[c-nsp] Article: Beware of counterfeit Cisco gear

[Gert Doering]

Hi,

On Tue, Oct 24, 2006 at 10:09:46PM -0700, Ted Mittelstaedt wrote:
> Additionally, in the auto industry, this sort of thing goes on all the time,
> and
> there's nothing illegal about it, they call it "aftermarket parts"  General
> Motors does not have a problem if I buy a new Alternator from NAPA
> and put it in my GM car.  Cisco should not have a problem if I buy a new
> WIC card and put it in my Cisco router.  The fact that they do, pushes this
> stuff underground which exacerbates the problem.

Well - the interesting question is: what will GM tell you if you bought
some important part for your car from a "aftermarket" source, and it
damaged something in the engine (due to not following specs precisely
enough).  Will they repair your car on warranty?

I think that's the heart of the issue: some of the clones just don't work
properly (more likely "those clones that are recognized as such are those
that have 'problems'") - and I can understand that Cisco doesn't want to
spend TAC time on chasing IOS bugs that turn out to be cheap hardware 
clones.

We had a PA-2FE-TX that Cisco claims to be a fake, and indeed it caused
*very* strange issues, both on a 7500 and on a 7200...

gert


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Gert Doering - Munich, Germany                             gert at greenie.muc.de
fax: +49-89-35655025                        gert at net.informatik.tu-muenchen.de