3 ms·

The real story here is that people are selling modded Pis as higher-memory versions. And this check actually caught them + is circumventable. The restriction is

The real story here is that people are selling modded Pis as higher-memory versions. And this check actually caught them + is circumventable. The restriction is somewhat annoying to a small subset of enthusiasts but seems to catch genuine fraud.

locknitpicker 13d ago
> The restriction is somewhat annoying to a small subset of enthusiasts but seems to catch genuine fraud. What fraud are you speaking of?
- petu 13d ago
  Selling modded board as official 8GB SKU with reliability/warranty expectations.
- alibarber 13d ago
  The memory that they are placing in it has to be cheap enough to be worth their while. Which in this climate is highly probably faulty memory, or memory that runs at a different speed/spec to the one advertised to come with the RPi. That is fraud.
  - horsawlarway 13d ago
    Yeah, I'm split on this because 1: I think people should be able to replace chips on an RPi as they desire, so I don't love that they're actively preventing this 2: As a buyer, I absolutely want to know if I'm buying an RPi that has had chips replaced 3: A shady seller changing the SKU to mimic a better board after changing chips is just flat out fraud. --- It's the classic "Mattress tag" case - it should be illegal to remove as a seller, and fine as the final customer. But that's really hard to functionally enforce.
    - alibarber 13d ago
      Absolutely agree. It's unfortunate, but given that there are so many ways you could end up with a poor quality knock-off (i.e. Amazon, sorry, 'third party marketplaces') it's probably something that skews the tradeoff quite significantly. I guess there are more individuals who will be upset when they can't run something on their equipment as it was advertised to them than will be upset that they can't re-solder the RAM. There are probably even fewer individuals who'll do due diligence in their own supply chain. Whilst those that suffer are technically suffering from some kind of crime / civil wrong - the chance of them getting a remedy for this is going to be non-existent.
    - deleted 13d ago
      [deleted]
  - locknitpicker 13d ago
    > The memory that they are placing in it has to be cheap enough to be worth their while. You're framing this as if no reputable vendor is willing or able to source cheaper parts. If they can get a better deal in more RAM, why can't they upgrade the boards? As a consumer, doesn't that benefit you as well? > Which in this climate is highly probably faulty memory, (...) That's specious reasoning and blatant fear-mongering. Consumer protection laws require vendors to support their products. If RAM is faulty, whether it was hand soldered by Eben Upton himself or hacked from a Soviet fridge, vendors are compelled to support customers. This means vendors ultimately have an interest in minimizing faulty equipment, because it hurts their bottom line. So why can't people have the right to upgrade their hardware? I thought we already went through this battle in the 1980s.
    - undersuit 13d ago
      A reputable vendor resells a product they've modified as unmodified?
      - locknitpicker 13d ago
        > A reputable vendor resells a product they've modified as unmodified? I wouldn't mind buying a 16GB board even though the official models at most ship with 8gb. I'd even wouldn't mind buying the kit and taking a stab at resoldering it myself. I mean, think about it. what is the whole point of a raspberry pi? Even if you might not, why would your opinion prevent others from doing what they want with their hardware?
        undersuit 13d ago
        So buy from a vendor that offers the 16GB modification and runs their own hardware support. You can still solder your own 16GB and you can do your own support. Maybe if the Rasp Pi was an unassembled kit "the whole point" would make sense. You can do what ever you want with your hardware. Have fun. Other people don't have to support you.
    - alibarber 13d ago
  - varispeed 13d ago
    This is classic gaslighting technique corporations use to extract more profit. Modifications or upgrades made by small business = fraud, OEM selling different SKUs = legitimate business. Don't fall for it.
    - Peanuts99 13d ago
      If a small business is modifying the product and not telling the eventual customer they've done so how is that not fraud? I don't want to buy a Raspberry Pi with a memory chip from who knows who which might have not passed QA modified by people who may or may not do a decent job at soldering it to the board.
- jamesh98 13d ago
  [dead]
- Grombobulous 13d ago
  Whether it’s fraud depends heavily on how it’s sold. If it’s represented as a new product or offered with manufacturer’s warranty, that would cross into fraud.
  - locknitpicker 13d ago
    > Whether it’s fraud depends heavily on how it’s sold. Only as far as new vs refurbished goes. But that's not the problem being addressed, is it? I mean, why can't I upgrade it myself?
- Brian_K_White 13d ago
  Selling a unit as something that it's not. A unit that rpi themselves sold with 8g is different than a unit that someone else modified. The reworked unit is not sold with the disclosure that it has been hacked and no longer covered by any warranty, and the memory installed is of totally unknown provenance and quality, timing specs, failed qa, etc. Even the simple process of heating everything up to desolder & resolder temps is not free, it degrades everything, the pcb itself, the epoxy holding the traces and pads down, and all the components, and means higher chance of some failure happening sooner than it would have. But it's sold as a real rpi unit for real rpi price or a little less to beat real ones. That is the fraud they speak of. You should be free to do this to your unit if you like of course, and rpi has infinite other possible ways they could have chosen to address the problem and didn't have to do it this way. I'm only saying there is actually a problem.
zamadatix 13d ago
Is there a way to circumvent it other than use ancient firmware?
Wowfunhappy 13d ago
If it's circumventable, how does it prevent fraud? Seems like it would likely just hurt the enthusiasts. You can already check whether the RAM has been swapped via https://geekworm.com/blogs/news/prevent-ram-swapped-raspberry-pi-5-how-to-verify-factory-ram-size https://geekworm.com/blogs/news/prevent-ram-swapped-raspberr....
varispeed 13d ago
> but seems to catch genuine fraud. In what way this is fraudulent if device works as described? No different than upgrading a PC and then selling it. You don't call it fraud.
- skybrian 13d ago
  The fraud is not disclosing what you did. It's passing off a third-party mod as an original part.
  - varispeed 13d ago
    Evidence that it is happening or is it RasberryPi gaslighting? If someone sells RPi with 16GB and the RAM is working fine, then why would that be fraud? If someone buys e.g. Dell PC, then adds 16GB of ram and sells it at 32GB without mentioning they put extra 16GB, is it a fraud? That's ridiculous.

locknitpicker 13d ago

> The restriction is somewhat annoying to a small subset of enthusiasts but seems to catch genuine fraud. What fraud are you speaking of?

petu 13d ago
Selling modded board as official 8GB SKU with reliability/warranty expectations.
alibarber 13d ago
The memory that they are placing in it has to be cheap enough to be worth their while. Which in this climate is highly probably faulty memory, or memory that runs at a different speed/spec to the one advertised to come with the RPi. That is fraud.
- horsawlarway 13d ago
  Yeah, I'm split on this because 1: I think people should be able to replace chips on an RPi as they desire, so I don't love that they're actively preventing this 2: As a buyer, I absolutely want to know if I'm buying an RPi that has had chips replaced 3: A shady seller changing the SKU to mimic a better board after changing chips is just flat out fraud. --- It's the classic "Mattress tag" case - it should be illegal to remove as a seller, and fine as the final customer. But that's really hard to functionally enforce.
  - alibarber 13d ago
    Absolutely agree. It's unfortunate, but given that there are so many ways you could end up with a poor quality knock-off (i.e. Amazon, sorry, 'third party marketplaces') it's probably something that skews the tradeoff quite significantly. I guess there are more individuals who will be upset when they can't run something on their equipment as it was advertised to them than will be upset that they can't re-solder the RAM. There are probably even fewer individuals who'll do due diligence in their own supply chain. Whilst those that suffer are technically suffering from some kind of crime / civil wrong - the chance of them getting a remedy for this is going to be non-existent.
  - deleted 13d ago
    [deleted]
- locknitpicker 13d ago
  > The memory that they are placing in it has to be cheap enough to be worth their while. You're framing this as if no reputable vendor is willing or able to source cheaper parts. If they can get a better deal in more RAM, why can't they upgrade the boards? As a consumer, doesn't that benefit you as well? > Which in this climate is highly probably faulty memory, (...) That's specious reasoning and blatant fear-mongering. Consumer protection laws require vendors to support their products. If RAM is faulty, whether it was hand soldered by Eben Upton himself or hacked from a Soviet fridge, vendors are compelled to support customers. This means vendors ultimately have an interest in minimizing faulty equipment, because it hurts their bottom line. So why can't people have the right to upgrade their hardware? I thought we already went through this battle in the 1980s.
  - undersuit 13d ago
    A reputable vendor resells a product they've modified as unmodified?
    - locknitpicker 13d ago
      > A reputable vendor resells a product they've modified as unmodified? I wouldn't mind buying a 16GB board even though the official models at most ship with 8gb. I'd even wouldn't mind buying the kit and taking a stab at resoldering it myself. I mean, think about it. what is the whole point of a raspberry pi? Even if you might not, why would your opinion prevent others from doing what they want with their hardware?
      - undersuit 13d ago
        So buy from a vendor that offers the 16GB modification and runs their own hardware support. You can still solder your own 16GB and you can do your own support. Maybe if the Rasp Pi was an unassembled kit "the whole point" would make sense. You can do what ever you want with your hardware. Have fun. Other people don't have to support you.
  - alibarber 13d ago
- varispeed 13d ago
  This is classic gaslighting technique corporations use to extract more profit. Modifications or upgrades made by small business = fraud, OEM selling different SKUs = legitimate business. Don't fall for it.
  - Peanuts99 13d ago
    If a small business is modifying the product and not telling the eventual customer they've done so how is that not fraud? I don't want to buy a Raspberry Pi with a memory chip from who knows who which might have not passed QA modified by people who may or may not do a decent job at soldering it to the board.
jamesh98 13d ago
[dead]
Grombobulous 13d ago
Whether it’s fraud depends heavily on how it’s sold. If it’s represented as a new product or offered with manufacturer’s warranty, that would cross into fraud.
- locknitpicker 13d ago
  > Whether it’s fraud depends heavily on how it’s sold. Only as far as new vs refurbished goes. But that's not the problem being addressed, is it? I mean, why can't I upgrade it myself?
Brian_K_White 13d ago
Selling a unit as something that it's not. A unit that rpi themselves sold with 8g is different than a unit that someone else modified. The reworked unit is not sold with the disclosure that it has been hacked and no longer covered by any warranty, and the memory installed is of totally unknown provenance and quality, timing specs, failed qa, etc. Even the simple process of heating everything up to desolder & resolder temps is not free, it degrades everything, the pcb itself, the epoxy holding the traces and pads down, and all the components, and means higher chance of some failure happening sooner than it would have. But it's sold as a real rpi unit for real rpi price or a little less to beat real ones. That is the fraud they speak of. You should be free to do this to your unit if you like of course, and rpi has infinite other possible ways they could have chosen to address the problem and didn't have to do it this way. I'm only saying there is actually a problem.

zamadatix 13d ago

Is there a way to circumvent it other than use ancient firmware?

Wowfunhappy 13d ago

If it's circumventable, how does it prevent fraud? Seems like it would likely just hurt the enthusiasts. You can already check whether the RAM has been swapped via https://geekworm.com/blogs/news/prevent-ram-swapped-raspberry-pi-5-how-to-verify-factory-ram-size https://geekworm.com/blogs/news/prevent-ram-swapped-raspberr....

varispeed 13d ago

> but seems to catch genuine fraud. In what way this is fraudulent if device works as described? No different than upgrading a PC and then selling it. You don't call it fraud.

skybrian 13d ago
The fraud is not disclosing what you did. It's passing off a third-party mod as an original part.
- varispeed 13d ago
  Evidence that it is happening or is it RasberryPi gaslighting? If someone sells RPi with 16GB and the RAM is working fine, then why would that be fraud? If someone buys e.g. Dell PC, then adds 16GB of ram and sells it at 32GB without mentioning they put extra 16GB, is it a fraud? That's ridiculous.