Just like Dahua, Andy would also not admit he was not a legitimate distributor.
I'm confused because you have changed the conversation from counterfeit products to gray market products. Those are two completely different things...
Dahua usually makes two versions of the same hardware: those with the Dahua logo on them, and those without the Dahua logo on them.
They only consider the version of the hardware
with their logo on them to be "Dahua" products. AFAIK, the unbranded versions are meant to be resold to companies who put their individual brands on them and are responsible for offering end-user support.
So no, Andy isn't a Dahua distributor, as he's not reselling "Dahua branded" products. The ads I've seen on Andy's Ali store are very specific that the products he sells do not have the Dahua logo on them. This is precisely why he can sell the products for a lot less money than the "Dahua" version of the same product.
Gray market: probably
Counterfeit: no
Andy's Ali store has a track record that speaks for itself. It's been around for three years and has an average 5 star rating from 1,011 reviews (that have literally come from all across the world). Ali stores that come online to deal shitty counterfeit products last a few months, if that.
If you want to pay extra money to get the same NVR hardware from an official Dahua dealer, that's fine. When you run into problems that require firmware fixes (like not being able to setup all of IVS from the NVR <as happf is experiencing>, and frames dropping when events record), you're going to be in the same boat as everyone who bought the less-expensive "no logo" version of the NVR hardware... stuck waiting for Dahua to acknowledge the problem and hopefully fix it.