Chisco vs Cisco VWICs

tokhss

soo tempted !

to say the least..

70 bucks for a vwic 2mft or hundreds for the real deal!

is anyone running the fake one ? if so.. is it running in production or in lab.. and how well is it running..

considering this is for my lab and i am trying to save money here.. im really thinking of testing some of these fakers and seeing if they hold up enough to pass my exams..

i just read an article that the us govt bought a ton load of fake gear that was sold by their gold cisco partners lol.. this was back in 2008.. wonder how well it ran or didnt !

tiersten

tokhss wrote: »

is it running in production or in lab

If anybody knowingly buys fake gear for production use then they should be fired on the spot.

tokhss wrote: »

considering this is for my lab and i am trying to save money here.. im really thinking of testing some of these fakers and seeing if they hold up enough to pass my exams..

Some people have bought them for lab use and they've been completely fine with no problems. Others have bought them and had issues after a random period of time. Finally some people have bought cards that were just dead.

Its up to you whether you want to risk the 2nd or 3rd option. Getting a refund out of these people isn't going to be easy.

tokhss wrote: »

i just read an article that the us govt bought a ton load of fake gear that was sold by their gold cisco partners lol.. this was back in 2008.. wonder how well it ran or didnt !

Its not hard to end up with fake gear. Your supplier might be 100% legitimate but you don't know who supplies them. They might have found an "amazing" deal on a bunch of gear and then shipped it on to your supplier who then sent it onto you. Another trick is that somebody along the supply chain just mixes in counterfeit products with real products so most of it is real but you'll get a couple units out of a pallet that aren't.

Recently Newegg had problem where they shipped out a bunch of fake CPUs. Newegg's supplier claimed that they had accidentally shipped Newegg a load of "demo" boxes but they were actually fakes. From what I can tell, Newegg did the right thing and sent out a real boxed CPU to everybody affected and terminated their relationship with that particular supplier.

jeanathan

How can you tell if the gear is fake? If it is fake then how does it work?

I mean a fake CPU would not be compatibly with an intel i series motherboard.
So how does a fake Cisco VWIC2 work on a 2800 series router?

I know a fake designer dress or suit is hard to tell because the knockoff is assembled in a textile plant that is very similar to that the designer uses.

For that matter I could get a sticker than says Intel i7 CPU and sell you an Intel i3 at the price of an i7.

So is a fake VWIC2 actually a VWIC1 card for the 2600 series being marketed as a VWIC2, that isn't a discounted knockoff. That is fake as in listing a VWIC2 for $70 and sending you a pair of shoes in mail, out and out fraud.

tiersten

jeanathan wrote: »

How can you tell if the gear is fake? If it is fake then how does it work?

The fakes are generally the same hardware design but made with lower quality components or QA isn't properly done on them. This means long term reliability may be affected or they might be DOA.

It not working is a big indication that you might have a fake card. Missing holograms. Bad soldering. Usage of different component brands. Different silkscreening. The box not looking right or not being sealed. Serial numbers being invalid or not changing between cards. There are sites that show you the differences between fakes and real cards.

jeanathan wrote: »

I mean a fake CPU would not be compatibly with an intel i series motherboard.
So how does a fake Cisco VWIC2 work on a 2800 series router?

Its fake because Cisco didn't make it. Either somebody has reverse engineered the design or they're from the actual factory that makes the real cards and somebody is running the production line without Cisco's knowledge.

If you've got the production line and the designs then it would be easy for you to run off an extra few hundred cards at the weekend when nobody is around. You'll need to get your own components since people may notice that the numbers don't add up. You're not going to bother putting it through the normal testing procedure either since that takes time and effort.

jeanathan wrote: »

I know a fake designer dress or suit is hard to tell because the knockoff is assembled in a textile plant that is very similar to that the designer uses.

Same for fake hardware.

jeanathan wrote: »

For that matter I could get a sticker than says Intel i7 CPU and sell you an Intel i3 at the price of an i7.

No because the fake Cisco hardware looks like real Cisco hardware and shares the same design. It reports to IOS as being the correct type of card.

The fake CPUs that Newegg got were made out of solid metal that was shaped to look like a CPU. The boxed CPU fake was designed to fool somebody so long as nobody opened the box. There was a reasonably well faked cardboard box with a giant hunk of plastic with a picture of a fan on it to show through the window. The CPU window let you look at the top of this chunk of metal that was intended to be a CPU. They even slipped a tiny blank booklet inside to rattle if you shook it around.

jeanathan wrote: »

So is a fake VWIC2 actually a VWIC1 card for the 2600 series being marketed as a VWIC2, that isn't a discounted knockoff. That is fake as in listing a VWIC2 for $70 and sending you a pair of shoes in mail, out and out fraud.

Never said it was like that. If you buy a VWIC2 fake then you get something that looks like a VWIC2 turning up in your mail. It just might not be made very well or it might turn up dead.

pitviper

I have a couple of CHisco VWIC-2MFT-T1s and E1s in the lab and they work fine - I actually had an issue with one of the cards (weird clocking errors) and the seller replaced it without hassle. That's not to say that all sellers are created equal. No way would I willingly use the stuff in a production network. We had a rash of outages at work a few years ago, mostly after power issues and the culprit ended up being a batch of counterfeit WIC-1DSU-T1s (that we purchased from an authorized distro none the less). We threw them all in a box and found out after the fact that they were fakes.

pitviper

tiersten wrote: »

Missing holograms. Bad soldering. Usage of different component brands. Different silkscreening.

This is the dead ringer on the VWICs - They seem like they were assembled in a hurry hence the components are all uneven/crooked. They also use different metal on the brackets and thumb screws so the fit is a little snug.

jeanathan

they're from the actual factory that makes the real cards and somebody is running the production line without Cisco's knowledge.

That is messed up. So theoretically if they did a good enough job only the a paper trail, say the s/n of device, could tell you one way or another. Makes you wonder about equipment on eBay, I see why you would never use eBay equip. in a real network even if you could save cash.

Never said it was like that.

Didn't mean to imply that, I was thinking out loud.

tiersten

jeanathan wrote: »

That is messed up. So theoretically if they did a good enough job only the a paper trail, say the s/n of device, could tell you one way or another. Makes you wonder about equipment on eBay, I see why you would never use eBay equip. in a real network even if you could save cash.

Pretty much. If you're putting this into a production network then I'd say go find a Cisco partner who gets their stock directly from Cisco if you can.

jeanathan wrote: »

Didn't mean to imply that, I was thinking out loud.

Sorry. My bad.

pitviper

tiersten wrote: »

Pretty much. If you're putting this into a production network then I'd say go find a Cisco partner who gets their stock directly from Cisco if you can.

+1

not worth the risk for real world application.

tokhss

LOL.. i think i will take the risk and save a few hundred bucks for a single card.. the fakers are going for 70 bucks are the real deal is around 3-500. .ouch...

pitviper.. who did you go through.. =D if there willing to replace, then its def worth a shot. you can private message me if you like. thanks!