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Thinking about buying from Alibaba - do fakes exist?

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Hey fellas, thinking about buying a machine from alibaba and was wondering if any fakes exist? And if so are they obvious fakes or do they look very similar?

 

Cheers

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seeing how this is a graphtec discussion thread I can almost guarantee any graphtec on Alibaba would be a fake.  they control their supply line much tighter than that

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Fakes exist and people get ripped off all the time.  If it looks too good to be true, it pretty much is.

 

I talked to a guy last week who lost $3100 trying to buy a large Graphtec CE6000 from international.  What he got was a Heletin with a cheap Graphtec nameplate. 

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There might be a few legit Graphtec dealers on there, but I wouldn't chance it. More knockoffs than real ones most likely.

 

Alibaba is good for products that you want to sell and need 5,000 of a certain product in custom packaging. Always get multiple quotes and order samples first.

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Right I see, the price is a little better hence why I asked! I guess I won't be touching that. Does anyone have experience of buying a machine from there? In my mind I feel like a fake would be very cost ineffective for a third party company to produce due to the research costs involved and the relatively niche market. If it was a fake wouldn't it just look completely different and then I could just get my money back?!

 

Cheers!!

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Right I see, the price is a little better hence why I asked! I guess I won't be touching that. Does anyone have experience of buying a machine from there? In my mind I feel like a fake would be very cost ineffective for a third party company to produce due to the research costs involved and the relatively niche market. If it was a fake wouldn't it just look completely different and then I could just get my money back?!

 

Cheers!!

not necessarily - they was selling several "Roland" look alike printers on there a couple of years back and from the reports they was old encad guts being put into a roland looking shell - but if you want to be the test subject let us know how it turns out.  in reality there are usually tons of used graphtec and rolands on cl very reasonable from people that thought they was getting into something that was free money with no expertise or work required.  I have bought several that way - 

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no necessarily - they was selling several "Roland" look alike printers on there a couple of years back and from the reports they was old encad guts being put into a roland looking shell - but if you want to be the test subject let us know how it turns out.  in reality there are usually tons of used graphtec and rolands on cl very reasonable from people that thought they was getting into something that was free money with no expertise or work required.  I have bought several that way - 

Good points.... think I'll give it a miss..

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I have looked at eco solvent print cut machines from there.  The prices are seductive.  My feel is that support is going to be the killer.  Nobody is going to show up at your door to fix it.  You would have to learn Chinese to have a conversation on the phone.  Any messages might have the google translation effect.  Maybe it is not as bad as that, but I wouldn't lay money on it.  I say it will be hard to find English forums like this for support.  This is of course, assuming it is a machine made there, (as the cheap ones I looked at.)

 

I guess it all depends on how much money, how sophisticated is the machine, how much risk you are comfortable with and how good are your skills at repair and troubleshooting flying solo.  Shipping the thing back will cost an arm and leg, if they will take it back should you decide to try to return it.

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The prices are great.. but I don't think I'd risk it as I may not get a proper unit as has been mentioned. Don't think it's worth the risk to me.. and if it wasn't the right one then I'd definitely not have any way of sorting it out :(

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