The problem for me is (and this holds across AliExpress as well), if I search for something, I get presented 30 different versions of the same thing, almost all from an unknown brand out of China, all with near-perfect reviews. I don't know if they're all the same thing, just relabeled; some are cheap copies of one original good version (and which one was is the good original); or something else. And if I end up with a cheap knockoff, how to resolve the issue - endless phone calls with a call-center in China and multiple rounds of trans-Pacific shipping? No thanks.

None of that is a knock against Chinese goods. I bought a set of Chinese carbon bicycle wheels last year and they're great. But, I went straight to the source and didn't take chances with AliExpress or Amazon.

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Waterluvian 6 hours ago | parent | next [-]

I think some Chinese brands do try to distinguish themselves. Anker, for example, isn't a revolving door brand name. But, yeah, there's an enormous amount of noise on Amazon. Unfortunately that noise is everywhere. If I went right now to try to find another source on, "what brands don't suck?" I would probably have zero confidence that any of the sources I find aren't just SEO garbage.

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user43928 6 hours ago | parent | next [-]

Any known brand seems like a good sign to me compared to AWOLP, IPOW and whatever else Amazon surfaces.

They sound like random letters stringed together rather than any attempt to build an actual brand.

	▲	Waterluvian 6 hours ago \| parent \| next [-]
		I agree completely, user43928.
	▲	rramon 6 hours ago \| parent \| prev [-]
		Those are private label brands where the US or EU owners look for ready made low cost products within a category across different Chinese factories and slap their logo on top. Like SEO they game the product search engine and listings on Amazon to appear on the first search result pages, knowing that most impulse buyers don't have much patience. The factories usually ship directly to Amazon warehouses and it is also fulfilled by Amazon (FBA).

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alistairSH 5 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

They might not be a revolving door brand, but I've had 2 different models of charging brick from them get recalled for spontaneous combustion in the past 3 years. So, despite their branding efforts, their QC still isn't great from my perspective.

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Waterluvian 5 hours ago | parent [-]

I've had the same. But unlike a lot of today's companies, I was able to get an actual human emailing me back the same day with a few questions followed up by a "we're sending you a replacement. Throw away the broken one." That was refreshing. Maybe they haven't gotten the memo that you're supposed to hate your customers.

	▲	alistairSH 3 hours ago \| parent [-]
		Fair enough. I didn't need a human - Anker sent recall notices (via Amazon sales records, I guess) and all I had to do was send photos of serial numbers on the bricks and pick from a list of replacements of similar capacity. So, their customer support was better than average, no question.

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dfxm12 6 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

How did you come to learn the original source in the case of the wheels? Can this be applied to other products?

	▲	alistairSH 5 hours ago \| parent [-]
		I'm a long time cyclist, got the name from friends on an old web forum that somehow manages to stay alive. This particularly brand (BTLOS) will come up on searches similar to "good Chinese carbon wheel brands" with reviews on FB, Reddit, etc. And the cycling industry has had Chinese brands making inroads for a decade or more. So, Winspace, BTLOS, and a few others have come to be known entities (some do sell through AliExpress, some direct from their own site). And there's a niche group of product testers on YT or similar that review these things. I assume there are analogous items in other hobbies, but I can't speak to any specific examples/brands.