Hello

After searching through ebay and looking at the various sony pro duo memory sticks for sale, I decided to purchase a handful to check them out. As suspected.....all fake. In the following review, I will be using my knowledge to educate buyers on spotting counterfeit sony pro duo memory sticks.

Sony is one of the best known manufactures of household technology which range from television sets to video cameras. High quality storage media are a series of products that Sony is excelling in worldwide and the counterfeit gurus are jumping in the bandwagon for a massive profit hike. Save save save, but where is the quality?

Packaging

After purchasing a sony pro duo memory stick from ebay, I was able to spot wether the item was a counterfeit or genuine instantly. All I had to look at was the packaging of the memory stick. Counterfeit memory stick are sealed in plastic packaging with dots of glue. These packagings can easily be torn apart by your average 6 year old kid. Genuine sony pro duo memory sticks are heat sealed. It looks like tiny rectangles linked together and travel around the whole perimeter of the packaging.

  Sealed with dots of glue. 100% FAKE xxx

Appearance

The serial and ‘Made in Japan’ writing seems to be printed on the memory card and will eventually rub off with your fingers over time. Genuine Sony memory sticks have the writing etched in with lasers and the letters can be felt (bumpy) when you slide your finger over the words. More so, the letters can be seen on an angle, where as the fake cannot be seen on an angle (being smooth).

Counterfiet cards feel as though they can be snapped very easily, When bending the stick close to the gold inserts, the black lines (plastic) come up directly off the connector.

Storage capacity

The actual true capacity of fake memory sticks vary. The traditional fake memory sticks could hold only 1 GB of data and were programmed to ‘act’ like 2 GB sticks. These days, counterfeits are much better dusguised.After playing songs on my PSP, some songs which I had just finished listening to had become ‘corrupted’ and not playable (i.e. ‘corrupted data’ was displayed on my PSP).Performing a speed test using HD Tach, Counterfeit cards can only acquire speeds of up to 6.5mb per second (fluctuating). Not very fast for a ‘high speed’ memory stick worth. Transfer of 2 GB of data takes approx 6-10 minutes. Genuine sony cards transfer at speeds of around 15mbps. A 2gb transfer should take approx 2minutes.

How long will it last?

A counterfeit memory stick will only last a couple of days if your unlucky. A couple of weeks on average and if your really lucky, a couple of months. A genuine sony pro duo memory stick will last you many years to come.

Price differential

Ebay is known for very good bargains and deals. However, in the memorystick department, all that's being sold is fake after fake after fake! Beware of sellers located in china and hongkong who offer prices of around $10-$30 for a 4gb memory stick. If it is a too good to be true price, the item will most likely be a fake. When purchasing memory stick from ebay.....there are no bargains to be made unless your happy with a counterfeit item. The only genuine memorysticks are either the same price as instore or sligtly cheaper.

I hope this guide helps.

cheers