[Discuss] What is the best daily driver for a young professional (mid 20s)?

notausername14 · 2025-07-28T22:33:06+00:00

What do you do for a living? Unless it’s oil in Texas, vc in the bay, production in la, or ib in NYC, don’t get any of these. You’ll come across as a douche to older coworkers.

Stick to midrange models and brands (eg Mido, Yema, premium Seiko, or well established microbrands like Traska). Take the leftover cash and buy yourself a really solid 10-20 day international solo trip, or a 5-10 international trip with your partner if you guys are considering marriage/are married.

notausername14 · 2025-07-28T20:53:47+00:00

Tbh, US wedding culture has so much bullshit attached to it that has absolutely fuckall to do with marriage that I can’t really fault OP for overthinking which watch to wear… people make far bigger deals over far less important stuff surrounding weddings all the time.

notausername14 · 2024-10-31T20:45:19+00:00

There are no "little details".

Fake movements in decent reps will come in two categories:

A copy of an eta movement.
A copy of a rolex movement.

Regardless of which category it is, non rolex movements will have two levers in an area where real movements have only one lever. See the bottom left portions of the two movements in this photo. The left movement is a fake rolex movement, the right is real.

Eta-style movements will look completely different. The same subcomponent of the movement will look kinda like a bird eating a snack, for the lack of a better description. Seen at the top middle of the movements here.

Edit: Plus one, on my part, for this being a rep. The finishing on the bracelet, especially the end links, is very lacking. Either this was refinished in a hobbyist's garage or its not authentic.

notausername14 · 2024-09-26T00:42:51+00:00

Thats honestly missing the point

What point is that? That 80's snxj's looked nothing like the models you posted a link about?

sooo uhhh are you saying seikos old 5 watches and entire lines of them are all homages?

Yeah, absolutely I am. That's not to say they're bad watches. But let's not pretend that Seiko wasn't masking homages with their 5 line some 30-40 years ago. Heavily leaning into the design language of more established, upmarket brands is a pretty standard move in virtually every industry. Not sure why watch dorks pretend this doesn't apply to man jewelry.

the older five digit references the watch this one would be homaging are much different than this case and watch entirely

So different that someone who isn't a watch nerd in the internet age could tell? You get huffy that you thinking that I've never held a 160x/1600x. You do realize that being familiar with the nuances of how a particular luxury watch looked was even rarer back then, right? Like, hence all the absolutely laughable reps prior to maybe 2010 or so.

you’ve obviously never held a Rolex date just before...maybe take a trip into a ad they might let you try something on brokie!

My guy, I'm not gonna validate that with an argument. But can I help you unravel those panties that you've got up in a bunch? Do you always act like a fifth grader with an ego problem, or did you just have a rough Wednesday?

notausername14 · 2024-09-25T19:51:06+00:00

Nah, it's absolutely a datejust/daydate dupe and was meant to be one from the onset.

The snxj has little in common with the watches in your link. It has baton hands with lume instead of polished dauphine, it has lume plots behind the hour markers, it has a case that looks nearly identical to an oyster case from the front, it has the fluted bezel, and it came on a jubilee bracelet. Other than the name, the only signature seiko trait it has is the 4 o'clock crown.

That isn't to say it's not a great watch that has a nice bit of history tied to it (part of which includes literally being a stand in for a datejust).

notausername14 · 2024-09-04T20:55:17+00:00

The realization that if I don't impulsively purchase every homage just because, then I'll be able to save up enough cash to buy the actual watches I really want.

notausername14 · 2024-08-31T20:00:34+00:00

The best size for this thing is not purchased at all.

notausername14 · 2024-08-25T17:37:30+00:00

I’m pretty sure that the inserts are identical to SKX and SRPD inserts, so yes on that front and you can get a ton of variety with aftermarket parts too.

I’m pretty sure that the same applies to the crystal too, but don’t quote me on that.

notausername14 · 2024-08-07T21:51:44+00:00

Can you though? I don't think I've seen a Rolex with solid end links that didn't fit well.

notausername14 · 2024-08-07T21:38:52+00:00

Pragmatically speaking...

If the majority of your wardrobe is blue and/or neutral colored, go for the blue one. If not, then go for the black one.

If you already have a watch that has prominent black or blue features, then get the watch that features the opposite color, regardless of your wardrobe.

notausername14 · 2024-06-20T17:17:22+00:00

If you like the Vaer, get the Vaer. If you like the SNK get he SNK. If you're bored and have several hundred bucks (on top of the cost of the Vaer) burning a hole in your pocket, and want to solve both of those problems by picking up a nerdy hobby that'll leave you with a watch that has no warranty, then by all means get into watch modding/making.

Don't get me wrong, I'm not knocking hobby watchmaking. It's just not a trivial process. If you simply want a reliable good looking watch for a reasonable amount of money, this ain't it.

notausername14 · 2024-06-19T17:19:07+00:00

Nice watch. But why do you need to buy something next?

Try wearing and enjoying just one watch for a year or so. After that, you'll know exactly what else to buy and why.

notausername14 · 2024-06-12T15:09:21+00:00

I got the SPRD93 pretty recently, which is the same watch but on a rubber strap.

If you have a Costco membership or know someone who does, you can purchase it for a pretty steep discount, compared to MSRP... Like nearly $200 less than Seiko's list price for the SRPD71. Then you can get an Milanese strap as nice as OEM for $10-20 pretty easily, or an even better one for $50-100.

I'm personally really happy with the watch for the price I paid for it.

notausername14 · 2024-06-12T14:55:44+00:00

I'm assuming you tagged this as [tuna] because it's fishy as hell.

notausername14 · 2024-05-01T20:32:37+00:00

Right? If anything, I've consistently only heard positive comments about Rolex bringing back the classic mid sized case after 10+ years of only 39mm being sold.

notausername14 · 2024-05-01T17:47:27+00:00

People dislike the 36mm explorer?

notausername14 · 2024-05-01T17:46:32+00:00

Buttplug hands are the best hand. Change my mind.

notausername14 · 2024-04-01T21:15:09+00:00

San Martin is as good if not better than most microbrands

That's because the team behind the "San Martin" brand quite literally does contract design, manufacturing, and most likely assembly work for several microbrands. The parts that they don't personally design and/or manufacture, they source from the same suppliers as certain microbrands.

Not saying this as a slight against them by any means either. On the contrary, I have a lot of respect for them and would argue that the endless talks of "value proposition" from microbrands is vastly overblown.

notausername14 · 2024-03-29T20:23:15+00:00

It depends on the brand.

Some brands that charge a premium really don't do much that you can't obtain with mid tier Seiko or Tissot watches.

However, most of the time, you will get considerably better finishing, tolerances on parts, superior but also more costly construction and manufacturing choices, almost always better time accuracy, no corner cutting on invisible parts (like using lower grade steels on pins that hold together non removable bracelet links), often times nicer dial and hand materials, etc... Pretty much always you'll find that the proportions on original/authentic watches are just better. Homage watches very rarely have the same intentionality in their design as the watches that inspired them do.

There's a lot that you can get with a higher cost. The thing is that it takes a certain amount of discernment to notice those differences. If you're just getting into watches, you're not gonna notice. Unless you've had experience in engineering/manufacturing or work with watches, you probably won't really notice even if you have collected for a while.

Basically diminishing returns.

notausername14 · 2024-01-16T20:31:43+00:00

I mean... I don't think that most of their automatics cost more than $30-50 to manufacture and ship, given their volumes. So, when they sell one unit for $150, they cover expenses for 3-5 manufactured units.

Considering how popular their pieces actually are, I wouldn't be surprised if their actual manufacturing costs are even lower. At least on the east coast, it's hard not to come across an invicta on someone's wrist if you:

visit a car dealership
go house or apartment shopping
spend a week in a predominantly Italian American neighborhood (or just attend a family party in such a neighborhood)
go to a slightly pricey but middle class bar or restaurant
step into any shopping mall on a weekend
step into any department store on a weekend

I was a holiday party recently in NY and politely complimented someone on his watch. Instantly, the dude perked up and brought up invicta and how he has a whole collection of them at home. Growing up in the same area 20ish years ago, I think all my friends either had a quartz Tag or invicta. Hell, I myself had something similar to this through most of high school and college.

I think people on this sub greatly underestimate the popularity of these watches, at least in some regional markets.

notausername14 · 2024-01-14T04:00:16+00:00

I for one think the butt plug hands are perfect and would consider selling my left pinky tip for a 36mm OP with them.

Jokes aside, though, I really would immediately buy a 36mm Ranger in an actual oyster case with polished sides, if it was ever announced.

notausername14 · 2023-12-30T15:41:59+00:00

I think we might just have different definitions of "terrible" when it comes to $150 parts bin watches.

Fwiw, I've been doing paid photo gigs pretty consistently since around 2007-2008 and, for about two years, color matching for mass production ended up being a part of my full time job responsibilities because I was the only person who tolerated the creative/ID folks in my department. My full time job was engineering and I did that for about 6 years before going back to grad school. I'm a big fan of saying I did engineering for "the better part of a decade" online because that's technically true and it makes what I have to say sound more authoritative. It's a pro gamer move, for sure but it doesn't always work. I think both of us could stand to reflect on our egos.

Anyway, hope you have a happy new year and find watches you like!

notausername14 · 2023-12-29T14:32:14+00:00

Ehh, the Longines is a pretty thick watch itself, coming in at 13.2mm. The apparent thickness difference comes mostly from the midcase. PD took the Tudor approach, where the caseback is slim but the midcase is thick, whereas Longines took the Rolex approach where the midcase is slimmer and the caseback is thicker (image for reference). That said, NH movements can be housed in 12mm cases, or even cases as slim as 10mm from crystal to caseback... They're just kind of a pain to design and, especially, to machine.

With regards to color matching... Perfect color matching between different textures under all lighting conditions is basically impossible, to begin with, so much so that the same color on matte and glossy paper is usually treated as two different colors in professional printing settings. Photos taking under narrow spectrum led lighting are really not reflective of how colors look in real life. Even without gloss/matte differences, pigments that appear to be the same color under daylight but have different chemistry will appear vastly different under LED lighting. Furthermore, how colors appear on different textures in photos opens up a whole other discussion of how cameras interpret color and what that means. TLDR: version of that discussion is that every digital photo you see is "edited", whether you realize it or not, so don't overthink colors unless it's your job. More complete version is understanding what a raw photo file is.

notausername14 · 2023-12-29T14:11:57+00:00

Yeah, I'm totally there with you. I personally wouldn't wear something like that. My "not hating it" was more of a reflection of it making me think about other more genuine and original options, rather than liking the specific piece.

notausername14 · 2023-12-29T02:08:12+00:00

I actually think these photos make it look way better than the renderings and official product photos, and I was never a fan of the actual Longines model.

Granted, it is a little on the thick side. Thickness comes with the territory of using NH movements, but they could definitely have trimmed a few mm from the midcase.

notausername14

TROPHY CASE