31–40 of 46 posts
The only watch brand I buy is Casio, nothing smart, nothing for show off, it’s reliable, cheap, and certainly you can change its battery:)
If you go with solar you don't even need to do that. +1 for Casio
Best option is a watch with a common battery type (e.g. CR2016) and accessible battery compartment.
My wife and I absolutely love Monte Blanc, for their Fountain pens, Inks, leather and luxury goods. They are wonderful products and add a great deal to both our lives. That being said, I would never, ever, buy electronics from them. They simply aren't an electronics company. You wouldn't buy a fountain pen or leather bag from Sony and expect it to be a premium product would you?
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I’d expect it to be mediocre quality, not an outright scam. Legitimate businesses don’t randomly decide to run a scam, so the fact that Mont Blanc did it here makes me strongly suspect we’re just not seeing how they do it elsewhere. Maybe you like their products, but are you familiar enough with the competition to know that you shouldn’t be getting more or paying less?
Absolutely do. My wife and I regularly attend pen shows, own many different brands of pens not just monte blanc pens, in fact monte blanc are the minority in our collection. In the fountain pen world Monte Blanc is like Rolex or Tag is to the watch world. One od the foundational brands of the genre.
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Yes, the Jinhao's of the fountain pen market make pretty decent pens, but that's not a fair comparison. That's like saying a Timex and a Rolex both tell time just as well, so why does Rolex exist?
> so why does Rolex exist? So rich people can show off their wealth.
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If you go with solar you don't even need to do that. +1 for Casio
The rechargeable batteries still need to be replaced, and it's hard for non-Casio dealers to get them AFAIK. Best option is a watch with a common battery type (e.g. CR2016) and accessible battery compartment.
AFAIK they don't need to be replaced on a comparable time frame if the watch regularly gets light.
This will sound silly but I don't understand the appeal of expensive watches. I can understand collecting or being interested in unique ones... but to an untrained eye (me) its hard to tell the difference between expensive and "fancy" ones. At least with cars, you know when one is a sports car or expensive lol
1) The mechanisms. It's just cool. Many of us on HN are engineers — wristwatches and time-keeping more broadly is one of the most classic, widespread forms of engineering. It's a form of engineering that has been around for a millennia, and it's fun to have something on your wrist, full of tiny gears with a satisfying subtle noise when held up to your ear, that can keep time to around 1-2 seconds a day with the 86,400 seconds in each day.
2) The history. There's so much to find that's unique. One of my favorite watches is the Doxa Sub300 in orange, it was the favorite of Jacques Cousteau who inspired so many of us with regards to diving (invented Scuba) and the ocean in general through his documentaries. Many of these brands have so much interesting history down to each model along with admirable craftsmanship. Some people like models that look like out-of-normality for a brand, like "oh wow can you believe Rolex did THAT?", e.g. a pulsation dial for a doctor to measure someone's heart-rate, while some like the classic model that exemplifies everything about the brand.
3) The accessory. As men, we don't typically have the amount of jewelry that women do, or the ability to wear the same wide range of dress. Watches are that thing where we can show off some aspect of our personality, of who we are or who we want to be, whether that's classy and subtle, fun and unusual, or even ostentatious.
4) The bonding. This is a smaller thing, but when you're into watches, and you meet someone else out in the wild who is as well, you have the best conversations. It's this thing you mutually geek out over, and it's incredibly pure. It's a great feeling, it's like finding someone who roots for the same sports team as you in some random city abroad.
Why expensive? In points 1 and 2, the expensive watches are the ones with the best mechanisms and the best history. In point 4, the expensive watch is the one that signals that you really care about watches, because it epitomizes 1 and 2. :)
This will sound silly but I don't understand the appeal of expensive watches. I can understand collecting or being interested in unique ones... but to an untrained eye (me) its hard to tell the difference between expensive and "fancy" ones. At least with cars, you know when one is a sports car or expensive lol
They're status symbols. As with most things in life, the quality isn't necessarily reflected by the price. "A fool and their money" et cetera. Cash circulating is a good thing, and provides jobs, even if the products they make are objectively not any better than x.
Any Joe Average knows a Ferrari when he sees it, but he's not going to look twice if the guy standing next to him in the Starbucks queue is wearing a Lange & Söhne wristwatch.
But I would.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
They're status symbols. As with most things in life, the quality isn't necessarily reflected by the price. "A fool and their money" et cetera. Cash circulating is a good thing, and provides jobs, even if the products they make are objectively not any better than x.
Wearing a brand that no normal person would identify makes no sense as a "status symbol". Any Joe Average knows a Ferrari when he sees it, but he's not going to look twice if the guy standing next to him in the Starbucks queue is wearing a Lange & Söhne wristwatch. But I would.
They're "status symbols" in as much as if someone turns up to a meeting with x pen or y watch, I recognize the value of those things, I think maybe they are successful. Maybe they're also counterfeit, stolen, or what they have to say has no merit, but they do like toys and can't think of anything better to spend their money on. Either way, it's a prop, just like someone's nice suit is a prop, just like their luxury car is a prop.
Can someone see through the bullshit? Of course. But in some circles, bullshit is all there is and the props are a crutch for having nothing of value to say or contribute, i.e., they can't possibly be wrong, or worse yet, ineffective, after all they turned up in the German car with a nice suit and nice pen.
Spoiler: I love Casio watches, specifically the cheapo G-Shocks. I have an Omega and a Breitling, but the G-Shocks get all my loving. The brand isn't what counts for me, the design is everything.
Sapper designed a nice watch... FML.
My wife and I absolutely love Monte Blanc, for their Fountain pens, Inks, leather and luxury goods. They are wonderful products and add a great deal to both our lives. That being said, I would never, ever, buy electronics from them. They simply aren't an electronics company. You wouldn't buy a fountain pen or leather bag from Sony and expect it to be a premium product would you?
>and add a great deal to both our lives I never thought that someone will consider that fountain pens and luxury leather goods add a great deal in his life.
Tried a Lamy Safari, a "cheap" for fountain pens at least (23 euros), and I have never looked back. I love writing by hand now, and take every opportunity to do so. It's just so much more fun writing when your thoughs can just slide out from your hand on to paper.
Daily drivers are my Lamy Aion (a 80Euro pen)with my Safari as a backup.
If you fancy some petty revenge, Mont Blanc refills fit a variety of cheap pens beautifully. I don't see them "NDA"ing that away anytime soon.
What's vengeful about buying their product?
you'd get a 200+ dollar writing experience for about 8 dollars. https://unsharpen.com/pilot-g2-montblanc-hack-200-pen-for-7/
You could also do this with a fountain pen buy buying a gold Diplomat 149 replacement nib and put on a Jinhao 159 Mont Blanc "homage pen" (pirate copy). and use mont blanc ink in that pen. Gold Nibs are not cheap but they are about 150-200 usd, but when a pen could easily be 1000-10000 usd in the extreme high end then that's a bargain https://www.instagram.com/p/ChJSq-Iv6HE/
Why would you do this? Because some people like to have good writing tools without paying an extra premium.