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I am STUNNED np50 dual charger


WrineX

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I  made a  post yesterday, about a chargers price. i still stand behind that opinion.

BUT.

 

I am not standing behind: me posting it.   i got a bit to carried away in being surprised at prices and such.

 

And i can only see the post getting more toxic and i started it, so i removed it.  
I will keep my opinion to myself,  and my apologies for your time wasted.






 

 

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Actually it's an interesting topic when discussed in a civil and rational way. 

 

In other areas not related to audio I've seen different cases of rebranded OEM hardware. In one of them, a marine aquarium filter sold under two different brands, there was a clear difference in product documentation. One of the brands included a thorough, well researched and well written manual while the other just had a placeholder. I could desribe one of them as a sheet, the other as a shit. Both units were identical as far as I know. (Note, I didn´t do sophisticated checks of important stuff such as the alloy of the pump shaft which can be an important difference for a marine aquarium).

 

So, not all rebranded OEM products are born equal.

 

- The Western brand selling them can offer a good technical support. You may even find out that comparing two brands selling the same unit one can give a superior technical support or offer superior warranty terms. That costs money (a lot!) and it certainly justiies higher prices.

 

- The Western brand may have actually secured a supply/manufacture with higher grade components and/or some design changes. Only a thorough comparison would determine if that's the case. The outside look can be identical but, what about the inside?

 

A good example would be the Sound Devices branded SD cards. Probably they not only have tested them thoroughly. If I were them I would have secured the supply with the OEM so that they don't make changes to the components or firmware without approval. 

 

And there are of course clueless brands beyond help. Several years ago I suffered a serious metal contamination incident in my aquarium with the sudden death of all my coral colonies. Before that they were growing a centimeter a month or so. Turns out the culprit was a poorly sealed magnet. To my horror, the vendor was unable to tell me the actual magnet composition. And they replied with nonsense when I asked why they hadn't sealed them with epoxy. 

 

So, not all brands relying on OEM suppliers are born equal. 

 

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1 hour ago, borjam said:

Actually it's an interesting topic when discussed in a civil and rational way. 

 

- The Western brand selling them can offer a good technical support. You may even find out that comparing two brands selling the same unit one can give a superior technical support or offer superior warranty terms. That costs money (a lot!) and it certainly justiies higher prices.

 

- The Western brand may have actually secured a supply/manufacture with higher grade components and/or some design changes. Only a thorough comparison would determine if that's the case. The outside look can be identical but, what about the inside?

 

A good example would be the Sound Devices branded SD cards. Probably they not only have tested them thoroughly. If I were them I would have secured the supply with the OEM so that they don't make changes to the components or firmware without approval. 

 

And there are of course clueless brands beyond help. Several years ago I suffered a serious metal contamination incident in my aquarium with the sudden death of all my coral colonies. Before that they were growing a centimeter a month or so. Turns out the culprit was a poorly sealed magnet. To my horror, the vendor was unable to tell me the actual magnet composition. And they replied with nonsense when I asked why they hadn't sealed them with epoxy. 

 

So, not all brands relying on OEM suppliers are born equal. 




well said, it think it was still civil, but i started off at the wrong foot i think and gave me a bad feeling the next day. so i wanted to rectify it. 

In Audio branding of loudspeakers you see rebranded  speakers drivers often , but by such huge companies and huge amounts (dayton audio and few others) that hardly anyone know what the original manufacturer was, often when the original brands are sold on ebay or aliexpress they get labeled as fake by consumers, although they might actually be the original brand, and not the rebranded dayton :) i took dayton as an example. 
quality control can be higher in these cases since they order huge amounts and have some leverage. 

so yeah you are right there not all equal. 


Hmm well yeah i can imagine they actually dont know what kind of magnet composition they used in your pump (i mean they should know ofcourse what kind of manget ferrite,neo,alnico etc) but cant imagine they would know what went in to making them.   but i can imagine when dealing with water and lifeforms it would raise the bar in materials you should pick or not pick.

il leave it at that, since the post it self is now unreadable for all new comers, sorry my bet. 

 

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Let's put this to bed.

 

The ones SGS sells ARE modified -- they do a circuit change, plus improve the visibility of the LEDs, as well as include a cable and, of course, back them up with full support.

 

Let's face it, if you're shelling out the amount of money that these transmitters cost and investing in a set of batteries, does it make any sense whatsoever to cheap out on the chargers? 

 

My choice is to buy the ones that are tested, improved, and backed up by a known reputable dealer!

 

 

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8 hours ago, John Blankenship said:

 

The initial question posed was if the SGS model is identical to the cheapo, no-name units.  The answer is "no, they're not." 

 

Oh that’s good to know. 

 

Aside from anything, WrineX builds a really great multibay charger for NP-50 style batteries. Anyone in the market for one should contact him. And me for real world experience, if needed 

 

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It's certainly an interesting topic in general.

I have no experiences with the product or company mentioned in this thread, but I've bought some medium size NP-F batteries from Dedo Weigert, thinking that given their reputation of their lights, they certainly will have good batteries, and at 45EUR it was still half the price of original Sony ones (which were discontinued anyway).

I got *exactly* the same batteries that I bought from Amazon some weeks earlier for I think 12EUR a piece. I was a bit grumpy at the time, but then thought they probably have tested 20 different brands and chose the one that worked best for them, and that time spent must be factored in somewhere.

That said, the batteries still didn't hold up anywhere near as well as genuine Sony ones over the years and hardly better then other chinese branded ones, so I wouldn't buy them again.

chris

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2 hours ago, John Blankenship said:

For NP50 batteries, the Lectrosonics branded are the best choice.

 

There are cheaper ones, but...

soooo many people asked to find them a source besides Letctro , but it looks like they are the only ones with high capacity :(

17 hours ago, John Blankenship said:

 

The initial question posed was if the SGS model is identical to the cheapo, no-name units.  The answer is "no, they're not." 

Good to hear, so removal of my assumptions, was needed :) so my apology to them. 
if i where them i would add it to the description modified or something.  since they look 1:1 witch lead to... well people assuming :)

would love more information on what they changed but thats just my curiosity.


and indeed now i put it to bed. 

 

 

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21 hours ago, Vincent R. said:

Than what? changing some components from the "standard" board? adding stuff? Like what?

What i do, is using a different resistors that sets the charge current, since 1Amp is much to high for such small batteries (and 2A total to much for the usb cable),

As for the light.. i made a version once of the stock chargers where i replaced the original light guide (if you can even call it that) the plastic translucent inserts.  i made my own light guides from acrylic that would fit in exactly, transferring all the light directly from the LED to the top. so you can see them even with lights on :)
in my own charger the light guide is part of the housing, it transfers light and functions as a spacer between slots. 

i cant say what they changed.

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I have a WrineX charger for my NP50s and it is absolutely brilliant. I cannot recommend it highly enough.

 

On the topic of 'stuff' that might look entirely similar to OEM stuff..... I have a pal who used to own a company making LED lights for film and TV. He had deals with numerous LED manufacturers, Philips, Cree, etc..... Part of his deal stated that the LEDs would have to be delivered to him with no more than a certain (very small) percentage of colour difference between the entire LED delivery that came to him. The manufacturer tested and graded the LEDs, taking out something like the top 2% to go to my mate's company. This was expensive, but not so much as buying the 'cheaper', less accurate coloured LEDs, and throwing out the 'bad ones'. As an aside.... he wouldn't make an LED lamp that way nowadays. Now he would design with built in self colour checking, and some sort of fuzzy logic along the lines of 'more red, less blue' until the (measured) target colour is reached.....

 

On the topic of QC.... I recently worked on a dance dhow where the audience get to 'vote' if they like what they are seeing. Each seat has a small led ringlight on a stick - the 'ring' sits above the occupant's shoulder. When they vote the ring changes colour. The lights add somewhat to the overall lightshow for the show. I got talking to the chap from the company who had supplied the entire voting system, including the ringlights. He told me that had pulled the whole system together in about 14 or so weeks, from commission to delivery, though they had done the design work in advance, and had taken the precaution of lining up a Chinese manufacturer to make the (some thousands of) led populated boards for the rings. They deliberately over ordered, knowing that there would be failures 'out of the box'. They nearly didnt make the delivery, on account of the failure rate, which was, apparently, nearly 50% !!!!!

 

Regards, Simon B

 

 

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