just what I noticed in the GT mini and also seen on the GT conversion kit
Fake Atmel MCU from some chineese distributor
the original BLF GT driver had the orighinal Atmel chips, but someone decided to safe 30 cents or so and sourced fakes
GT mini vs original GT XHP35
it also uses a voltage divider to detect battery voltage, so likely code changes needed to get it work so it cant be just a mistake ordering from wrong source
The website loads slow, and when it loads i can not select anything or add anything. (the buttons stay grayed out) here is their website as seen in the photo below. (just a blank page with no images or script) I tried two different computers and different browsers, ( chrome & firefox) nothing works.
My guess from working with china is not that they so much tried to save a little money but that the supplier sold them fakes as the real thing. China companies rip off other china companies just as readily as anyone else.
Tried two different computers, two different browsers, and two different ISP connections. its near impossible for them all to have the same exact issue. See my post above #1778.
That does look like some kind of local issue, could be your ISP’s local cache is the problem or who knows what. It is very strange you are the only one reporting the issue though.
And for the record, the lights will not be shipping for at least a weeks, most likely 2 weeks, so there is no major rush.
I would try the things I listed above and see what happens.
I highly doubt that they know they are fake, unlike some manufactures lumintop has never complained about the cost of components for their lights, they will simply pay what is needed to get what is needed to make it work. Except in cases where they simply can not source the components at all.
They appear to work fine though, so it is possible that they are “real” but made “off-the-record” which is another common Chinese trick when making products for overseas companies. I am not going to speculate as long as they do the job though.
Fake uses a voltage divider to detect battery voltage on Pin 7 from what I measured with DMM 0.7V and 2 resistors
I removed one of them and it works not sure why the voltage divider is there it increases parasitic drain
I did not see these things mentioned before and could effect 2 separate computers if they were used to access the lumintop site before they updated it.
As I said, I don’t think they did go with a “cheap chineese distributor”. That is not what they have shown to do in the past, even with some really expensive parts we worked with on another project.
It is very hard for them to see it is not original if they do not have one to compare and the one they get works as it should. I doubt they even see the components before the drivers are delivered. Most of the time the assembly house sources these things and then just delivers the final drivers.
Just ask anyone here to look at a chip by eye with nothing of reference and tell if it is a fake, same thing with lumintop. Heck I could not tell it is a fake without them side by side.
On top of all that, if it does what it is supposed to do, why would they even look? They would just assume that the parts delivered were the parts they ordered. I bet if I looked at the prototype drivers they sent me they would have the same MCU, I didn’t even notice because the MCU worked as intended so why assume that it was not the right one?
While it is not ideal, it works and has not had any issues. Lots of possible explanations, could even just be old stock from 10 years ago with different markings for all we know.
Lastly that is a GT-mini driver, not a GT70 driver. So isn’t this the wrong thread anyways?