of "genuine" batteries with everything from bits of lead (byebye RoHS) to old screws inside to disguise the poor quality parts used.
The scumbag faking scum are even using ultrasonic welders to put genuine cases (recycled obviously) on fake cells, and even going as far as labelling them NiMH on the Customs forms to get around the lithium restrictions.. !!!!!
If you don't believe me google it, there are lots of deathtrap electric drill batteries around using recycled laptop packs where the one bad cell is simply removed and the completed stack soldered up and repackaged with genuine PCB and a genuine case.
Needless to say, the e-bike users are also feeling the pain from this, as a lot of the more expensive bikes need the exact pack to work so rebuilds are commonplace.
I am thinking about starting a counterfeit battery analysis and testing company as this could help a lot of people get their money back in a way similar to h2testw for fake memory cards..
AC/DC
As most of these products come from China tracing supply is impossible. Also believing the stickers is also impossible as anyone who has dealt wiht China will tell you, whatever you buy comes with the stickers you request doesn't mean a thing........
Remember its only a few years ago a fake NEC was found out there.
We have so much bought on our behalf out there that the supply lines are blurred and safety concerns from the maker are non-existant
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