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Temption Formula Rally Chronograph Watch

Updated Jan 5, 2008

1st to recommend

Description

Cool. A lean and clean motorsports-inspired German chronograph powered by an automatic movement with day/date display. The internals provide precise timekeeping in the case of an understated looker. The stainless steel case is a black/silver/black steel sandwich with a red tachymeter register on the black matte bezel. The deep black face has red and white dial markings, luminous hands, and a needle-slender red sweep seconds hand. The strap is black leather with matching red stitching, secured by a deployant clasp. Sharp. The effect is finished off with red coral inlays capping the screw-down crown and pushers. Subtle, precise, masculine and sweet.

For a more assertive take on the same functionality, check out Temption's Curare Classic Chronograph -- all black with yellow markings, just like the curare frog that inspired it.

Temption is an interesting German watch company. It is not building watches for status-seekers. It designs and builds contemporary watches influenced by Bauhaus and WabiSabi design principles, in an effort to offer lasting value and style. The founder emphasizes simplicity, legibility and build integrity in every design. Want exclusivity? Temption only makes 700 watches per year. Get one. (via Temption)

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Jorg Schauer Kulisse Edition 11 Chronograph Watch, Black

Updated Jan 5, 2008

1st to recommend

Description

German watchmakers often have a leaner, more austere aesthetic than their Swiss counterparts, in whose shadow they toil. But this creates alternatives for you that are very high quality, affordable, leverage Swiss internals, and are distinctive enough to set you apart. This Jorg Schauer Kalisse is a good example. This is an automatic mechanical chronograph with a beautiful, simple dial for precise reading of elapsed time. The case is stainless steel, hand-finished to a matte ground, with a striking screw-attached bezel. The crystal is slightly-domed sapphire and there is a display case-back revealing the decorated movement. A leather strap is standard, with stainless steel bracelet options offered.

Other Kulisse models offer white faces with blue hands, as well as additional complications. This is the cleanest, meanest Kulisse. (via Jorg Schauer)

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Schaumburg AquaBlack 2 Dive Watch

Updated Jan 5, 2008

1st to recommend

Description

Dive watches are popular, even among people whose only exposure to water is rain or a shower. The idea of wearing a watch good for the pressures of immersion at 1000m or even 2000m gives this chunky watch style a daydream factor that's hard to resist. There sure are a lot of dive watches on offer. Well, it's not my favorite style of watch, but I get asked about them often, so here's one I recommend: The Schaumburg Aqua Black 2.

Schaumburg is a small German watch company, formerly known as Lindburgh & Benson. The company uses precise Swiss commodity mechanical movements and packages them in massive hardware designed to take tremendous undersea pressures while keeping precise time. The Aqua series are rated to 1000 meters. This is a straightforward watch with hours, minutes, sweep seconds and date. The movement is automatic mechanical, so self-winding. The screw-in crown is protected by machined protectors. The timing bezel is unidirectional. The standard strap is water-resistant leather.

The Aqua Black 2, shown here, has a black face with orange hour markers. Aqua Black 1 has white markers on black face. The coming Aqua Black 3 has a fully enumerated orange face. The cases on all are steel with black PVD finish. This is probably the deepest black PVD finish you'll see on a watch. If you prefer silvery stainless alone, the same watches are available in the standard Aqua Diver series with a wider range of face colors. Also in stainless are chronograph versions. All have thick sapphire crystals and solid steel backs.

1000m rating too wimpy for you? The Aqua Titan series are rated to 2000m water resistance! (via Lindburgh & Benson)

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Pioneer Elite Kuro 50" High-Definition Black Plasma TV - PRO1150HD

Updated Jan 2, 2008

1st to recommend

Description

Choose the size appropriate to your viewing distance or room: 43", 50" or 60", but by all means if you need a new HDTV get a Pioneer Elite Kuro plasma screen. Yeah, I know....everyone is trying to sell you an LCD instead of plasma. LCD looks bright and exciting until you live with it. Then you notice that its too-vivid visual character makes everything look videoish, cartoonish and over-saturated, even if you get it ISF calibrated. LCD doesn't have the speed, the subtle color gradients possible with a multi-billion colors palette, or the pixel illumination control to win. Even the newest LCD screens are still too slow for fast motion sports. Good plasma screens with sophisticated chip sets, on the other hand, do a much better job capturing the nuance of film and the actual textures and light behaviors of actual objects, people and animals. Good plasma is more fully dimensioned and cinematic. And the best commonly-available plasma TVs are Pioneer's Elite line, with their current (late 2007) generation "Kuro" technology for deep blacks, sensational contrast and nuance, and correction for plasma's traditional bugaboo of over-luminous greens.

These are full 1080p capable, but nevertheless visually rich with a beautiful image at HD 768p and upscaled DVD. If you don't have room, inclination or cash for a full companion sound system, the Elite's in-set sound and speakers can still pull you into a movie. (via Pioneer Electronics USA)

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Oris Artelier Chronograph

Updated Jan 2, 2008

2 people recommended this item

Description

A style sleeper in the classic mechanical chronograph category, the Oris Artelier's beautiful guilloche dial, understated wrist presence and high level of finishing of its polished steel casework will fool many into thinking you sprang for a $6,000+ timepiece, but you can slide into this for a third that. The Oris-modified commodity Swiss movement is durable and precise, with minimal decoration driving up the price. On croc strap with deployant or polished & satin stainless steel bracelet, this Oris chronograph satisfies all the senses that entice you to buy a luxury mechanical watch in the first place.

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Jaeger LeCoultre Reverso Grande Date Watch

Updated Jan 1, 2008

1st to recommend

Description

In watches, precious few qualify as genuine icons and those that do line up behind the Jaeger-LeCoultre Reverso. The original sport watch, today the Reverso skates both sides of the line dividing dress watches from casual and is equally at home in both roles. The vast range of contemporary Reversos includes five case sizes for men and women, and every wrist size. The Grande case size has enough presence not to get lost in a sea of today's dinner plate sized watches, yet is discreet enough to fit under a shirt cuff and work with a suit.

The Grande Date Reverso is a hand-wound Swiss mechanical watch with Jaeger's in-house double-barrel 8-day rectangular movement. That's right -- wind this watch no more than once per week for up to 8 days of precise timekeeping. This watch has a large date indicator, a power reserve gauge, standard hours/minutes/small seconds, and a sapphire display window on the reverse of the case to show off the exquisite movement.

A Reverso of any size will never be unstylish nor ordinary. This Deco-infused design and exacting JLC execution provides a lifetime of ownership pleasure, and telegraphs your taste. Available in steel, gold and pink gold, with leather strap and deployant clasp or polished bracelet. (via Jaeger LeCoultre)

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Cuervo y Sobrinos Robusto Buceador Automatic Dive Watch

Updated Jan 1, 2008

1st to recommend

Description

The distinctive flair of Cuervo's Cuban heritage is vivid in this latin take on the dive watch. Face it, most dive watches are worn for "desk diving," never seeing a drop of water other than the stray spray of a garden hose or the splash of washed hands in the mens room. But there's always dreaming. Rated water resistant to 660 ft., this watch is ready for swimming, water sports, snorkeling and light diving. Water resistance is misunderstood. You need a rating well in excess of your intended use. Don't swim with a watch rated water resistant to merely 50 feet. The pressures the watch sees from your arms stroking through the water are quite different from merely dipping your wrist in standing water. The Buceador's 200 meter depth rating is the minimum for reliable use in routine water sports and amateur underwater activities.

Available in white, black and blue face, the blue is the one to grab. With orange accents and luminous hour markers, it makes a visual statement without shouting "DIVER!" as its clunkier cousins from other brands. It also eschews the ubiquitous engraved thick outer timing bezel of most dive watches in favor of an interior bezel under the sapphire crystal, which is rotated via the second crown.

The curvy stainless steel case has both brushed and polished surfaces. The Cuervo-modified and decorated commodity Swiss automatic mechanical movement keeps precise time in a stylish package. The strap is synthetic rubber secured by a stainless steel deployant clasp. This is an unusually expressive diver, not the blunt instrument usually seen in this sector of watches. (via Cuervo y Sobrinos)

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Arnold & Son Scout GMT Navigation Watch

Updated Jan 2, 2008

1st to recommend

Description

Arnold & Son was a premier British watchmaker that specialized in navigation timepieces for longitude location back when the Brits were assembling an empire and networking the world via sailing ships. Now a Swiss watchbuilder co-habiting the same tent with Graham (another once-British specialist in chronographs) under Swiss parent The British Masters, Arnold & Sons continues the brand's traditional navigation focus.

The Scout is an arresting watch, though not for being loud but for being beautiful and functionally interesting. Using an Arnold-modified commodity Swiss automatic movement, the Scout displays primary time, plus a second time zone. The second time zone display doubles as a solar compass and the circumference bezel permits easy and precise triangulation for fixing your unknown position at sea, referencing the known position of at two mapped features. The orange and black color scheme on the face is enhanced by the craft of the compass point markers. All the navigation graduations are precisely rendered.

This watch has a polished stainless steel case with a coin-edged outer bezel. The casework is at Jaeger levels and the best I've seen for anything not made by Jaeger than has a street price under $5000. At 44.5mm diameter, the Scout isn't small, but it doesn't wear like a pie plate either. The case contours and its relative thinness for a multi-function watch, plus the beauty of its face, make it tasteful yet loaded with presence.

The Scout has a sapphire display back, and the movement elements in view are nicely decorated. The watch is not made in high volume and the dealer network is small. You won't see it on every wrist. It's not a known icon; Arnold is a brand in-the-making in the modern watch world, and the Scout won't broadcast status other than that which derives from taste, imagination and an appreciation for the distinctive. The Scout comes on a synthetic rubber black or yellow strap with polished and signed buckle. A stainless steel bracelet is an option. (via Arnold & Sons)

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Oris Chronoris Automatic Mens Chronograph Watch

Updated Jan 1, 2008

1st to recommend

Description

The ubiquitous chronograph, a staple of masculine watches, is frequently rendered illegible, its face crowded with dials or rendered a tuna-can-caricature of timekeeping when made big enough to give its registers some breathing room. Then there's the problem that most chronos look alike, distinguished only by black, silver or white face as backdrop for the standard three subdials chronograph layout. Yes, of course the Jaeger-LeCoultre Master Compressor Chrono is visually and functionaly distinctive and exemplary in its crafting. But its near five-figures street price isn't in everyone's reach. If you want something masculine, distinctive, iconic, tasteful, mechanical and affordable with sports timing capability, the Oris Chronoris is for you.

The modern Chronoris is a modern update on Oris' motorsports-inspired, iconic 1970 Chronoris, still with the click-stop inner timing bezel and the stopwatch sweep second hand. For today's version, Oris enlarged the case a bit (now 40mm across w/o crown, up from the original's 37mm) for more wrist presence without putting a wall clock under your cuff. The thin orange click-stop bezel is there, along with Oris' trademark "big crown". The commodity Swiss automatic movement is Oris-modified. The new Chronoris adds a minute counter at 12 o'clock.

People bemoan '70s styling, remembering only the shag carpet, big lapels, gold chains and blow-dry hair on men. But they forget that '70s excess came later in the decade. Along with the clean and sweet 1970 Camaro, the early Shark Corvettes with thin chrome bumpers and flying buttress greenhouse, and the '70 Dodge Challenger, this Chronoris is inspired by design themes from when culture was on the bubble and confidence, optimism and exuberance were in perfect balance. The sleek truncated oval, two-texture brushed and polished case surfaces, and the uncluttered dial precisely graduated for timing functions puts you back in a time when people were still excited about going to the moon.

Oris commissioned an era-appropriate perforated black leather racing strap with brilliant orange edging and a deployant clasp. They include an alternate stainless steel bracelet along with the changing tool and spare pins to alternate looks at will. It's all wrapped up in a convenient and cool leather travel case. This is a man's watch that won't overwhelm your wrist, oozes cool, and don't be surprised if your wife or girlfriend lifts it now and then before you get a chance to strap it on in the morning. (via Oris)

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Fatman iTube Vacuum Tube Amp for iPod

Updated Jun 2, 2007

1st to recommend

2 people recommended this item

Description

Gawd, I hate my iPod. Not even noisy old speed-unstable 8-tracks stripped so much emotion from music as an iPod full of mp3 files does. Imagine dumping all the clean, full-bodied digital bits that were once on a CD, now stored on your iPod, into your washing machine. Fill with bleach, full-strength. Wash, rinse and spin. Shovel the now-sharp, brittle little buggers out of the tub and transfer to the dryer. An hour later, pour the abrasive heap back into your iPod. That's about what happens to music that passes through an mp3 mill and your 'Pod on the way to your ears. Where's the Tone; the Big-T TONE that puts the sound of live music in your head? Aw, it's been bleached out, trampled and scraped to the bone by lossy compression and wrung moistureless through the wringer of the itty bitty chip amp squeaking away just behind the headphone jack.

Well, here's how to get your sound halfway back to some semblance of expression -- a neat and tidy remote controlled iDock connected to 13 juicy watts of emissive vacuum state glory per channel! You'll use this just like a cheesy plastic case chip amp iDock, except it's gleaming polished steel, with the heft of real iron, and it spews a restored stream of full-bodied Tone. Wire this up to a pair of Zu Tones or Druids, or any other 95+db/w/m speakers to hear iPod tunes rehydrated. You won't go back to the usual white plastic dock box that blows. (via Bluebird Music)

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Haupt Shirts for Men

Updated Nov 13, 2006

1st to recommend

2 people recommended this item

Description

Who are you? Before you're close enough to hear, you're easily seen and you're making an impression. It might as well be a good one. A shirt is a fair percentage of the observable surface area of your walking billboard of a persona. Haupt can help sharpen your message. Their shirts are German engineering exercised in fabrics. Imagine the precision and tmeless design of a Leica in textiles. But unlike dour German cars that are all left brain and bleached of emotion, Haupt shirts are interesting every day you wear them. Meticulous craft + precise execution + artful expression = a bump in your street cred. Haupt shirts feel exact yet look indulgent, whether in cotton or Haupt's specialty, tencel.

Wear that Jaeger Master Compressor Geographic watch, elsewhere on my list, under the sleeve cuff of your Haupt shirt and feel your personal style snap like a Leica's bayonet mount as you twist its lens into place with a click. (via His Favorite Shirt)

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Robert Graham Shirts for Men

Updated Nov 12, 2006

1st to recommend

Description

What's your visual language, the idea of you that people begin inferring before they get close enough to hear you speak? In a casual dress business world, where New Economy Blue still hangs over the male wardrobe from the Burst Bubble of Shortsighted Excess of 1999, it's been time to move on. But where to? One of the few canvases for expression among the male tieless employed is the shirt. And no one is making more expressive shirts than Robert Graham, an American designer working in Indian cotton who understands emotion in clothing without veering off the masculine rubric for color, pattern and form. Particularly in stripes, RG's color intensity is striking. Aside from the gorgeous fabrics, RG's shirts are detailed with accent embroidery and contrasting panels in relatively hidden places, like the reverse side of cuffs, collars and plackets. "Knowledge, Wisdom, Truth" is tagged on every RG shirt and somehow when wearing one, you feel a little closer to all three. At first look, some men will think it takes unusual confidence to wear an RG shirt. That's the point, isn't it? But really, slip into one and you'll see that you should have found these shirts a long time ago. Jacket, jeans or a suit, people will want to know how you found your style, and where you buy your shirts. What's your visual language? Here's a start.

Robert Graham shirts fit a little closer so you'll take one size up from usual. (via Robert Graham Shirts)

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Audion Golden Dream 300B PSET Vacuum Tube Monoblock Power Amplifiers

Updated Nov 7, 2006

1st to recommend

Description

You can buy more powerful audio amplifiers. Quieter ones too. Even cheaper on both counts. But you cannot today exceed the sheer tonal richness and emotive density attainable from the Audion Golden Dream 300B SET amplifier (monoblock pair needed for stereo). If you have the combination of speaker efficiency, room size, and habits to live your audio life within 28 watts per channel, this is as far as you need to look for landmark multi-decade sound.

The equivalent of alt- or indie music in the audiophile realm is "SET," Single-Ended Triode amplification. SET is embraced and admired by what the Best Buy and Magnolia crowd thinks of as the lunatric fringe of hifi, for its beautiful, holistic, liquid tone, honest presentation, and achingly emotive fidelity to the original music. In an SET amp, there is no splitting of the positive and negative waveforms during amplification, as there is in the more common "Push-Pull" topology. The price of having one tube (or a pair in parallel) do all the work is inefficiency. On a per-dollar basis, you don't get much power in conventional terms, but you do get heat. But well-executed, an SET amp can deliver uniquely glorious sound.

The Golden Dream uses a pair of legendary 300B triode power tubes in each monoblock in a "PSET," Parallel Single-Ended Triode configuration, to coax 28 watts from a pair of tubes that normally will only deliver 7 watts each in SET mode alone. Audion also trimmed out the bass bloat all too typical of 300B SET amps, so you get the bass depth and linearity of a pentode below 100Hz, instead of euphonic harmonic distortion down low. Like its brother the Elite 845 amp, the Golden Dream is loaded with silver in the signal path and in the transformer secondary windings. Parts quality is uniformly high and components are hand-matched during assembly.

Even on speakers much less expensive than the $16,000/pr. cost of the Golden Dream, a pair of these amps plainly exhibit their unrivalled midrange magic of human tone. Nothing screams fraud like a reproduced human voice missing its expression and humanity. The Golden Dream seemingly reconstructs convincing tone from shards of fidelity left unmolested on your CDs and even tone-barren MP3s. Vinyl through these amps just plain kills.

The 845 tube Elite has a little more jaw-busting drive, while the Golden Dream bests it in refinement, grace and sheer emotive tone. As with its younger brother, the Golden Dream monoblocks include input level controls and the input sensitivity to be driven by a disc player directly. Still, the right preamp makes the sound whole. If you have the beans to pair these up with the Audion Quattro preamp, you'll be immersed in the deep-water music expression only reachable in the context of aurally holographic fidelity.

Short on Benjamins but want as much of the same sound as you can possibly afford? Check out Audion's more affordable 300B, KT88 and EL34 tube amps in their Silver Night, Golden Night and Sterling ranges. The title link goes to the US distributor, while the link below leads to Audion's UK international site. (via Audion)

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Audion Elite 845 3-box SET Vacuum Tube Stereo Power Amplifier

Updated Nov 7, 2006

1st to recommend

Description

The equivalent of alt- or indie music in the audiophile realm is "SET," Single-Ended Triode amplification. SET is embraced and admired by what the Best Buy and Magnolia crowd thinks of as the lunatric fringe of hifi, for its beautiful, holistic, liquid tone, honest presentation, and achingly emotive fidelity to the original music. In an SET amp, there is no splitting of the positive and negative waveforms during amplification, as there is in the more common "Push-Pull" topology. The price of having one tube (or a pair in parallel) do all the work is inefficiency. On a per-dollar basis, you don't get much power in conventional terms, but you do get heat. But well-executed, an SET amp can deliver uniquely glorious sound.

The trouble with most SET amps is deficient power. You need hyper-efficient speakers to get satisfying volume and dynamics from two to seven watts per channel. Zu speakers have the efficiency to make those watts go a long way, but not everyone has Zu. Nor a small room to limit the challenge of filling it with satisfying music. The answer is the Audion Elite, the best 845 tube amp going.

Built around the big, sexy, retro, illuminating, Fritz-Lang-meets-Tesla vibe of the fistful-of-glass 845 triode, the Audion Elite pumps out 24 honest watts per channel with enough drive to sound like 3 times that into real speaker loads, while keeping that heavenly triode tone intact. A simple 3-tube circuit per side, this 3-box stereo amp is inexpensive to own and maintain, thanks to robust build and good contemporary Chinese tubes that sound great in this circuit. The Audion Elite amplifier has a big-toned dynamic sound that's also refined, subtle and fresh.

The sonic, tonal and drive match with Zu speakers is sensationally synergistic, but in most rooms, this amp has the muscle to pump triode tone at satisfying level through any speaker with at least 88db/w/m efficiency. Unlike most euphonic triode amps with round sound that also seem a trifle slow, all of Audion's amps have their trademark transient speed, transperancy and definition, including the big-tube Elite.

Most digital disk players can drive the Elite inputs directly, and each channel has a level control so a single-source system can get by nicely without a preamp. Still, tone is even more truthful with a preamp, so if you have the eggs, mate the Audion Quattro preamp with the Elite power amp for an experience at the very top echelon of musicality in audio gear today. There are a ton of decent SET 845 tube amps around right now, thanks to an explosion of discerning music loving EEs in China, the US and Europe. Hard to go wrong with any of them, but this one is the best so far, making everything from Government Mule to Drive-By Truckers, to Tom Waits to Rosa Passos to Shostakovich sound convincing, penetrating and true. (via Audion)

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Audion Premier Quattro 2 and 4 Box Pre-Amp

Updated Nov 7, 2006

1st to recommend

Description

What's the best car? The best guitar? The best wine? The best loudspeaker? The best watch? In most categories, there is no "best," just contenders. In high-end audio preamps, however, this is the best, right now in 2006 and probably next year too: The Audion Quattro in 4 box or 2 box configuration. Preamps are troublesome components, having to accept a small magnitude and delicate signal and amplify its voltage so that same signal can inform the muscle needed from the power amp. Along the way, there are sockets, switches, volume and balance controls, and myriad solder connections to degrade that signal and, by extension, your sound. Then there's noise to be dodged, various amplifier input impedances to be mated to, and the circuit has to make as little imprint of its own on the sound as is possible in an imperfect world. At the end of the chain before hand-off to the power amp, the original signal must maintain its fidelity and meaty tone. All this is why many audiophiles are frequently heard declaring, "Preamps suck!"

Well, they don't. There are always a few good ones and while nothing outward about an Audion Quattro suggests why it is the best preamp, it nevertheless is.

From their first preamp well over a decade ago, Audion has consistently demonstrated special insight about preamp circuits. Using vacuum tubes, their circuits combine speedy transient response with seamless, fluid tone that preserves the emotion and expressiveness in any music you play. If you play vinyl, Audion phono sections have always excelled as well. The new generation Quattro delivers these qualities same as before, but just more so. Even driving other manufacturers' power amplifiers, the full-bodied holistic tonal fidelity of the Quattro preamp informs the performance of everything downstream from it.

Not the last word in convenience, the Audion Quattro is a multi-decade purchase with dual-mono construction, so yes you have separate switching and volume controls for each channel in a stereo system, but effort is low and the rotary volume switch makes channel-to-channel matching quick and repeatable. No, there isn't a remote control option either, at least not yet.

I've owned or heard every preamp worth mentioning in high-end audio for the past 40 years and owned several during that time. This preamp will place more tonal realism and impactful emotion in your system than any competing preamp you can buy.

If you look through my list here on ThisNext, you're probably getting the idea that an Audion + Zu soundchain is something you ought to be playing your music through. Americans can contact Ray of Sound at the link, to find a US retalier. Everyone else can find what they need at Audion's UK web site, below. (via Audion)

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Cuervo y Sobrinos Torpedo Pulsometro Chronograph Watch

Updated Nov 6, 2006

1st to recommend

Description

Pre-Castro, Cuervo y Sobrinos was a Havana watchmaker of considerable renown. Now CyS is located in Europe and crafting Swiss automatic movement watches that also resurrect many of the expressive mid-20th-century Caribe-Latin tropical case shapes and dials that evoke a more elegant and understanding era. Put a Cuervo watch on your wrist and feel your heart rate slow, your stress level drop, and your euphoria level climb every time you check the hour. The case shapes are decidedly vintage but updated to the newer large sizes of contemporary timepieces. Project a higher sense of style than the generic status brands, keeping the quality but eschewing the lack of imagination. Look at this watch -- now THAT's a watch face! The Cuervo y Sobrinos web site shows the full spectrum of lazy Cohiba style they offer. My favorite is this Torpedo Pulsometro Chronograph in stainless steel. Your dial can be black & white, all black, 2-tone cream, or my favorite, black & cream.

Your watch is often noticed before you're within speaking distance, so make a careful choice that telegraphs your taste and imagination. THIS is a careful choice for an independent-minded man. (via Cuervo y Sobrinos)

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Hamilton Ventura Mens Watch

Updated Nov 12, 2006

3 people recommended this item

Description

The original Hamilton Ventura was designed to introduce the first battery-powered electric watch movement in the mid-1950s. Still located in Lancaster, Pennsylvania at that time, Hamilton blended its art deco heritage with the prevailing space age / jet age / nukie zeitgeist to come up with a distinctive and daring wrist aesthetic. In the 1960s and 1970s, as all things '50s became uncool for awhile, and Hamilton faded as a domestic watchmaker, the Ventura receded from public view. But I still remember how extravagent the Ventura looked on the wrists of middle-aged businessmen in Pennsylvania during my youngest desk-diving Cold War years, and the look stuck with me. Today's version is a splendid repro, but with a quartz movement it's more accurate than ever.

By the way, the "Shop for this at:" link above leads to Amazon.com. I don't do business with Amazon -- ever -- but I piled on another thisnext user's recommendation and unfortunately the Amazon reference was embedded in the entry. Here's an alternate dealer online: http://www.ewatches.com/Hamilton/Ventura.html. (via Watches Planet)

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Denon DL103 Moving Coil Phono Cartridge

Updated Sep 29, 2006

1st to recommend

Description

Probably the single-greatest value in high-end audio for 40 years running, the original Denon DL-103 moving coil phono cartridge was introduced in Japan as a broadcast standard when most people had black & white TV. I bought my first one, the currently defunct "D" version, in 1974 for $300. It sells for $229 retail today, which is amazing given that this is a painstakingly built product whose innards were nano-scale before nano was now. I still use the 103 in all my turntables today.

Moving coil cartridges generally combine low voltage output with superior resolution and musicality, but they require a step-up transformer or pre-preamp between the cartridge and the phono input on your preamp or receiver. Some phono preamps have moving coil inputs to handle the low level output of these cartridges. Check your gear to be sure. Fortunately, with the ubiquity of the Rega RB-300 tonearm and similar imitators on most turntables today, you can usually fearlessly mate the Denon DL103 to your rig. The stylus is conical, which is kind to your records and renders setup comparatively unfussy. Cantilever is aluminum. All the materials are ordinary to keep the price low, but design and execution are executed beyond the price class. In a world of 5-figures phono cartridges as delicate as angel's breath, this Denon puts you in the realm of fully dimensioned, tonally rich, satisfying high-end analog glory for a small fraction of the cartridges that can otherwise match or beat it. Its excellence is in the balance of traits that cannot in this world all be made perfect. In audio, this is one of the living legends. If you don't want to spring for a step-up device, try the cheaper, high-output Denon DL-160 instead. (via The Needle Doctor)

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Thorens - TD 2030 Turntable - Turntable

Updated Oct 1, 2006

1st to recommend

Description

Yup, vinyl still sounds best. I know, I know....what about the snap, crackle and pop? You know what? After over two decades of living with the quiet background of CDs along with the flat, hard, cold sound, a little analog noise isn't so bad. Not when it comes with the emotion, dimension, big-T Tone of analog molded into plastic. Kids who grew up slipping peanut-butter-fingered silver discs in the CD player are discovering this, so how about you? CD sales are declining, downloads aren't making up for the loss, but vinyl and turntable sales are.....GROWING!

Of course, 12 inches of vinyl won't fit in your CD player nor will its laser read them, so you're going to need a turntable. There are a lot of choices and many are quite good at multiple price levels. My turntables are vintage '70s battlewagons, but if I were buying today, this Thorens is one of the turntables I'd buy. It is a simple suspensionless design with emphasis on quality where it counts. The main bearing is ultra-quiet and maintenance-free. The plinth is anti-resonant, dual-slab acrylic sandwiching a thin poly membrane in transparent blue. The platter is 14 pounds of aluminum with anti-resonant backcoating, for good flywheel speed stability. Motive is belt-drive using a regulated AC-synchronous motor. You can buy the TD2030 with the versatile and industry-standard Rega RB300 tonearm or the SME M2. Order it with the Rega and add an aftermarket "Heavyweight" counterweight from Expressimo. Three compound cone feet limit energy transfer from surroundings and are adjustable for level.

Altogether, the plinth materials and design, the main bearing, and the quiet drive provide the right tonal fidelity from a spinning vinyl disc. And analog fans know that turntables are design statements too. This one kills. The plinth is clear head on, but edge-of-space blue from above. Everything is finished to a high lustre and nothing superfluous is present. Here's a hint. Put a Denon DL103 moving coil phono cartridge on it and get an appropriate phono preamp. That's all you need to know about getting into the insanely-priced big leagues of vinyl playback for Tequila money. While you're at it, order some records, too. (via Acoustic Sounds)

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Sonno Versa CoolMax Mattress from Design Within Reach

Updated Sep 28, 2006

1st to recommend

Description

This is the best memory foam mattress I've found. It has a 15 year warranty, never needs to be flipped, and won't harbor insects or trigger allergies. No springs, nothing to come apart or deteriorate and, most important, no fatigue on your part. It's great with DWR's low-profile Italian beds that use no box spring. (via Design Within Reach)

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Guild F512 12-string acoustic guitar

Updated Sep 22, 2006

1st to recommend

Description

I picked up a guitar for the first time in 1968. One of these days I might play well enough to justify all that time. But nevertheless, quite a few guitars have congregated under my roof somehow, and I know Tone and longevity when it's in front of me. Sooner or later, every guitar player owes him or herself a 12-string. Sometimes described as an orchestra in your hands, an acoustic 12 string has tonal complexity and acoustic power that makes a 6 string brother seem malnourished by comparison. But you don't want just any 12-string. The tension on the structure of the guitar is deforming. A lot of companies give you a lightweight instrument that sounds responsive out of the box, but just watch what happens to it over the next decade.

Guild 12-strings are built to a different standard. The Guild 12 is a piano in your lap. Yeah, it's heavy but that's not all. It packs stunning acoustic power. You don't just get the leading transient of a note, you get the full Joe Frazier wallop of telephone cable strings reaching out to rattle your ribcage and bang on your skull. You'll think you're Glenn Gould in sandals with 15 pounds of instrument instead of several hundred.

With Guild's trademark double-truss rock maple neck, big head, and jumbo body braced to survive centuries but tuned for Tone, this is the 12-string to have. It's going to sound great out of the box, but it's going to sound sensational as you play it in over the next decade. The Guild 12's sound only improves, never degrades. Dig deep and play. Leadbelly played a big Stella, but he'd have wanted one of these if he could have had it. The F412 has maple back and sides, the F512 has rosewood. Both are factory handmade spruce-top American guitars. (via Dream Quest)

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Oris Flight Timer Limited Edition WWII Commemorative Man's Watch

Updated Sep 19, 2006

1st to recommend

Description

Right off the bat, people are going to ask you what that big knob at 2 o'clock on your watch is for. It's a big polished stainless steel protrusion set off the watch case a bit, shiny enough to be a control element on a Harley-Davidson, and you've seen smaller doorknobs. Well...not really. But it's unusual. Not without purpose though. See, this watch tracks time in THREE zones at once. So when you've flown out of your home airfield in Honolulu with a fuel stop at Johnston Atoll headed to Majuro in the Marshall Islands and you want to keep all three times on your wrist, that big knob at 2 o'clock is handy to twist with your gloved hand in the chilly cockpit when the radio call comes in to send you to Ponape instead. When your itinerary changes at the last minute, that third time zone is easy to change without taking this watch off your wrist.

Oris has other chunky Flight Timers but only this commemorative to 60 years of (relative) peace since the end of WWII tracks time in three zones, and has that intriguing knob. It's a limited edition, black & white no-nonsense face to read 3 zones plus seconds, in 42 mm of steely aviation glory. You get this watch in a polished wood presentation case and it ships with both the burly brown leather pilot's band and a stainless steel contemporary alternative. Only 1945 copies made. Now, wouldn't you rather have a watch with a story instead of just a watch? (via Authentic Watches)

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Oris Sinatra Limited Edition Man's Watch

Updated Sep 21, 2006

1st to recommend

Description

Frank Sinatra was never underdressed, but that didin't mean he wouldn't have to put the fist of his watch-wearing arm into the kisser of some lug who let a careless insult slip. Especially if the insult involved Frank's dame, or Dino, Joey, Peter, and Sammy. This Oris dress watch is made for such a moment. When your shirt and jacket sleeves ride up your left arm as you extend a quick jab to take care of business, you're going to want to make the right impression on your adversary -- and any onlookers you've no doubt attracted. About 40mm of gleaming squarish stainless steel flashes your design sense just before crunch time hits. Your victim will be thinking the polished and blued numbers on the mid-century dial shame his own sorry timepiece just before you stagger him back on his heels. Or you might drop him flat with the hefty mass of steel encasing an Oris-modified Swiss automatic mechanical movement adding to your momentum. There's enough shock mounting for the movement to keep time right through the meeting of fist to face, like nothing happened. And the black stingray band is as tough and stylish as you are. There are several beautiful Oris Frank Sinatra tribute watches, but there are only 2090 of this one, ever. Each one comes in a cedar humidor to double as cigar storage, complete with a stainless steel cutter. Now which would you rather have -- this or some watch worn by a tennis player in short pants you saw on a billboard? (via Dream Watches Blog)

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Basil Hayden Bourbon

Updated Jul 12, 2006

1st to recommend

7 people recommended this item

Description

An excellent premium boubon for drinking neat, Basil Hayden is also my go-to bourbon for cocktails. Mix your Manhattan around this when you're holding the Pappy Van Winkle's 20 year old in reserve for sippin'. (via Small Batch Bourbons)

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Craftsman 11539 14.4 volt DieHard Cordless Drill/Driver

Updated Jul 12, 2006

1st to recommend

Description

There are bigger, heavier, more powerful cordless drills than this one and scads of wimpier alternatives. But this one is just right for a do-it-yourself homeowner. It comes with two batteries that charge in an hour. Torque is adjustable in 24 increments and a bright white LED illuminates your drilling area. Balance is spot-on, battery life is excellent. Only $80 bucks! (via Orchard Supply Hardware (OSH))

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