Omega X-33

Watch Costs are Relative

by

I’ve always found it a little funny when people complain about how expensive an Apple Watch is. For me, the cost has never been the barrier to owning one. Right now I’m wearing a Series 10 46mm. It’s not the cheapest watch I own, but it’s close. The actual cheapest is my Seiko SKX007, which I picked up a couple of summers ago as a knock-around watch for the beach.

I bring this up because my Omega Speedmaster X-33 recently needed a battery replacement. While it was at Omega, they called to say it also needed a full service. Not exactly shocking—I bought it in 2006, so it’s pushing 20 years old, and this is only its second service. It’s had a hard life: I wore it daily for years before I started rotating in other watches, and titanium picks up dings easily. At the last two battery changes they even noted “condition poor” on the paperwork, which felt a little insulting if I’m honest.

So yes, I’ll be glad to have it back shiny and refreshed. What I’m less thrilled about is the price of the service. And yet, it’s not surprising. It’s about what I paid the last time I had another Omega serviced. The kicker? The cost of this service was actually more than what I paid for my Apple Watch.

That’s the point, really: watch costs are relative. The X-33 was the most expensive thing I had ever bought when I got it, and I still love it. But the idea that maintaining one watch can cost more than buying a brand-new Apple Watch puts the whole “Apple Watches are too expensive” complaint into perspective. For now, I’ll just be waiting a few weeks while the work gets done and chuckling at the absurdity of it all.

The photo is of a much younger X-33 right after getting a NATO strap for it, since the titanium band was getting beat up too much.

The Blog Post Were I Write About Watch Straps for Seven Paragraphs

by

Can you tell the difference between these two watch straps? Visually there isn’t much of a difference. Holding them they feel pretty similar however there is a noticeable difference between the two. What distinguishes one from the other? If you look closely enough can see that one of them has the word Omega etched into it. That little etching equates to a vast difference in price.

Is the Omega strap better? After wearing  both for a while I would say yes. Is the Omega strap much better even slightly more comfortable than the other one? I would say yes. Is it worth many times more money than the generic one? Probably not.

This is a situation where I’m reminded of the Steve Jobs biography where the author discusses Jobs theory on best versus average of something. I think the used knives for the analogy. The point was do you buy a cheap $10 knife. Do you by a $75 knife or do you buy the top-of-the-line $400 knife? If your chef you might need that extra bit of “better” you get from the $400 knife. In most other cases you’re probably best served with the $75. I think the argument was average were really good to the best ever is only about 10 to 15% in a lot of cases. I know that any number like that is suspect however the sentiment I think holds true.

With these NATO watch straps I think the sentiment also holds true. The Omega one is better. At least in my opinion. It is a much more flexible and comfortable my lawn. It feels more sturdy.The clasp is a bit easier to get on and off. Overall I think it’s a better band.  Using the analogy from the jobs biography however it’s only probably better 10 to 15%. In my opinion it’s not worth the massive price premium I paid for it. I still don’t regret the purchase. I am even considering possibly another one.

Why am I talking about watch straps anyway? For starters I’ve spent a bunch of time in recent months researching and buying a few NATO straps for my watches. Since this is my blog and all I felt like writing about it.

I wore a NATO strap 2 summers ago. I wore one for a few months on my X-33. I liked it however at the time I missed the metal band and switched back to it after a while. In recent months I’ve liked the idea of switching out my watch bands more often. It’s a little bit of extra style and I thought it was cool to be able to do that without having to go to someone to swap out a leather or metal band.

In June I took my X-33 in to have its metal band removed so I can use a NATO strap. At the same time I splurged and picked up the black and green Omega NATO strap. After getting the Omega strap I bought two more straps that were significantly cheaper online so I had a variety. Who cares if you can swap out straps to watch when you only have one of them or in my case two of them that are identical. I purchased a thick nylon band in a gray green. I also picked up a black leather one. After wearing all them I ended up liking the Omega one the best however the leather one is still pretty good. The gray green nylon one is a bit too stiff and I won’t be buying that brand nylon strap again.

After a few weeks of wearing a variety of bands on my X-33 I took in my speed master to also have its leather straps removed so I could use interchangeable NATO straps. I was very tempted to buy the leather NATO strap from the Omega store. The leather strap seemed more reasonably priced in comparison to other nice leather bands however I wasn’t sure if I liked the color so I passed on it for now.

Since swapping out the bands on both watches I have bought another nylon band in a different color pattern. I plan on getting a few more however i have enough of a variety now to keep things interesting for a little while. I am still not 100% sold if I will keep using the NATO straps on all my watches however for now I am pretty happy.

If you are a James Bond fan then yes another cool thing about these gray and black NATO strap is that it looks like the classic James Bond Goldfinger strap. I was surprised when I previously researched that many people pull off nylon straps on my fancy watches in fancy dress clothes such as suits or tuxedos. For me that was the final deciding factor on they will work with any style clothing. Of course that same research yielded me wearing Chuck Taylor’s with khakis and dress pants. The Internet is a wonderful thing.

Is The Date Too Much to Ask For?

by

It is funny how you miss the little things. I have been wearing my new Omega watch for almost 5 months now. The one thing I miss off my old timex is the ability to look at my wrist for the date. I can get the date off my Omega, but I have to hit a button to get it and then cycle through the menu to get back to time. It is a pain so I never do it. Something so simple, yet so difficult. I find myself having to look at my mobile phone or the time preferences on my powerbook to get the date now a days. Bob got a good laugh at me when I commented about the new watch not giving the date, but the $40 timex does. Oh well, what are you going to do?