belial2k

Has anyone heard what is going on at RWI? I cannot get on the site, I keep getting an error message, but I am getting PM notices sent to my email from the site. Obviously my customers are trying to reach me and not everyone is having problems, so I was wondering what other members over there were experiencing and how widespread the issue is.

chieftang wrote "It is immediately noticeable on the wrist from a distance" and also "Further, pictures (unless the rep and the gen are in the same shot) can be very deceiving because of variances in shooting angles, crop factors, lighting, shadows, etc." It just seems to me if these factors can make it hard to determine in photo that has been blown up to the size of your monitor then the conditions "on the wrist from a distance" when the watch is moving, is not in the best lighting, not held at steady angle, may be partially obscured by a sleeve, could be reflecting light or shadow from a number of sources, ect ....would make such a small difference (the largest I've heard is .2mm) impossible to see. That is like claiming "I can't see dust on the crystal in the close-up, but I can see it on someones wrist from a distance"..... I just had to back up that I didn't put words in anyones mouths, but I think most people got I was metaphorical with the "crazy" comment. As in "don't let it drive you crazy!" As was pointed out we are all looking for perfection and we all have our own pet peeves. I was a singer in a previous life and no matter how many takes we did or how we mixed it I never could get it to sound "right" to me, and I drove everyone else crazy trying to get it perfect. So trust me....I know where you are coming from, I just had to throw my two cents into this long thread since I hardly ever post over here in the light.

This whole thread is reminding me of the running joke "post a picture of a gen and call it a rep and somebody will pick it apart with all its 'faults'. " I think its funny that some members claim they can spot a .1mm difference in a rehaut on someones wrist and tell its a fake, but the same members say "you can't tell from those blown-up pics because the angle and lighting are not exactly right" Not bashing anyone here, I know that you THINK you are seeing something, but I wonder how many of those watches you've called out as a fake are really gen? There is a story we learn in psychology 101 that explains all of this. You can look through a window that has a hairline crack in it for years and never notice the crack. Then, one day you notice it. From that day on you can't look out the window without seeing the crack. Then you start to obsess about the crack. Then you can't look out the window....you only see the crack....Eventually you get to the point that every window you look out you are trying to see the cracks....and somehow you find them whether they are there or not, whether it is just a spider web, or something on the other side of the glass you don't really see because you are no longer looking through glass but looking at it and the background is now a part of the glass. I'm not saying any of you have degressed into the full psycosis of the background being the glass....but you might want to consider carefully what you are saying when you can claim to spot a fake rehaut from a great distance but magnified pictures make it somehow harder to spot. We have spent so much time trying to find fault in reps we forget that gens are not all EXACTLY the same. I can show you 15 gens and at least 5 of them will have a different looking bezel pearls, and that is just ONE example of many differences you can find when comparing gens. Most ADs will not spot a good fake unless you go in and ask them to authenticate it. Then they will quickly start finding the faults. But if you present it to them for any other reason they are just like any other guy on the street. They are not obsessing with every minor detail like we are. Someone who is into reps is far more likely to spot a fake than someone who is into gens in my experience. No offense meant to anyone, but like some people have said here, enjoy the hobby and the fun of searching for perfection, but don't let it make you crazy.

The 111 H series does not have the repeating Panerai engraving on the movement back like the previous series and the firenze sig is also totally wrong for the H series. I bought one of these thinking it was a gen when they first came out and didn't find out my mistake until I tried to resell it and I started to get hit with a bunch of emails from people who knew better. At first I thought they were trying to scam me because a jeweler had been fooled by the watch, too...but after doing more research I found out they were right and I had to end the auction early and take a huge loss on the watch. Very expensive lesson to learn