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| The Flux Capacitor Watch by ThinkGeek |
ThinkGeek is a great place to get your fill on geeky stuff. Their 'Invented at ThinkGeek' items are almost always a hit. I have quite a few of these exclusive items. ThinkGeek's latest awesomeness is the
Back to the Future Flux Capacitor Watch. At only $50, this thing is worth your...wait for it...time.
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| Makes time travel possible |
Out of the box, this thing is just amazing. Maybe I am just a major
Back to the Future fanboy, but I am truly impressed by the presentation. Even the box is really nice. The only complaint I have is the window shows too much of the foam surrounding. While the pack out is acceptable, generally, you use a more 'quality' padding material if you display it in a window. But enough about the box, we should talk about the watch itself.
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| This is heavy |
This is one bulky watch. The case is really thick and the band is fairly thick. Having said that, this does feel like a quality piece of jewelry and quite heavy. Watches are consider jewelry, right? I just wanted to write that sentence without using the word 'watch'. Because, you know that 'watch' will come up many more times in this post. I guess you could also call a watch, a....wait for it...time machine.
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| Flux capacitor, fluxing |
Telling time on the watch is a different from your typical watch. There are three 'arms' to the Flux Capacitor, each arm with four LED's. This makes twelve total LED's for the twelve hours on a regular clock face. Looking at the top left arm of the "Y", the four lights represent 1, 2, 3, 4. The right arm of the "Y" is 5, 6, 7, 8. Leaving the leg of the "Y" with 9, 10, 11, 12.
To read the time, press the middle button. The lights will blink three times. For example: at 9:41, the lights will blink 9, 4, 1. It takes a little while to get used to, but it is quite simple.
Does it flux? Well of course it does. The main reason to get this is to see the chasing lights. Just press the bottom button and flux away. The time circuits will show a random date...you just traveled to this date.
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| Time circuits, on |
The time circuits show the date; year, month, and day. The liquid crystal display is a little dim and difficult to read in some lighting. I wish this area was back lit somehow and would prefer the month-day-year format. But it is red, and red meaning Destination Time on the real time circuits. Oh, you guys at ThinkGeek think of everything geeky.
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| I have girly wrists |
As mentioned, this watch is quite bulky. I mean, look how it makes my wrist look all dainty. I am guessing this is due to the minimal spacing of the LED's, any closer and you would not be able to read the lights as separate lights. Also, the depth of the face needs to accommodate the "Y" and cable details, as well as the LCD time circuit screen. Plus, you need all that room in there to shield against the 1.21 gigawatts of power.
The bezel and band are stainless steel. Awesome, this matches my car.
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| I have a cool scar and cool car |
The watch is secured with a heavy duty clasp. This is a fold over clasp with dual button release, it also has a locking latch. The band is quite wide, not only making my wrist look tiny (again), but also covering almost a third of my awesome scar.
Watch dimensions:
- Band width - 24 mm (measured at middle of watch band, not bit rate of data)
- Case width - 35 mm
- Case length - 44 mm
- Case height - 17 mm
- Weight - 164 g (weight as is, without removal of links for sizing)
Is it worth it? If you read this far (by the way, thanks for reading), then you are obviously interested in
Back to the Future and/or watches. So, yes! For $50, you cannot go wrong. The cool factor alone is worth
$34.50, be a man. Any
Back to the Future fan will enjoy this. Plus, if you are driving your DeLorean and someone...everyone one...asks you "where is the flux capacitor?", you can show them your watch. Heck, you can even do the poster pose.
For another cool Flux Capacitor item from ThinkGeek,
check out their USB Car Charger. I may or may not do a review on this. But, it is really cool.
