F@X computer sales and service centre technician U Kyaw Min Oo attempts to fix a fake MP4 player.

BEWARE imitations, video and music lovers are being warned – make sure the MP4 you buy is the real thing, or risk getting a dud.

Poor-quality merchandise masquerading under fake brand names are lying in wait for the unwary, say electronics shop owners and technicians from service centres in Yangon.

“Consumers who prefer famous brands should watch out to avoid being cheated, or they could end up spending more on service charges,” said the owner of one downtown Yangon store.

All the MP4 players available in the market here are made in China, but imitations of famous Japanese brands are also plentiful, he said.

“Genuine products are labelled ‘Made in China’, whereas fakes have no labels,” U Nay Min Tun, owner of Myanmar A-Hla camera shop.

Brand-name products are usually more reliable because they value their reputation among consumers, he said.

“Buyers should not choose imitations with false brands because they can be damaged while being recharged,” said Mg Kan Myint, a teenager who bought an imitation whose memory was destroyed while recharging.

“Two hours is enough time to recharge an MP4. Overcharging can burn out the adaptors or the memory if the product is poor-quality,” said U Nay Myo Win, owner of A-Hla Gabar Camera Shop.

“Most MP4 players brought to our service centre have been ruined because of over-charging. Customers who have bought bad products should take care while recharging the batteries,” said U Kyaw Min Oo, a service technician of F@X computer sales and service centre that services MP4s. “It’s better to recharge before the batteries are exhausted so as to reduce recharging time,” he said. Good-quality MP4s cut off the current automatically when they are fully charged.

Some MP4 players cannot be used in connection with the front removable disk sockets in a computer system box, and could be damaged during installation and recha-rging, he said. The rear disk sockets that are directly joined with the mother box would be better for recharging, but they may be useless for encode computer files to fake MP4s.

Some players are damaged by salt from ordinary batteries that are not meant to be recharged, and some by moisture, he said.

And some fake equipment is also no use for encoding audio and video files from computers. Many MP4 players in the market cannot encode the video files directly from the computer, and the software of files needs to be changed to the system software used in MP4, he said.

“If you want to encode video files to a fake MP4, you will have to spend more on service centre charges,” he said.

The more poor products come on to the market, the more MP4 service centres proliferate in downtown Yangon. Some sellers provide false users’ guides describing functions the equipment does not perform. MP4s cost between K25,000 and K30,000.