Fake 8GB USB drive

I recently got ripped off on ebay , someone said the usb drive was 8GB and it was only 256 MB, i really needed the drive so i worked a deal with him for 5$ (shipping included plus it matches my PC) the drive only gives me the option to format in fat32, and only gives me option to format it 8GB, how do i format it to it's real size?

I am useing windows xp pro, but also have gentoo via vmware if there is someway to format it that way instead, i am horrible with linux though i just installed it recently to learn how to use it. Also how did they do that in the first place? Firmware upgrade on the USB flash drive? thanks for any help

 

I've seen this issue in our Forums before. I highly doubt it was an 8 GB stick and most likely a 256 MB to begin with. What make and brand is it? Have you checked their site?

Can you post a link to the ebay item number?

 

Just out of curiosity, how much were they asking for the 8gb drive? If the price was way too low, that should have been a sign that something was amiss....

 

well, i ended up paying 5$ for it, paid 15 and then he refunded me after i called him out on it being a fake. Here is the 256MB = 8GB sellers link (allthough he did apologize and admit he bought a bunch cheap from china who ripped him off and he is in the US, so this is a case of cheap chinese rip offs, i have no problem with seller we worked it out, 5$ is fair for the 256 MB flash drive imo shipping included)

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&rd=1&item=120267737269&ssPageName=STRK:MEWA:IT&ih=002

his feedback speaks for itself

 

When formatting a drive using Windows by right clicking and selecting format, it only gives you the option to format the whole drive. If it only gives you an 8Gb option, then it's an 8Gb drive.

My question is, how do you know it's not an 8Gb drive?

 

I use eBay extensively and there are certain things to check before you buy.
The most important:
Feedback Rating
I've found that it is fair indicator of a seller's reliabilty.
As a rule I never buy from a seller with less than a 99% feedback rating, unless on reading the feedbacks themselves, I see that the buyer was not being reasonable.
If you look at his feedbacks, you will see this seller has recieved 71 positive, 1neutral and 1 negative (I assume that last is yours) feedbacks in the past year. All his sales have been for this same item. The one neutral was left by another buyer who also had a problem with his thumb drive, but he states that the seller (like he did for you) apologized and refunded his money.
(A neutral feedback doesn't affect a seller's overall feedback percentage.)

It is unfortunate that you have had this experience, but I think you shouldn't think of this as a "fake" or "rip off".
If you have a problem with an eBay purchase, you should get in touch with the seller before you leave feedback.
Due to this one incident (that you admit wasn't the seller's fault) you have brought his feedback rating down from 100% to 97.1% and will no doubt cost him a lot of business.