jkerouac

Transaction reviews belong in the review section for each dealer rather than in the brand-specific forums. If a person wants to do a model-specific review, those should go in the brand-specific forums. Perhaps posters who use only one type of forum to post both model-specific and dealer-specific reviews should be encouraged to cross post so the relevant information appears in the appropriate location.

If a watch develops a problem after the original transaction review (which is often posted within a few days of the watch's delivery) and these cannot be resolved to the buyer's satisfaction, then this should be posted in the dealer review section as well.

I personally think dealer reviews that describe a problem and how it was or was not resolved are the most valuable of all reviews. They outweigh the transaction was smooth, fast, and I'm delighted with my watch-type reviews by ten to one.

I personally don't think we need a separate forum for negative reviews, in fact I think this would detract from the overall value of the review sections.

As for the showcase forum, Scoobs highlighted one problem with this approach, which is that dealers were in effect "paying" for reviews by providing freebies in exchange for reviews. Even a well-known reviewer places an order for a brand-new model, I wouldn't be surprised if dealers sometimes cherry pick to send them the best from a batch in order to spur additional orders from people waiting for those first reviews.

A better solution might be for a "mystery shopper," such as a new member, to order a new model and loan it to one of the better reviewers for examination. In this way there would be little or no opportunity for the dealer to cherry pick. Second, follow-up reviews of the same model shipped perhaps six to nine months after the original release could indicate whether originally quality standards are being maintained or not.

Granted, quality control is never going to be as consistent in the rep world as in the gen world. An inferior shipment of parts comes in one day? Use them anyway until the next shipment comes in. Somebody new on the assembly line makes an on-the-job training mistake? Ship it anyway. But our dealers should be on our side in this equation, not on the inconsistent factory's side. That's presumably why they enjoy favored status on this and other boards.

Just don't anyone complain about The Zigmeister's prices after seeing this, it's just shows how lucky we are to have him.

Ken

So who has complained? Besides, I (and I am sure many others) have more confidence in The Zigmeister's service than just about anyone elses.

Heck, my father just had his Rolex serviced by an AD. I tried to dissuade him, but it was already too late.

Damn, I tried this on an old college girl friend. Based on the picture, she hasn't changed a bit!

I have tremendous confidence in my ability to ..... change a strap or resize a band.... at least until I realize that I'm in danger of stripping a screw.

As for taking a watch apart, I've only done that with watches that were essentially broken or worthless to begin with. I nver ahve been able to put one back together again.

For anything else, I don't have the training, tools, eyesight, steady hands, or patience to do the work that someone else can do relatively quickly and well for a relatively reasonable sum.

I have tremendous admiration for those on the board who have these skills, especially if they are essentially self taught. I salute you all.

The wobbly crown is definitely a weird feeling, and even for some time now it still makes me nervous.

Has anyone heard of one of these crowns breaking or falling off -- and if so, was it repairable?

By the way, the one problem I did have with my GST was having a pusher fall off. I finally had to glue it on. Other people reported the same problem. If your GST is relatively new, check the pushers to ensure that they are secure and won't fall off somewhere. I was fortunate to find mine each time it happened, but others were not as fortunate.

BCE is tops in my book for "feel" and looks.

Ingy and UPO have the looks of the gens, but the casebacks are just a bit shy of high-end gen finishing, in my opinion. They both have slightly rough edges that I'd be suprised if the gens had. If I wear the UPO for 4-5 straight days, the case back even irritates my wrist a bit. But then, I haven't worn the gens of either of these watches, so it is possible that the gens fall a bit short in this area as well.

For looks, feel, and comfort, none of my watches top the BCE.

Very funny, but I also felt for the kid who kept sliding and falling down. If he bashed his head against a counter or blew out a knee or ligament the damage could be permanent. As someone who took a "wrong turn" off a retaining wall and ruptured his Achilles tendon last year, I know a bit too much about such accidents.

Remind me not to submit to any of Nanuq's stress tests myself.

By the way, despite the damage to my foot, knee, and elbow, my Chopard GT XL didn't get a single scratch.

@ Jk i agree with almost all of what you say above but if you change the date at the wrong time it will fuck up

And I agree with you.... but I set my 7750s to 4:22 (hour and minute hands on top of each other) when I reset the day and date. The principal is the same, moving the hour and minute hands as far away as possible from the gears that change the day and date around the 12:00-1:00 hour.

I actually made this statement in my first draft, but I deleted it because I thought it was silly for me to nitpick about where to park the hour/minute hands. But in principal we are completely in agreement.

Cheers.

I will wind quite a bit, say up to 50 or so turns, but with moderate or gentle force -- not as fast or hard as you can.

I seldom leave my chronos parked. In my mind it's kind of like buying a great car but almost never using it. My opinion is that it's probably better to either run them all the time, or use them almost never, as opposed to clicking them on and off a lot.

Forum wisdom is that a well serviced Asian 7750 will last as long as any movement out there. However, consensus is also that some 7750s are delivered with clean, well-lubricated movements, others arrive either not particularly clean and/or not particularly well lubricated. Non-technical users (such as me) have no way of knowing the true condition of our movements.

My response is that if I truly want a new 7750 to last for a long, long time, then I invest in a preemptive service. Since a thorough service is close to the cost of a new reasonable quality rep, if I don't absolutely love the rep, I figure that if and when it does die I will spend the money I might have spent on service on a new rep instead. In my opinion that is the most important decision an Asian 7750 owner can make, more important than how you wind the watch, where you set the hands when you change the day/date, etc.

Awesome pics of a beautiful watch...as usual. Thanks for sharing.

I have mostly bypassed this thread until now, but decided to read it after seeing the child slavery article in my local paper. I apologize for not reading every word in every post, but I think I get the general drift.

I also watched the recent TV documentaries on the replica trade, as did my wife. She was particularly concerned by the strong insinuations that the rep trade could be funnelling money to terrorist organizations.

Now I don't take these unsubstantiated allusions to terrorist links very seriously, but taken together with child labor and slavery, apparent disregard for quality control in products from toothpaste to kids toys, as well as mind-boggling pollution, and the Chinese manufacturing sector has some very serious issues that need to be dealt with.

And contrary to some comments that were made here, I don't think American businesses such as Walmart or clothing companies who out-source to China have a very good record of monitoring what goes on in their factories. (The same goes for companies in other countries as well).

But we can influence policy makers in government and in private business to push for change, and to empower the Chinese people themselves to push for change. Right now the Chinese seem to see themselves as punching bags, and they desperately want to be taken seriously as a legitimate world leader. But they will never be equal to the western powers, or even India, until they address their problems and become a more open and responsible society.

Will I stop buying Chinese? No. Quite frankly I think it would be impossible. But do the Chinese problems influence my purchasing decisions to some extent? Absolutely.

Best post of the day....week.....month.

Congratulations to you and your wife.

A few weeks ago in San Francisco I passed by a small but upscale jeweler just off Union Square who had both a Hublot and a DeWitt Academia in the window. The HBB doesn't do much for me, but I was rather curious about the DeWitt, so I went in and tried it on. Nice enough watch, but $30K for the gen??? Rep or gen, it isn't my type of watch.

A few doors down was a larger shop that carries Panerai and quite a few other high-end brands, including Cartier and Rolex. As usual the Panerai section was almost empty; all they had was a single Radomir. And as usual I was drawn to the JLCs.

Crap, it's Friday afternoon and I just found this thread. If it isn't too late, I'd definitely try to get there.

Former journalist, more recently technical writer.

(Pardon my spelling, my editor has given up on me)

This thread helps restore the forum equilibrium after that Top Intellectuals thread.

To keep the see saw going, I soon expect a thread on favorite 16th century poets -- or perhaps combine this and the previous thread into Top Pointy-Headed Intellectuals with Jiggly Jugs.

Rocco Siffredi wears a Panerai. Not too sure of the model number or if it's a rep, but, he wears one...

Might it be an 069??

I wear pretty much any of my reps to work. I used to not wear my SS Breitling Evo on the theory that it was a bit too fancy, but even that barrier has dropped. As you might surmise, I'm not into bling or mondo watches

Today my choice happens to be the UPO with black bezel/orange numerals.

I've met him, and he is what might be called a cold duck. Very disagreeable person, one on one. Not to mention, his professionalism has been called into question.

I guess he's going for the Rigoberta Menchu category.

As I said, I found Gladwell entertaining and thought-provoking. But I was surprised that he made this list. I've browsed his books and he seems a bit light-weight compared to the others on the list.

Excuse me while I look up Rigoberta.

That strap is outrageously nice with that watch. Great photographs. Thanks very much for sharing.

... So where did you find that beautiful strap?

I should have mentioned, Malcolm Gladwell, the New Yorker and non-fiction book author on this list, spoke at a conference I attended two weeks ago. Engaging and entertaining fellow. Al Gore (another member of the list) also spoke at the conference, but I was on a plane home by the time he spoke.

Is there a built-in Windows utility that does this?

It's called Encrypting File System. Using Encrypting File System

By the way, no encryption system is absolutely uncrackable, but they do make it much, much, much harder to get at the data -- hardly worth the effort unless the data is really, really worth the effort and the person trying to get at it is extremely knowledgeable.

An interesting list, although I also don't recognize most of the names -- and I'm fairly well read. Even after reading some of the capsule bios, I don't think I'd be able to cast an intelligent vote.

What I find more interesting is that we even have a thread on RWG regarding top intellectuals, as opposed to who is going to win the world cup or favorite tv shows.

But at least we can all benefit from having something new to talk about at the local pub when the home team tanks.

Thanks, V, for making us all more aware.

The process of making data unrecoverable involves rewriting data (not simply reformatting) over the areas where the previous data was written. As you noted, there are programs on the market that do just that.

Another solution would be to simply put in a new virgin hard drive, and give the old one the "Nanuq" treatment by dropping it from a tall building, driving over it, or "dissassembling" it with a sledge hammer until you are reasonably convinced that all the king's soldiers and all the king's men could never put it back together again.

Sometimes these guys are spamming a bunch of people to gather a consensus, or just on the assumption that at least one will provide an intelligent answer.

I recall a few times being asked about Rolex reps. I don't recall ever posting in the Rolex forum, and sold my only Rolex rep more than a year ago -- so how did I suddenly become this fountain of insight on Rolexes for someone I'd never even heard of before?

Those types of requests are very easy to ignore.

You are a generous person, Lanikai, but that doesn't mean you have to help every one. You did the right thing, and the majority of the board know that you are a class act with or without the signature.

Last year I worked with a big, hulking bear of a man who wore the dinkiest little watches (35mm or so??), and not even watches that were remotely interesting -- just ugly crap. Part of me felt like cluing him in, but it probably wouldn't have mattered, since he isn't into aesthetics, just function.

As for me, I started wearing bifocals a few years ago, and I'll be damned if I can see with the naked eye a lot of the details many of you capture with zoom and macro functions. So a watch between 40-44 mm with good legibility and contrast that isn't too heavy, even with a metal bracelet, is a really good thing. I like Pams, though I never got enthused about the Arktos-style bezels, which I think are overkill -- the same for Big Bangs, Offshores, Grahams or Bentleys.

But a man with really, really big arms can probably wear any of these perfectly well.