What you should watch in a watch while buying it?

Author- Vibhor Shergill (Brother of Sabhyata Shergill)

“Whatever the right hand finds to do, the left hand carries a watch on its wrist to show how long it takes to do it.”
Ralph W. Sockman

Nothing looks more urbane and more sophisticated than a snug fitted wrist watch when it comes to accessorizing that well fitted blazer of yours or that leather biker jacket that adorns your aura.
Watch is one such accessory item that instantly does two things for the person who wears it:-

• Others subconsciously perceive you as a responsible and a meticulous person who values time and won’t indulge in any dealings that would waste their time.

• It makes you look extremely attractive in the eyes of the opposite gender. In fact, when choosing a partner, a good wrist watch can easily give a head start to you in your dating life because while choosing a partner we tend to pay attention to the details about our partner and that is when a wrist watch works like a charm in making you look attractive in their eyes.

I believe those are enough a reason as to why everyone should invest in a good watch.



Now, if you are a frequent visitor to the posts on this blog, you might be probably aware that we take each topic from the grass root level and we will do the same with this post as well. We will begin with the basics first, understand how a watch works, then we will proceed to understand what are the different types of watches available in the market along with their Pros and Cons. After that, we will move on to discuss how some brands cut costs and manufacture below par products that are very non durable and often the materials from which they are built cause various skin allergies. Then we will proceed onto deciding which watch would be the best for you, according to your needs.

So without further a do, let’s begin..

The Basics
A wrist watch can be basically divided into three categories:-

• A Quartz (Analog and Digital) Watch
• A Mechanical (Automatic and Hand Winding) Watch
• A Smart Watch

Quartz watch- As the name suggests, a quartz watch makes use of a quartz crystal to keep time. A quartz watch makes use of an electronic circuit known as an electronic oscillator that produces a periodic and oscillating electronic signal with very precise frequency by taking power from the battery. Quartz watches are several times more accurate than other watch types and most of the available analog and digital watches in the market, belong to this category.

(Image of a Quartz Watch)

PROS:

• As mentioned above, these watches are extremely accurate and lose only a few seconds per year. This is one of the main reasons as to why this category of watch is the most popular among buyers.

• Quartz watches are less costly when compared to mechanical and smart watches.

• These watches have less mechanical parts and are mainly based on an electronic oscillator and battery so the chances of malfunctioning of any component are comparatively less.

CONS:

• Since these watches rely on batteries to drive the electronic circuit, the batteries wear out in a period of two years. Once that happens, the watch slows down and then eventually completely stops ticking. So, you can’t be sure whether the time displayed is the correct time, therefore it’s better to get the batteries replaced every twenty to twenty two months.

Mechanical Watch- This type of watch revolves around the mechanism of storing mechanical energy in a spiral spring called as the mainspring of the watch. This energy is stored in the mainspring either by manually winding the crown present on the side of the watch or by the natural movements of the wearer’s body. Hence the name, mechanical watch.



(Image of the inside view of a Mechanical Watch)

PROS:

• These watches do not require any batteries, hence you can always be sure that the time displayed is the correct time, as long as the mainspring is wound either manually or by natural body movements.

• In addition to being the functional timepieces, mechanical watches are a status symbol and are often considered as jewellery items because of the brands that manufacture them. The top manufacturers that make mechanical watches are Rolex, Rado, Cartier etc.

• These watches are aesthetically attractive to a lot of users. Mechanical watches are a masterfully crafted instruments which use technologies that are centuries old. The idea that a set of gears and springs can tell the time with near-perfect accuracy, needing no more than for its user to wind it up, and in the case of an automatic watch, not even that, just woos the buyers.

CONS:

• Mechanical watches are extremely expensive as the combination of the complex gears and that make the watch work are very difficult to design and put into operation in sync with other gears and springs.

• These watches are less accurate than quartz watches and need to be wound manually, in case of hand wound or need to be worn all the time, in case of automatic for them to show the correct time. Though, wounding the watch may be satisfying to some users.

Smart Watch- Smart watch is the latest development in the field of wristwatches and is basically a wearable computer in the form of a wrist watch. A smart watch, in addition to displaying the current time and date, makes use of the Bluetooth technology to connect with your Bluetooth enabled device such as smartphone to display text messages, incoming calls, notifications from applications that are installed on your device as well as monitoring the heart rate of the user. Thus smart watch is also called as wearable fitness tracker.



(Image of a Smart Watch)

PROS:

• Smart watches are all rounders. In addition to displaying the usual time and date, smart watches track the calories one has burnt during the day and lets one make and pick calls without needing to take out the phone from the pocket. This is one of the fundamental reasons as to why the smart watch buyers have risen in the recent years.

• These watches are highly customizable. Since these wearable computer devices have a screen in place of a predefined dial, one can customize the watch’s face as per one’s wish.

CONS:

• Unlike Quartz and Mechanical watches, Smart watches need to be charged almost on daily basis just like a regular smartphone. Since these watches perform functions similar to that of a smartphone, the battery of the smart watches drain quite fast and hence need to be charged frequently.

• The fitness data tracked by smart watches is not 100% percent accurate and there is a chance of it displaying wrong information. So, the users who buy these watches to assist them primarily in tracking their fitness goals might find themselves in tough times.

• Smart watches, though support numerous features like navigation, watching videos etc can’t be used for anything more than placing calls, getting notifications and tracking fitness data due to the limited screen real estate.

Now, having learnt about the various types of watches, let’s proceed to learn what one should look for when buying a watch.

The Strap material- Choosing a right strap is one of the most essential components when deciding to buy a watch. Whether you love metal straps or leather ones or even the casual rubber ones, one thing that you must ensure is the quality of the material from which the strap is made, as not every material suits every skin type and choosing the wrong material can cause severe skin allergies.

As a rule of thumb, go for either a genuine leather strap, a resin strap or a completely stainless steel strap. These three materials are found to be suitable for most skin types.

The Dial size- The dial is the heart of a watch, therefore choosing the right size of the dial is extremely important. The diameter of the dial needs to be chosen by taking into consideration the size of the wrist.

For men having small to medium size wrist, the dial diameter that looks the most elegant ranges between 38 to 42 mm and for a larger wrist size, a 46 mm dial diameter would best suit the needs.

For women, the standard dial diameter ranges from 26 to 30 mm, though mini watches have diameters in the range of 22 to 25 mm.


(Image of the size comparison of different dial diameters)

The Case thickness- The watches that have case diameter under 17 mm look most aesthetically appealing on a person's wrist. Anything above that, makes the watch look excessively popping out of the wrist.

Having learnt about what one should keep in mind while choosing a watch, let’s proceed to discuss the ways by which some manufacturers (names not taken) cut manufacturing costs to maximize their profits and in turn deliver a sub-standard watch to the customers which are very non durable and are known to cause rashes and in some cases, severe skin allergies.

• Constructing the under portion of the dial using metal. Since metal costs several times lesser than stainless steel, some brands resort to using an ordinary metal to construct the dial. Due to the high reactivity of the metal, it reacts with the skin and causes irritation, redness and skin allergies to the users who are sensitive to metals. So, to be on the safer side, what one must ensure is to buy a watch, the dial of which is made out of 100% stainless steel or genuine leather or high quality resin.

• Mentioning exaggerated water resistance capacity of the watch. Some manufacturers take advantage of the fact that most users won’t take their watches under water and even if some do, they won’t dive beneath 15 metres and thus the manufacturers mention exaggerated water resistance figures and charge heavily for it. If one is interested in wearing the watch under water and likes to scuba dive, one should choose the watches that mention 100 metres of water resistance, otherwise 30 metres of water resistance should be sufficient for most users.

Now, having learnt how some manufacturers cut costs to maximize their profits, let’s proceed to zero down on some of the best watches available in the market that are not only built from high quality materials and remain true to all their claims but also offer the most value for your money.