Complete watch set for under £1000: The Swiss collection

Updated 16 April 2014

I recently wrote a post on getting your complete watch set for under £1000. I focussed on the Japanese brands and selected four models which I felt were really good, packed with loads of features (maybe apart from the dress watch). However, this made me wonder whether I would be able to come up with a similar collection of nice Swiss watches comprising of the three major styles of watches, namely i) Diver, ii) Aviator & iii) Dress watches and of course, one Banger watch which you can wear everyday.

There were some great deals around and Amazon UK seems to offer the maximum choices with some amazing discounts. So here is my Swiss watch collection:

1. Diver: Wenger Aquagraph

The Aquagraph retails at £340.00 but is available on Amazon UK for only £272.00

This quartz diver watch from Wenger (better known for their Swiss Army knives), is water resistant to 1000m, yes you read right - not 100m  or 200m or even 300m but upto 1000m. Though I am not sure how many dive to those depths but it is nice to know that you have a watch which can.

Here are the main features and specs:

• Case Material: Stainless steel
• Sapphire crystal
• Case Diameter: 43 millimetres
• Case Thickness: 15.00

2. Aviator: Victorinox SAF Airboss Mach 1 V.25091

RRP: £320.13 (No discounts when I last checked).

This aviator style automatic watch is from Victorinox, the owner of the famous Swiss Army knives but now making fabulous watches as well. It is an automatic watch with a black dial.

Features and specifications:

• Sapphire crystal
• Stainless Steel Case with a leather strap
• Water Resistant to 100 metres
• Case Diameter 41 millimetres
• Case Thickness 12 millimetres

By now, we have used up more than half of our budget (a total of £660.13) which leaves us with only £339.87 for the dress and banger watches. So I am going to cheat a bit and go with the discounted prices. So, taking the Amazon discounted prices, we have spent a total of £592.13 which leaves us with £407.87 for the 2 other watches (much better).

3. Dress Watch: Tissot Visodate T0194301605101

RRP: £650.00 but now available at only £373.24 on Amazon UK.

This is an automatic watch from my favourite Swiss watch brand. It is one of the oldest in the World as well. A nice classic design with their old logo.

Specifications and features:

• Sapphire crystal with antireflective coating.
• 42mm Case Diameter
• Water resistant to 30 meters.
• Case Diameter 42 millimetres
• Case Thickness 12 millimetres
• Leather strap with deployment push button clasp with buckle (which is a big deal)

If we were to go by the retail price, we have exceeded the budget (total of £1310.13). Even if we take the discounted prices we only have £34.63 which is not enough to buy a decent watch. Fact: Swiss watches are costly.

Just in case you are wondering whether it is possible to buy a Swiss made watch for £34 and less. The answer is a big "Yes!".
Swatch Once Again  retails for only £32.

Swatch Watch Again (Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported license: Khalid Mahmood)

This nice and simple medium sized (Case : Ø 34mm T : 8.75mm) Swatch watch is made of plastic. It is a quartz watch with day and date and is water resistant to 30m.

Who says you cannot have a complete set of good Swiss watches for less than £1000.

NOTE: Prices are correct as of 12 April, 2014.

Complete watch set for under £1000: The Japanese collection

I know it is the 1st of April but I am not joking. Read on.

I was in a watch forum recently and according to one of the members, "you need to spend at least £1000 for a good watch". Well, I have to disagree. It all depends on what you mean by a "good watch".

Majority of watch users have only one watch which they wear all the time. Now-a-days, most people do not even own a watch and rely on their mobile phones to tell time.

Then there are the watch collectors who have several watches - I happen to be one of them. However, I am not a watch snob and do not look down on people who wear electronic watches or quartz watches. I do not even think that mechanical or automatic watches, no matter how technical or iconic, are "superior".

However, I do believe that some watches are better suited for certain functions as compared to others. I can't recall who said it but it went like this: "You should have a different watch for each occasion" and I agree with this statement.

Given below are the four main categories of watches and the ideal characteristics:

1. Diver: Good visibility, tough, should be water proof to at least 200m and normally featuring a uni-directional rotatable bezel.
2. Aviator: Large face, good lume, day / date and multiple time zones, designed to withstand extremes of temperature and g forces and preferably with chronograph function. Usually have prominent and large crowns.
3. Dress: To wear to the office and on formal occasions with a suit. Slim to fit under the shirt cuffs. Normally minimalist design with leather straps.
4. The Banger/ Sports watch. Tough watch for everyday wear, usually with chronograph function which you wear when you are engaged in extreme sports, dancing in the night club or gaming at home.

However, you do not have to spend a fortune to have a decent collection of "good quality" watches and in-fact you can have a collection comprising of the 4 types of watches for less than £1000/ I suggest that you do not go for the latest or limited edition models. Some online stores including Amazon offer great deals (sometimes as much as 50% off). Let us look at a selection of some Japanese watches.

1. Diver: Seiko Men's SSC019P1 V175 

 RRP: £279 and just £186.99 on Amazon UK

• Case Diameter: 47mm
• Chronograph
• Solar powered
• Hardlex crystal
• Stainless steel case and bracelet
• 200m water resistant (divers certified)
• Pepsi (red and blue) bezel

2. Aviator: Citizen Red Arrows Chronograph CA0080-03E 
RRP: £199

• Chronograph
• Solar powered (Eco-drive) with Power Reserve Indicator
• Mineral Crystal
• Stainless Steel case with rotating Inner Ring
• 100 m water resistant
• Atomic Timekeeping.
• Case size: 43 mm

3. Dress: Orient Cosmos ET0K003W 
RRP: £112.26 (On Amazon UK)

• Self-winding, 21 jewels, Mechanical Automatic Movement
• Power Reserve: Approximately 40 hours
• Mineral crystal
• Stainless steel case
• 50m Water resistant
• Case Material: Stainless Steel with alligator leather band
• Case size: 40 mm

I love the design of this watch. Their automatic movement is made in-house.

Now, that's a total of approximately: £590 (So if you have a budget of £1000, this leaves you with £410 to spend on the Banger).

4. The Banger:  Casio Solar Chrono GW-3500BB-1ADR
It retails at £290 but you can get it for only £181.50 on Amazon UK. This is an "Aviator watch" according to Casio.

Just check out some of the amazing features:

• Shock Resistant (The G Shock is afterall the World's toughest watch)
• Solar Power (no need to change batteries)
• Stopwatch and Countdown Timer
• Water Resistant 200 m (meaning that you can use this as a diving watch as well).
• World Time and Multi Band 6 Radio Controlled - allows this watch to pick up six different time calibration signals around the globe and ensures that the exact time is displayed across Europe, The United States, Japan and China.

One thing I did not like was the case diameter. It is huge - at 50 mm. Better stay away if you have a small wrist. Shop around for other G-shocks with smaller diameters.

So supposing you bought all 4 watches at the retail prices, you have now spent a total of around £880 which still leaves you £120 to spend on other gadgets. You will have saved more if you had shopped around a bit. So why would you spend £1000 on just one watch?

NOTE: Prices are correct as of 1st April, 2014.

Replacing Timex Ironman Triathlon battery and straps

The Timex Ironman Triathlon digital wristwatch has come a long way since it was first released in 1986. I have had mine which is in fluorescent Green (T5K434SU) for nearly 2 years now. I was initially looking for a Casio G Shock but when I came across this fantastic deal on Amazon UK - only £17.50 including postage and VAT (normal price is around £55), the decision was made and it has become my favourite watch.

It was an amazing deal for a shock proof that can really take the punishment, waterproof upto 200m, dual time, 100-Hour Chronograph with Lap and Split Times, 30-Lap Memory Recall, 99-Lap Counter and of course the great Indiglo lights.

However, recently the battery died. Then my son went and cut off the strap. I went to some of the watch shops around town and asked them how much it would cost me to get a pair of new straps and get new batteries - I was shocked when I found out that I would have to spend around £40. It would actually be cheaper to get a brand new Ironman Triathlon similar to mine. 

I do not know why I did not think about it before, but it dawned on me one day, that I could probably fix it myself and much cheaper than at the shops. Thankfully I had not thrown it away.

Unfortunately, I could not find the green straps anywhere on the net and finally settled on original black straps from the WatchBattery (UK) Ltd site. They cost me £ 15.49 including delivery. It never occurred to me to contact Timex directly. Anyway, the batteries -  2 DURACELL Lithium CR2016, cost me only £1.45 including delivery. The repair cost me a total of £16.94 - slightly less than the original cost of the watch. 

I was initially a bit worried about the black straps and the green case but it worked out quite well. 

Changing the battery was quite straightforward. Had to remove 4 outer screws and one for the battery latch. It is good practise to change the rubber gasket as well but I left the original one in after cleaning it and brushing the debris. I did not pressure test the watch for water proofing as I did not have the tools but I did test it by wearing it in the bath and there were no leaks - you normally see condensation forming on the inner glass crystal of the watch if there are leaks. 

Here are some pics:   

Kindle Fire and Kindle Fire HD now in the UK

The Kindle Fire and Kindle Fire HD are now shipping in the UK.

The new Kindle Fire HD features an amazing HD display with high speed Wi-Fi and stereo sound Dolby audio. The 16GB version is available from £159.

The popular Kindle Fire is also now available in the UK with a 20% faster processor and twice the memory of the original Kindle Fire, for only £129.

Both devides allow instant access to over 22 million movies, TV shows, songs, apps, games, books, and magazines, as well as 1 month free trial of Amazon Prime and a 1-month free trial of LOVEFiLM instant.

Update 19 Nov. 2012:

The Kindle Fire comes with 8 GB internal memory but It does not have any memory card slots or support for USB drives (it's main drawback). However, it comes with free, unlimited Cloud storage.

Read "Three Ways to Expand the Kindle Fire’s Limited Storage Space".

Amazon launches Kindle Fire

Features:

• 7" color toughened touchscreen, anti-reflective treatment, 1024 x 600 pixel resolution at 169 ppi, 16 million colors.
• Dual-core processor
• Size: 7.5" x 4.7" x 0.45" (190 mm x 120 mm x 11.4 mm).
• Weight 14.6 ounces (413 grams).
• 8GB internal storage
• Free cloud storage
• Over 100,000 movies and TV shows
• Comes withe the Amazon Silk cloud-accelerated browser - supports Adobe Flash
• All in one email app
• 1-year limited warranty and service included. Optional 2-year Extended Warranty available for U.S. customers.

The Kindle Fire will be released on November 15, 2011 and is now available for booking at $199 on the Amazon.com.