- The Fake-Cree LED Awareness Thread - The new "low" in Budget lights.

The Wave

Latticebright XP-E clone:

Unfortunately, I don’t have a known-good XP-E on hand to post the comparison shots.

The leatherman was a gift and it was engraved with my name. I just heard that I still may be able to send it in for repair under a 25 year warrenty. I’ll look into it

Their warranty is suppose to be really good. :bigsmile: Though I would only expect one free shot with sometime like a broken knife point that is usually from improper use.

I ordered 20 CREE XML RGBW “Warm” White LEDS from TopLightLED.com for $5 a piece. They were titled warm but they have the same specks as the neutral white. They came from China and arrived in 4 Days!!! I hope they are real? They look legit, but if someone knows how to spot the fake, please let me know.

its difficult to say with those RGBW emitters you have there, until we can see the LB fakes up close to compare then to a genuine Cree version.

BIG MISTAKE!!!
It’s TopLEDLight.com not TopLightLED
OOps



What about these? They are off a SRK 10 emitter light.

The bubbly base as well as the circle hole rather than square hole suggest that they are genuine. Now, I don’t really know what I’m talking about. This is just repeating what I read earlier in this thread.

Do the bond-wires pads look round or square? for some reason the die size looks smaller than a genuine Cree XM-L, its difficult to say from those photos even though the pad coating looks stippled like a real Cree XM-L. You may need to try to compare them to any higher quality light you have with a genuine Cree XM-L.

I would need a better picture than that to say for sure.

I’ll try with my camera. Only had the wife’s camera that day.

I just made a new picture of a XM-L colour (neutral white die) for comparison (this one is bought from IOS a year ago, so it sure is real), and your XML colour leds looks extremely like the real deal except for the bits sticking to the side on the silver background that are not present in my led. Is this just a Cree variation or is that a indication of fake? At least it looks like your leds looks more like Cree than like Latticebright:

Cree:

The orientation of the bond wires looks different in the Latticebright and the substrate is visibly whiter:

Yes… It is like mine.

Which is this one? You have any link?

I found some more counterfeit Cree emitters in my lights:

First, everyone’s favorite “Super Light”:
Fake XP-E emitter: Note the off-center die surface. The die is square, the offset is just due to the angle. Sorry about the dust…

I was one of the few to receive the $4 “XM-L” dive light when one of the retailers accidentally (?) listed the item at the wrong price earlier this spring. The light was a poor performer with very CW emitters, but the low output was attributed to the low drive current. One of these lights suffered a catastrophic leakage failure ( :zipper_mouth_face: ) and was set aside for spare parts. I checked the emitters last night, and found that they were counterfeit XM-Ls.

Pictured here, the left hand emitter is the counterfeit. Notice the smaller die size, sharp, crisp edges, well defined lines, and lighter green smooth PCB:

Here is a closeup of each emitter; fake is on top, genuine Cree on the bottom. Here you can see the bond wires and junctions more clearly:

Goog comparison photos Keltex. it seems the biggest noticible differences are the smaller die, smoother dome/coating, and coloration of the fakes from the real Cree XM-L.

Nice side-by-side shot fo the XP-E and fake. Will add that one to the OP list. Thanks for the photos.

Bummer. Just checked my Super Light and yep, it’s fake.

Lousy photo but you can clearly see the square dot in the top left hand corner, which should be round.
The galling part is the huge ‘CREE’ engraving on the side of the light. |(

[quote=Lancman]

Cree engraving on the side does not count at all. :).