Bought a Macbook with fake SSD

[colinscity]

Hello everyone,

This is really my first time with such a huge issue and I have been using eBay since 2008.

In November i bought a Macbook Pro 2009 17" that was purported by the seller to be upgraded and fully maxed out running Open Core Legacy Patcher to Big Sur, the SSD was alleged to be 1TB.

After purchasing it, I received a message from the seller telling me that he had disconnected the battery and that i would need to reconnect it once it arrives. This was a big shock to me as I have previously bought another Macbook Pro and they never did this, the seller became very rude and aggressive during our conversations and was even able to get my feedback removed from his page and on my "left feedback" section.

If this wasn't bad enough already having to spend extra money on tools to open a macbook that didn't need to opened at the time, now I have to buy a new SSD for the macbook as it failed when trying to transfer 80GB of files from my sd card.

During the transferring of the files, half way through the macbook froze and rebooted twice, I thought that was strange as it's quite a very capable device. When I opened Chrome to visit youtube the page became really slow and then the macbook froze completely which caused it to reboot, after some time i turned off the macbook knowing it was stuck in reboot and powered it back on but this time the entire macOS had been wiped from the macbook, all that was left was the Windows 10 Particion which also malfunctioned. 

I tried everything to get this working again even re-installing Windows 10 which didn't work, then wiping the Windows particion which didn't work.

I eventually got Snow Leopard on a bootable USB device and I was able to access the Disk Utility which showed the SSD in a greyed out way which said it was unmounted and i just couldn't get it mounted no matter what i did.

I tried the erase, repair and re-particion it and nothing worked, in fact the final attempt completely wiped the SSD from being detected and after that happened the Macbook wouldn't turn on even when connect with the Magsafe cable.

I was very worried about that and thought maybe it was completely broken but i removed the SSD and tried again and the macbook powered on and detected my USB drives that i had connected.

I believe there was a fake SSD installed with a maximum capacity of 64GB as i had used about 20GB and then half way through of the 80GB file transfer it failed.

I don't know what can be done as I have accepted the delivery of the macbook and have been using it for about 3 weeks without issues so i doubt i can even ask for a partial refund as i had to buy a new SSD for this macbook.

The information displayed in the macbook said the SSD was a SanDisk SSD but it doesn't look like the official SanDisk SSDs, it had no label or logos on the front and does feel quite light. I wouldn't be surprised if the seller unknowingly bought a fake SSD thinking he could boost the value of a 2009 Macbook at a very cheap price, even second hand/used 1TB SSDs are between 70-100 Euros.

[jckl1957]

You say you bought this in November.

You only have 30 days from receipt to open a return case through Ebay so it seems you are out of time to do this.

You can try your payment provider on the grounds that you have purchased an item online which is not as desscribed and does not work properly.

[pillarboxred]

You sound like you know what you are doing with Macs. My old white cased MacBook , in order to continue taking updates, had to have a new non-Apple  Solid State Disk (SSD)  installed. In the end, I donated it as it couldn't take the new OS at the time. I think that was about eight years ago and I have had to purchase two MacBooks since. I would be worried that Apple aren't offering updates for 2009 MacBooks so Security could be an issue. I admire your ingenuity and knowledge but an old Mac is really only good for using offline as, say, a DJ machine or for storing and editing writings or photos. Computers, in the UK, are allowable business purchases so you don't really buy them with your own money.

[pillarboxred]

Can you click on the icon of the SSD and use Get Info? What os can you use with it? If it is working, and you are satisfied it is secure , it sounds you have a working Mac for not a lot of money. I wish I could do the same.

[colinscity]

Hello,

Yes i bought it in November but I have the option to return it until the 17th of January with the eBay Global Shipping programme, it was bought from the USA and i live in Ireland so that's why the return rate was so extended, the estimated delivery date was the first week of January but it arrived a few days before Christmas.

[jckl1957]

You have 30 days from receipt.  If you are in time, open a return case.

[papso22]

That's good news.

[colinscity]

Hello, 

I didn't click Get Info if i remember correctly but i can't do that anymore as the SSD is no longer recognized as even being connected and causes the macbook to stay dormant.

I'm actually a music producer so this was perfect for me using the windows only applications, Windows 10 worked really well on it. With open core legacy patcher you can use the latest macOS versions, i was using Monterey on the 2009 17" Macbook and it was so good. I want to keep it because i was able to get my external microphone to work and record vocals on it whereas it won't do that on my 2015 macbook and i've had to use and old 2016 iPhone SE to record the vocals for years.

I have purchased a non-apple SSD, it is 600GB which should be enough for now, i go through storage so fast, i have already used close to 650GB on my 2015 Macbook already. I live in Ireland and it will definitely be written as a business expense because my windows 10 laptop is borderline unusable but on the 2009 macbook it worked way better than my windows 10 laptop.

I'm actually having withdrawls from the 17 inch screen, i really like it a lot and it plays 1080p YouTube videos very well without overheating.

[nigel_paul_wright7557]

I would buy a new SSD but from a reputable dealer.

I had problems with a flash drive which worked great for months.

I accidentally attempted to over fill it and once full it locked out any further writes/deletes. It was just good for read only after that.

You might have thought a SSD would not allow over filling.

[pillarboxred]

I'm only half understanding the technicalities but I'm wondering about  whether the replacement SSD was fake.  A fake SSD wasn't made by the brand on the label. An unbranded one is simply generic and might not violate Apple's nor SanDisk's patents nor copyrights. You were swicked if it was claimed to be 1Tb and it was only 68GB but that might be a matter for the police or Trading Standards. 

As you probably know better than me, if a computer is full up, moving a lot of content to a plug-in hard disk is a workaround  to free space for the tasks in hand and they cost a lot less than they used to or at least hold a lot more data for the same price.

I like the idea of using an older machine, "sweating it" as they say, but I lack the knowledge to do that.

[nigel_paul_wright7557]

I bought a new 1Tb branded SSD for £45 online.

[colinscity]

WOW that's a really good deal, I have bought a 600GB SSD from a retailer from their online store so if there is any issue i can return it to a physical store, i'm just being impatient waiting for it because i want to use the 17" macbook again. Everything in Ireland is way more expensive than the UK especially when it comes to technology, when it comes to SSDs as soon as it hits 1TB they just overcharge completely for it, if this new SSD works i'm definitely going to consider the 2TB Crucial SSD for the macbook and get an enclosure for the 600GB and use it as an external SSD for older files.

[colinscity]

It was an international purchase so it would be impossible to get the police involved in either jurisdiction, I watched a couple of videos on YouTube of guys buying alleged real SSDs from AliExpress/China and they all seem to have the same issue as being labelled 1TB but having about 64GB storage. I have a fake SD Card that says it's 512GB but is about 32GB storage and it's write speed is atrocious, it starts off relatively ok and then drops to a negligible level.

I had used about 5-10GB at the absolute most out of the alledged 1TB before i began the mass transfer of files and it failed half way through the mass transfer which does make me believe it's true capacity was around 64GB.

[magpiecorner1]

Loving the idea of that last comment '........ your don't really buy them with your own money'.

Wish it were true.

[colinscity]

I have a positive update, I got an SSD today and got the macbook workin again, it took me 2 hours to get the macbook to turn on, I have no idea what was wrong with it because now that it's working again there is no issues with the power button or even the SATA flex cable as it's reading/writing to the new SSD without any issue.

I actually removed the RAM, Battery and SSD twice and it still didn't fix the issue, what actually fixed it was disconnecting both of the SATA Flex Cable connectors and reconnecting them and keeping the flex cable metal protector removed, it must have been damaging the transmission in the flex cable.

My original 600GB SSD order was cancelled today so I went to the Cex store and bought a cheap 120GB SSD which will do for now.

I'm just glad it's working again because I love watching YouTube videos on the 17 inch screen.

[colinscity]

This macbook is definitely going down as a business expense especially as i need a new Windows laptop to run windows only softwares and this can dual boot windows 10 smoothly, but yes even though it is a business expense it was still my own money that bought it haha.

[colinscity]

Update:

I bought a 2TB SSD from Amazon (Sold & Dispatched by Amazon so it's legitmate) then after 2 weeks the MacBook completely died and wouldn't turn on no matter how many SMC resets I did (I spent hours doing it for an entire day) That MacBook always shut down randomly when it was awoken from sleep mode or when booting so I believe it had an issue with it's capacitor which was an issue with these models that i later found out doing my searches for a solution. I was definitely scammed badly by that seller because after buying a replacement on eBay and swapping out the new battery that was in it to the replacement after a week it started to display "Service Recommended" even though it was a new battery with 2 charge cycles when i first got it, so is that battery fake too? if so then that seller should be ashamed of himself and eBay should ban him even though he said i was the reason for his decision to stop selling on eBay.