Buying SDHC cards from eBay... how can I know which merchants are reliable? How to guard against fake cards?

I would like to buy a Sandisk 16 GB SDHC card. I'm from Canada and
those capacities are very scarce in the stores here. Costs are high --
like $200 and over.

B&H sells the 16GB Ultra II card for $150, but the shipping costs are
exhorbitant, like $26 by UPS, and those UPS crooks will add maybe $50
for "customs brokerage".

So maybe eBay is the answer. On eBay, the 16 GB Ultra II cards go for
around $150 and less. Shipping is still high for something that
weights about as much as a fly, but it is less less, and USPS is
available... they don't levy brokerage fees.

But I've heard that fake cards are all over the place on eBay. How can
I tell which the fakes are?

Who are the merchants I can trust on eBay?

Dunc

BobW wrote:
"Duncan H. Davies" wrote in message
...

[snip]

Who are the merchants I can trust on eBay?

Dunc

You shouldn't be using eBay until you understand how it works.

Bob

To each his own. I don't know all the details of ebay. My son uses them
for everything. Sometimes he makes out sometimes he doesn't. Apparently
the people using it rate each other. Personally, my opinion of ebay is
shaded by the bad things I've seen mentioned here and elsewhere.
Obviously this is not the norm but why bother if you don't have to. The
op is basically concerned over shipping costs.
Amazon show this item via a reseller at a lower price than B&H. Amazon
are normally very good.
Dave Cohen

On Wed, 21 May 2008 16:07:21 GMT, Dave Cohen wrote:

BobW wrote:
"Duncan H. Davies" wrote in message
...

[snip]

Who are the merchants I can trust on eBay?

Dunc

You shouldn't be using eBay until you understand how it works.

Bob

To each his own. I don't know all the details of ebay. My son uses them
for everything. Sometimes he makes out sometimes he doesn't. Apparently
the people using it rate each other. Personally, my opinion of ebay is
shaded by the bad things I've seen mentioned here and elsewhere.
Obviously this is not the norm but why bother if you don't have to. The
op is basically concerned over shipping costs.
Amazon show this item via a reseller at a lower price than B&H. Amazon
are normally very good.
Dave Cohen

They aren't any good at all. Amazon.com won't ship SDHC cards to
Canada, and amazon.ca doesn't list them.

Dunc

On Wed, 21 May 2008 08:52:10 -0700, "BobW"
wrote:


"Duncan H. Davies" wrote in message
.. .

[snip]


Who are the merchants I can trust on eBay?

Dunc

You shouldn't be using eBay until you understand how it works.

Bob

Do you know which merchants on eBay offer authentic cards? If not,
your reply is off-topic.

Dunc

Of all the things you can buy on eBay, memory cards are probably the one
item where you're more than likely to get a fake. Pay B&H, get the real
thing, and avoid eBay. It used to be a decent service, but it's really sunk
low lately.

On Wed, 21 May 2008 10:03:49 -0700, "BobW"
wrote:


"Duncan H. Davies" wrote in message
.. .
On Wed, 21 May 2008 08:52:10 -0700, "BobW"
wrote:


"Duncan H. Davies" wrote in message
...

[snip]


Who are the merchants I can trust on eBay?

Dunc

You shouldn't be using eBay until you understand how it works.

Bob

Do you know which merchants on eBay offer authentic cards? If not,
your reply is off-topic.

Dunc

Duncan,

How will you know that any reseller ships authentic cards?

You just need to learn how eBay works -- specifically the Feedback Forum --
and then you can answer your own questions. Do the work.

I already know how eBay works, thank you. My question was how to know
which merchants ship authentic memory cards, not how eBay works. .

Your response implies that a fake card can be recognized immediately
once received, prompting negative feedback, but that is not something
that is known to me.

Dunc

"Duncan H. Davies" wrote in message
...
I would like to buy a Sandisk 16 GB SDHC card. I'm from Canada and
those capacities are very scarce in the stores here. Costs are high --
like $200 and over.

B&H sells the 16GB Ultra II card for $150, but the shipping costs are
exhorbitant, like $26 by UPS, and those UPS crooks will add maybe $50
for "customs brokerage".

So maybe eBay is the answer. On eBay, the 16 GB Ultra II cards go for
around $150 and less. Shipping is still high for something that
weights about as much as a fly, but it is less less, and USPS is
available... they don't levy brokerage fees.

But I've heard that fake cards are all over the place on eBay. How can
I tell which the fakes are?

Who are the merchants I can trust on eBay?

If you pay with **Paypal**, you can trust all of them, because you have
insurance.

I got a lens from Hong Kong. took a while, but everything as expected. only
they lied about the "tax free" part.

Today I just got a lens from England via eBay.co.uk. It's a 50 MM 1.7 AF
Minolta for my Sony A350. I bought it in the weekend and got it today, so
real quick. Also I can't get those lenses here in Portugal.
Anyway: at first I thought I saw a scratch,but after I cleaned it, it turned
out as brand new: not even a small scratch or anything like it. I'm very
happy with it and only paid less then 95 euro including shipping. Here, if I
could find it, I'd probably have to pay twice that.
Hope it helps.

I don't understand, why anyone in their right mind would pay so much for so
little. Why not buy a few smaller cards? You spread the risk of write/read
failures. This happens more often then you think!!!
My RAW files are between 13 and 17 MB, but I wouldn't dream about bigger
cards then 4 GB.
If you need more storage, take an imagetank of 60 GB. Not hat expensive,
surely cheaper then a 16 GB card...

Regards,
Bert

Many cards from Ebay are Sandisk forgeries. Try asking the seller to
guarantee that the card is legitimate and suppl.ied directly from
Sandisk USA or Canada.

"Duncan H. Davies" wrote in message
...
I would like to buy a Sandisk 16 GB SDHC card. I'm from Canada and
those capacities are very scarce in the stores here. Costs are
high --
like $200 and over.

B&H sells the 16GB Ultra II card for $150, but the shipping costs
are
exhorbitant, like $26 by UPS, and those UPS crooks will add maybe
$50
for "customs brokerage".

So maybe eBay is the answer. On eBay, the 16 GB Ultra II cards go
for
around $150 and less. Shipping is still high for something that
weights about as much as a fly, but it is less less, and USPS is
available... they don't levy brokerage fees.

But I've heard that fake cards are all over the place on eBay. How
can
I tell which the fakes are?

Who are the merchants I can trust on eBay?

Dunc

"BobW" wrote in message
...

"Duncan H. Davies" wrote in message
...

[snip]


Who are the merchants I can trust on eBay?

Dunc

You shouldn't be using eBay until you understand how it works.


Yes.
Its just like sex.
You shouldn't have sex until you are perfect at it.

Makes sense.

--
Jeff R.

"Duncan H. Davies" wrote in message
...
I would like to buy a Sandisk 16 GB SDHC card. I'm from Canada and
those capacities are very scarce in the stores here. Costs are high --
like $200 and over.


Why don't you just go down to BestBuy Canada, and buy two 8GB SD cards for
$39 each?
http://www.bestbuy.ca/catalog/prodde...gon=&langid=EN