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cmoore49

macrumors regular
Original poster
Mar 22, 2008
113
13
Just ordered the fake element ronin from Aliexpress.
Will let you know what the quality is like when I receive it.
 
Dam tempted to order!

Must resist..

What's the verdict on the other fake eleme t cases? Quality as good??

Aliexpress legit?
 
That's the one I ordered.
Aliexpress is definitely legit. I have ordered other fake elements from them and the quality was actually pretty good.
It dos take a while to ship but worth it in my opinion
 
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Oooh nice. I'll have to check back to this thread because I like the Ronin at lot but not $200 a lot. : ) Please let us know and post some detailed pics, please!

~Paik
 
Price skyrocket

You guys should on the fence should have jumped over, it went from $68 usd last night to ~$450 this morning. Luckily I was compulsive enough to go for it last night.
 
You guys should on the fence should have jumped over, it went from $68 usd last night to ~$450 this morning. Luckily I was compulsive enough to go for it last night.

Who would pay $450 when the real deal is $199 :confused::confused:
 
Yeah...I'd be far more concerned that the listing are gone from people who were selling them earlier who said they'd be available on Jan 15th and now when it's the 15th, they magically disappear...

I can't justify spending $50+ on something no one has seen or provided feedback on from sellers you don't know from Adam...

I really hope these turn out to be decent replicas. I'm betting they won't have the nice metal volume and silent toggle buttons, but that'd be fine if the rest looks nice.

~Paik
 
Just received a message telling me the plant machinery was damaged and for me to cancel my order.
Now I see other vendors selling the Ronin for up to $90. I wonder if they figured they could get more and started making excuses.
 
I just received a letter from Aliexpress. It states that since my order did not ship in time, it was cancelled and I would receive a refund in 7-10 days.

Not impressed...
 
My order was also cancelled, and now it appears that all the Ronin listings have been removed, except for the $10,000 and $16,000 multi-lot listings. I wonder what's going on with that. Maybe manufacturing with tight tolerances on wood is not their thing.
 
Sorry to bring up this thread again. But I have bit different experience with the site! Sally Li said this to me:


SALLY LI
Fri Jan 25 22:35:20 PST 2013
Dear
Due to the Chinese New Year, the workers are beginning to have a holiday, the ronin case can not be produced in Chinese new year ago.
Bring your inconvenience, very sorry.
Company's decision:
Now free to send you a Original 1:1 sector 5 for iphone 5. And we assume all costs.
sector 5 colors: black, silver, gray. Please tell the color, I will ship as fast as to you.
Once the ronin case have stock , I will give you a ronin case for iphone 5.
When you receive the ronin case,you give me confirm the order is ok.
Thank you!

So as I understand this I will get 2 cases. The sector 5 that has already been shipped and when the ronin is available I will get that one as well! Anyways thought I would share my experience with Sally Li!
 
I just received a letter from Aliexpress. It states that since my order did not ship in time, it was cancelled and I would receive a refund in 7-10 days.

Not impressed...

You should tell them that's not how it works. Generally speaking, once they charge you, they have to provide the product. This is why major retailers don't charge your card until the product is about to ship. Call them on it, and tell them you'll settle for $200 to purchase the product at a different retailer.
 
I wish they would make a bootleg Ronin in different colors. I'd like to see it in a dark grey/black wood.
 
Aliexpress isn't a retailer. Think of them as more like eBay for cheap chinese goods.

The suppliers are so unreliable that Aliexpress provides a default escrow service. So unlike eBay/Paypal where your money goes directly to the seller, the cash flow goes like this:

You order the item from the seller. You pay Aliexpress. They hold onto the money. The seller ships the item to you. Once you have received the item, you have to release the funds to the seller in order for them to get paid.

The seller didn't come through, so you get your money refunded by Aliexpress. They certainly don't "owe" you the $200 retail value of the genuine item so you can purchase it elsewhere. That's self-entitled armchair fantasy lawyer crazy talk.

One reason they do escrow is instances like this where sellers are offering 'prospective' items that have yet to even be put into production. They see the Ronin case, realize it will be a hot counterfeit item, and then put the counterfeit up for sale before the real one has even been released for them to reverse engineer.

In this case, it was likely way more complicated for them than anticipated due to the wood. Natural materials can be pretty hard to get down to these tolerances at the price point they're aiming at.

Speaking of which, the fake Ronin's are out. And they are hideous.
 

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Bought a Fake Ronin

http://www.aliexpress.com/item/New-s...376159697.html

This one is fairly impressive. The corners aren't as wide as the one bought above^. There has been no noticeable difference in signal strength. The only problem it has it that the metal is darker than advertised and the wood isn't 100% flush with the metal at the corners. But no one else can really tell during your daily use unless you point it out. It only came with one suede back plate though, it should also come with a leather one. It took a while to line up the back plate so I had to take it on and off a few times and I didn't notice any residue. But I didn't leave it on for very long. Overall I'd say it was a good buy.

My review, please excuse camera, the focus range is limited. http://youtu.be/q2Hv6BqM5rs
 

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^ that's not a squeegee, lol. It's just a Element Case card that you can put on your keychain.
 
Sorry to bring up this thread again. But I have bit different experience with the site! Sally Li said this to me:


SALLY LI
Fri Jan 25 22:35:20 PST 2013
Dear
Due to the Chinese New Year, the workers are beginning to have a holiday, the ronin case can not be produced in Chinese new year ago.
Bring your inconvenience, very sorry.
Company's decision:
Now free to send you a Original 1:1 sector 5 for iphone 5. And we assume all costs.
sector 5 colors: black, silver, gray. Please tell the color, I will ship as fast as to you.
Once the ronin case have stock , I will give you a ronin case for iphone 5.
When you receive the ronin case,you give me confirm the order is ok.
Thank you!

So as I understand this I will get 2 cases. The sector 5 that has already been shipped and when the ronin is available I will get that one as well! Anyways thought I would share my experience with Sally Li!

Do you have a link to her store?
 
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