Is my USB stick fake?
February 24, 2016 6:12 AM Subscribe
I have a SanDisk Extreme USB 3.0 Stick with a non-standard CE logo on it. Other people online seem to have SanDisk kit with the same wrong logo. I'd like to know if it's fake or if it's normal for them?
The CE logo has pretty obviously been altered by bringing the two letters a lot closer together, practically touching.
Looking at the layout of the various printed elements, though, I would say that whoever laid-out that particular block tightened-up all of the regulatory logos in order to get them to match the width of the "Made in China" line.
Did you buy this stick at a trusted retailer, or was it via some cheap, no-name source?
posted by Thorzdad at 6:59 AM on February 24, 2016 [1 favorite]
Looking at the layout of the various printed elements, though, I would say that whoever laid-out that particular block tightened-up all of the regulatory logos in order to get them to match the width of the "Made in China" line.
Did you buy this stick at a trusted retailer, or was it via some cheap, no-name source?
posted by Thorzdad at 6:59 AM on February 24, 2016 [1 favorite]
That's not the official CE mark.
Urban legend has it is a "Chinese Export" marking, but that is apparently some kind of joke that people took seriously. It could be fraudulent or it could be just someone cramming things together and inadvertently messing up the logo.
There are plenty of fake-capacity USB drives on Amazon, though, and the only surefire way to determine that, from what I've read, is to write a whole bunch of data to the drive and then verify that all of it is there. Fill it up with videos and make sure you can watch them all or something, I guess.
posted by ernielundquist at 7:15 AM on February 24, 2016
Urban legend has it is a "Chinese Export" marking, but that is apparently some kind of joke that people took seriously. It could be fraudulent or it could be just someone cramming things together and inadvertently messing up the logo.
There are plenty of fake-capacity USB drives on Amazon, though, and the only surefire way to determine that, from what I've read, is to write a whole bunch of data to the drive and then verify that all of it is there. Fill it up with videos and make sure you can watch them all or something, I guess.
posted by ernielundquist at 7:15 AM on February 24, 2016
Did you buy it from Amazon proper, or a vendor selling through Amazon? Amazon's own products should be legit, but they can't guarantee the authenticity of third-party sellers.
posted by mikeh at 7:20 AM on February 24, 2016
posted by mikeh at 7:20 AM on February 24, 2016
I just checked and my SanDisk Cruzer Force has the same CE logo misprint on the back. I bought mine from Deal Extreme, for what it's worth.
None of the product images on the official SanDisk site show the back of any of their memory sticks, so that's not helpful.
I have however just scrolled through a crap-ton of google image search results for photos of SanDisk thumb drives and was able to find about a dozen pictures showing the backs of different drives. Every single picture had this same squished CE logo. I'm assuming that every one of those pictures isn't, by chance, of a counterfeit drive. So I think it's safe to say that at least some genuine SanDisk drives use this squished logo.
Of course, that doesn't mean that we don't have counterfeit drives. Just that we don't have evidence that they are counterfeit.
posted by 256 at 7:25 AM on February 24, 2016 [1 favorite]
None of the product images on the official SanDisk site show the back of any of their memory sticks, so that's not helpful.
I have however just scrolled through a crap-ton of google image search results for photos of SanDisk thumb drives and was able to find about a dozen pictures showing the backs of different drives. Every single picture had this same squished CE logo. I'm assuming that every one of those pictures isn't, by chance, of a counterfeit drive. So I think it's safe to say that at least some genuine SanDisk drives use this squished logo.
Of course, that doesn't mean that we don't have counterfeit drives. Just that we don't have evidence that they are counterfeit.
posted by 256 at 7:25 AM on February 24, 2016 [1 favorite]
Can you post a photo of the whole stick? Because it looks to me like it's fake. I did a google image search for (without the quotes) "sandisk extreme usb 3.0 64 gb" and got this result:
http://www.legitreviews.com/images/reviews/1994/extreme-usb-back.jpg
The label on the stick in the image looks nothing like your label however the product numbers match.
Hmm, found an image of a slightly different product that matches your image more:
http://content.hwigroup.net/images/products_xl/158270/2/sandisk-cruzer-extreme-64gb.jpg
But without better photos of your usb stick, it's hard to tell.
posted by I-baLL at 7:32 AM on February 24, 2016
http://www.legitreviews.com/images/reviews/1994/extreme-usb-back.jpg
The label on the stick in the image looks nothing like your label however the product numbers match.
Hmm, found an image of a slightly different product that matches your image more:
http://content.hwigroup.net/images/products_xl/158270/2/sandisk-cruzer-extreme-64gb.jpg
But without better photos of your usb stick, it's hard to tell.
posted by I-baLL at 7:32 AM on February 24, 2016
I have a different Sandisk stick that is at least 4 years old, from a verified vendor and it has the squished logo.
posted by soelo at 7:52 AM on February 24, 2016
posted by soelo at 7:52 AM on February 24, 2016
Response by poster: I bought it from Amazon proper. I tested with f3 and the capacity is fine. Apart from the BN it matches I-baLL's second image exactly (except for that white dot top right, I don't have that).
posted by gorcha at 8:01 AM on February 24, 2016
posted by gorcha at 8:01 AM on February 24, 2016
Many manufacturers squish the CE mark. It's very poorly designed and quite difficult to fit on a small device at a readable scale in the existing design.
posted by DarlingBri at 8:20 AM on February 24, 2016
posted by DarlingBri at 8:20 AM on February 24, 2016
Many manufacturers squish the CE mark.
Further to this, I have now been sort of compulsively checking the CE mark on other items around the house and found it in a squished form on a variety of things I can be pretty certain are not counterfeit, including my XBOX 360.
posted by 256 at 8:38 AM on February 24, 2016
Further to this, I have now been sort of compulsively checking the CE mark on other items around the house and found it in a squished form on a variety of things I can be pretty certain are not counterfeit, including my XBOX 360.
posted by 256 at 8:38 AM on February 24, 2016
I just checked about 30 miscellaneous electronic devices in my IT office from generally-legit sources and about 25 of them have the 'squished' logo. These labels are designed by factory graphics people who may not much care about that huge gap for official certification or whatever, and just need to fit everything into 15mm of linear space without looking stupid. I'm sure many of them remove that space for layout reasons and nothing else.
posted by BlackPebble at 8:56 AM on February 24, 2016 [2 favorites]
posted by BlackPebble at 8:56 AM on February 24, 2016 [2 favorites]
I just happened to have my Sandisk Extreme (16GB) in my pocket. I bought it from Amazon proper and it looks like OP's, with the logos clustered together and the squished CE logo.
I'm reasonably sure mine's legit -- it's fast as hell, holds the advertised capacity, and I've had zero problems with it.
posted by neckro23 at 9:02 AM on February 24, 2016
I'm reasonably sure mine's legit -- it's fast as hell, holds the advertised capacity, and I've had zero problems with it.
posted by neckro23 at 9:02 AM on February 24, 2016
There's nothing about the mark itself that guarantees it's not a fake. People who make fakes can just as easily put the properly-spaced logo on. It's just a terrible mark that some graphic designer dealt with, probably for sizing.
posted by sageleaf at 10:43 AM on February 24, 2016 [2 favorites]
posted by sageleaf at 10:43 AM on February 24, 2016 [2 favorites]
I have a SanDisk Clip Jam MP3 player with the same (squished) CE logo. I find it highly implausible that the MP3 player is counterfeit.
posted by Shmuel510 at 11:10 AM on February 24, 2016
posted by Shmuel510 at 11:10 AM on February 24, 2016
FWIW my Sandisk Cruzer USB stick, bought from a brick-and-mortar main-street retailer here in Ireland a couple of years ago, also has the logo squished. I would expect it's merely for space reasons, as there's not a lot of room on there, and the official logo has far too much space between the characters than is truly necessary.
posted by macdara at 11:56 AM on February 24, 2016
posted by macdara at 11:56 AM on February 24, 2016
Also worth noting that the CE mark is not a signifier of quality, authenticity, or accuracy; nor is it issued by a central certifiying body to tested products. It essentially means nothing beyond "someone has self-assessed that the product meets certain EU safety, health or environmental requirements".
In theory it only means that the manufacturer (if made in the EU) or distributor (if imported) is responsible for any failure to meet those requirements within the EEA. In practice, it means less than that.
It's basically the ISO9000/9001 of labelling…
posted by Pinback at 2:08 PM on February 24, 2016
In theory it only means that the manufacturer (if made in the EU) or distributor (if imported) is responsible for any failure to meet those requirements within the EEA. In practice, it means less than that.
It's basically the ISO9000/9001 of labelling…
posted by Pinback at 2:08 PM on February 24, 2016
This thread is closed to new comments.
posted by randomkeystrike at 6:49 AM on February 24, 2016