Q: (better) alternative for OPA627 ?

[Kjelt]

And there is this chinese company that makes reverse engineered STM32's.
An sich nothing wrong with that (if they had a valid license or agreement which they don't) but as long as no-one removes the Chinese markings and re-brands them as original ST people know what they are buying.
However in China the latter it seems is not a question of IF but WHEN.

https://olimex.wordpress.com/2015/11/09/chinese-clones-attack-stm32-microcontrollers/

[wraper]

And there is this chinese company that makes reverse engineered STM32's.
An sich nothing wrong with that (if they had a valid license or agreement which they don't) but as long as no-one removes the Chinese markings and re-brands them as original ST people know what they are buying.
However in China the latter it seems is not a question of IF but WHEN.

To be frank, they are compatible but not exactly clones. Also they have higher per clock performance than STM32 MCUs. They don't need to clone actually, buy the licence from ARM https://community.arm.com/community/arm-partner-directory/partner-gigadevice-semiconductor, throw in compatible peripherals and here you go. AFAIK they cannot be rebadged unnoticed either, because firmware programming will reveal it.

GigaDevice GD32 series of MCU got the trade mark in world wide such as US, Korea& Japan

https://olimex.wordpress.com/2015/11/09/chinese-clones-attack-stm32-microcontrollers/

https://olimex.wordpress.com/tag/gd32/

[ebclr]

China handle 80% of the electronic market, just because parts come from china, does not mean this parts are sold by criminals, I went in China several times and never have a dime stolen, when i went in London They hit my wallet on my 1st day there.

Have a lot of good people in China, also some bad guys as in any place it's not true that everything that comes from China is Fake and from criminal origin, this a label easy to make for group of people that can't handle to compete with those guys on a price performance basys.

China have a Hugh network of honesty business. Even in china you get what you paid form this means if you want 1st class pay 1st class, But can assure you 1st class in China is cheaper that 3rd class in Europe.

[wraper]

China handle 80% of the electronic market, just because parts come from china, does not mean this parts are sold by criminals

If you bay opamps at <20% of the cost they normally cost, you ARE buying counterfeits from the criminals. Same goes for mobile phone chargers. You have not so high chance getting genuine branded charger from china even if paying reasonable price and zero chance if buying very cheap. Very low chance to buy genuine memory cards either.

[Cerebus]

If you bay opamps at <20% of the cost they normally cost, you ARE buying counterfeits from the criminals.

Not necessarily. As a previous poster has pointed out there are many good reasons why parts can be discounted. It's not the price, it's not the country, it's the supplier that determines whether a part can be considered likely to be fake. Prices, as of writing, from some reliable suppliers for an identical part LT1013DDR:

Farnell, (Stock number 1623220), price each £2.129 (1-10 parts), £1.846 (11-100 parts)
Digikey, (Stock number 296-14615-1-ND) price each £1.36 (1- 2500 parts)
RS, (Stock number 660-9681), price each £0.366 (5 - 20 parts, no 1 off price available)

By your logic RS with a 5 off price 17.2% that of Farnell and 26.9% that of Digikey must be criminals selling counterfeits when I think we all know that's not true.

[wraper]

I will, on the other hand, be surprised if you got a fake card if you pay Amazon price on eBay.

Actually quiet easy to get a fake at genuine price, it won't be like 2 GB one which appears as 64 GB but it won't be from the brand written on it either, just some cheap slow crap. You can even get counterfeit Mitutoyo calipers from non Chinese sellers at the price of genuine.

[wraper]

If you bay opamps at <20% of the cost they normally cost, you ARE buying counterfeits from the criminals.

Not necessarily. As a previous poster has pointed out there are many good reasons why parts can be discounted. It's not the price, it's not the country, it's the supplier that determines whether a part can be considered likely to be fake. Prices, as of writing, from some reliable suppliers for an identical part LT1013DDR:

Farnell, (Stock number 1623220), price each £2.129 (1-10 parts), £1.846 (11-100 parts)
Digikey, (Stock number 296-14615-1-ND) price each £1.36 (1- 2500 parts)
RS, (Stock number 660-9681), price each £0.366 (5 - 20 parts, no 1 off price available)

By your logic RS with a 5 off price 17.2% that of Farnell and 26.9% that of Digikey must be criminals selling counterfeits when I think we all know that's not true.

By normal price I mean one of the cheapest prices from distributors. Not average among them because there is always some the price bloated multiple times. As of RS part number, they get rid of the last 5 pcs in their stock. Do you think all of those sellers in Chine get rid of the last pieces they have by selling the part for the same cheap price for years? Heck I even got fake TB6560AHs for not ridiculously cheap, which turned out being remarked TA8435H. They are both stepper motor drivers but not compatible at all. It would blow up with rest of the circuit if I hadn't measured the pins before soldering them in. Opamps get counterfeited because it is very easy to do (tons of opamps with the same pinout) and difficult to check.

[wraper]

So far I did not have the "luck" to get genuine priced fake things. I only shop at big sellers that has thousands of feedbacks, or shops with reputation among the community.

Who knows, you might as well just bought fake memory cards but just didn't notice it. It is not easy to notice, especially if this in not something that you extensively check for.

For extreme cases, Dave even got fake parts from Digikey, but similar cases are rare.

He got SMD resistors in the cut tape which were out of spec. More likely they were wrong parts in the bag with the right label, rather than counterfeits. If he got a full reel, that would be a different story.
Read the negative reviews http://www.amazon.com/Samsung-Memory-Micro-UHS-I-Class/product-reviews/B00MNT86NE/ref=cm_cr_arp_d_hist_5?ie=UTF8&filterByStar=five_star&showViewpoints=0&pageNumber=1
They bought at genuine price.

[wraper]

Bunnie investigates microSD memory cards:
http://www.bunniestudios.com/blog/?p=918

[Cerebus]

As of RS part number, they get rid of the last 5 pcs in their stock.

No they don't. I bought some the other day - which is how I know they have a good price at the moment - and it said "5 pieces in stock" both before and after my purchase. Just a quirk of their systems.

I don't know about you but I trust people, not prices. The point I'm making, which you seem to be determined to ignore, is that it is the individual supplier that is the crux of honesty not the whole country or people of a particular ethnic group. Please remember that it was me who issued this warning earlier in the thread:

Unless it's from a known and trusted supplier it would be wise for one to assume that from ebay, aliexpress etcetera that any op-amp that's in any way 'premium' is a fake. The stepping point from probably good to probably fake is somewhere just above LM358. Incredibly I've got some TL072s that are fakes, with obvious 'blacktoping', parts that I really didn't think it was worth anyone's time to fake.

Note the qualification, "Known and trusted supplier", and the suspect group "ebay, aliexpress etcetera".

And I don't like the crypto-racism that's creeping in here. You can't just pick on the poor old Chinese and blame them for the behaviour of some of their tribe. I had a Latvian family living in the downstairs maisonette here for six months and after they left the police came around looking for them in connection with the fraudulent purchase and sale of some cars. Should I base my judgement of all Latvians on them? Of course not.

[wraper]

And I don't like the crypto-racism that's creeping in here. You can't just pick on the poor old Chinese and blame them for the behaviour of some of their tribe. I had a Latvian family living in the downstairs maisonette here for six months and after they left the police came around looking for them in connection with the fraudulent purchase and sale of some cars. Should I base my judgement of all Latvians on them? Of course not.

Franly usually we export not the best people.

[wraper]

As of RS part number, they get rid of the last 5 pcs in their stock.

No they don't. I bought some the other day - which is how I know they have a good price at the moment - and it said "5 pieces in stock" both before and after my purchase. Just a quirk of their systems.

Either way something is
off about that price, they sell reel of 2500 for more than that.
http://uk.rs-online.com/web/p/operational-amplifiers/9233987/

[Cerebus]

As of RS part number, they get rid of the last 5 pcs in their stock.

No they don't. I bought some the other day - which is how I know they have a good price at the moment - and it said "5 pieces in stock" both before and after my purchase. Just a quirk of their systems.

Either way something is
off about that price, they sell reel of 2500 for more than that.
http://uk.rs-online.com/web/p/operational-amplifiers/9233987/

You can often find weird counter-intuitive pricing with RS. Identical parts with identical quantity and reeling requirements with different stock numbers and prices; industrial temp range parts cheaper then commercial temp range etc. etc. I've given up trying to figure it out and just take advantage of it when it crops up. Hence I ended up with LT1013Ds in the industrial temp range when commercial would have done me quite nicely but would have cost more.

[Kleinstein]

With SMT chips one could also get old chips if they are cheap. Old chips might have to much humidity and thus could turn into popcorn in some production lines.

After drying they can be OK for hobby use and hand soldering.

I would consider this a major reason to find discounted chips, that are not fakes - they are just overstock and limited shelf life.