Casio A178... meh
I didn't pull the trigger on the W217H but did with this one for very specific reasons...
...and it still didn't work out.
The A178 is not a new model. In fact, it's a 15-year-old model as its debut was back in 2002.
I like the idea of the A178. Larger digits, full weekday/month/day + time on the face, great night light, reserved styling, loud beep, buttons that are easy to press and the metal bracelet fits well.
Unfortunately, it's nowhere near as good as the A500W, which is the reason why I didn't keep this watch.
The A178 has a feature set that sits between the A158/A168 and the A500W/AE1200WHD, and oddly enough currently sells for less than the A158/A168 does. The only one that doesn't is the gold tone A178WGA (gold versions always cost more just because they're gold).
For a daily wearer, yes the A178 would work well. It's one of those watches that takes a very long time to wear down, especially with its "10-year battery" (which is actually 7 to 8 years with regular use).
The larger digits are very easy to read, and I'm pretty sure the A178 has the largest date digits on a Casio.
Where styling is concerned, the A178 carries itself well. Not too big, not too small, no crazy colors save for a little splash of blue with the WR text on the face (which means Water Resist).
There are certain Casio digitals I own for style and others for function.
The A158WEA is one I wear for retro style. Love the gold/metal look of it, love the retro style, love the F-91W module 593 reliability. And it's very comfortable. But the fact the month isn't displayed on the main timekeeping screen and the poor night light drive me nuts. And the lack of a countdown timer is annoying because that is a feature I use fairly often.
The A500W has the countdown timer and another thing I use often, multiple alarms. It has 5 of them. The night light isn't EL but it's still much, much better than the A158 and easily readable at night. I like the A500W so much that I added it to my wish list because I'd love to have a second one as a backup. Yes, I think the watch is that good.
The A178 doesn't really fit anywhere for my needs. It doesn't have the classic retro Casio style nor does it have an advanced feature set.
I'm not saying the A178 is a bad watch because it's not. It's designed well, sized well, is very legible and has a great screen with decent contrast. But in the end, the A178 really didn't do anything new or better for me compared to what I already have, so it was returned.
I would recommend the A178 for someone that likes the A158 or A168 but prefers having the full date displayed on the face in the most legible way possible. It's the information on the screen and the digit legibility that are the A178's best selling points, no question about that.
Said another way, the A178 has the biggest digits for an affordable digital watch on a metal bracelet. You can find other watches like the Timex Ironman Classic 50, which while having extra-large digits does not have a metal bracelet option. If your eyesight is poor and you are in the "I just need a watch I can read" camp, Timex has the best of the lot where affordable digital timepieces are concerned and you have to deal with a rubber strap to get that. But if the A178's large digits are readable for you, that's the best digital on a bracelet you can get where legibility is concerned.
All sunroofs suck (and so do convertibles)
General Motors actually had the right idea in the mid-1970s. Too bad the idea didn't last.
"The last convertible" was supposed to be the 1976 Cadillac Eldorado Convertible. At the time of production, this was GM's final sendoff to convertibles built in a General Motors factory. It was a message to the car industry and the world that the era of convertible cars was over and that GM would never build them again.
While the idea of having a car with no roof is very romantic, the reality is that it's one of the worst cars you could ever own.
The convertible sucks
Rain will teach you very quickly why a convertible car sucks.
Interstates in Florida have overpasses you pass under just like other states. While driving under one of those during a hard rain, you're almost guaranteed to see two types of people parked under the overpass waiting for the rain to stop. Motorcyclists and convertible owners.
It's easy to understand why motorcyclists park and wait for the rain to stop. But as for the convertible owners, there's a different reason. It's not because the roof leaks because it probably doesn't. It's noise. A canvas roof isn't sound insulated at all, so every drop of rainwater that hits is much louder than it would be on a hardtop. The noise inside a convertible is so bad during a hard rain that it's literally deafening.
There are other reasons convertibles suck, but the fact you can't even drive the stupid thing in the rain without going deaf is just plain dumb.
The sunroof sucks even more
The sunroof is the most widely available and cheapest way to get an open-air option in a car's roof without having your auto insurance rates go up, hence the popularity.
Sunroofs on trucks and SUVs always leak rainwater first because of roof flexing. Since trucks and SUVs ride high and have a lot of body roll, a lot of roof flex happens. Roof flexing breaks sunroof seals on the larger trucks almost too easily.
Coupes and sedans with sunroofs won't leak as early as trucks and SUVs will, but their fate is just the same. At some point the seal will break and/or the tubes will clog and/or the tube connectors will fail.
Is it easy to repair a sunroof when it starts leaking? Nope. There is absolutely no way to repair one properly without literally taking the roof apart and having the entire sunroof reinstalled again. Once a sunroof starts leaking, you have 3 options. Deal with the leak, seal the roof RTV silicone so it never opens again, or sell the car.
There is no such thing as a quick fix for a leaking sunroof. Doesn't exist. Oh sure, there are tons of YouTube videos offering "quick" sunroof fixes. None of them work.
Should carmakers stop making convertibles?
No. When GM stopped making convertibles after '76, people whined and complained about it loudly.
The whining got loud enough to where GM started having convertibles made again in the mid-'80s and has been making them ever since.
Anyone who has ever owned a convertible regardless of make, model or country of origin knows how terrible of a car it is. A ragtop is meant to be a weekender vehicle, as in something driven infrequently as best, never driven fast and always garaged. She's a fair weather cruiser that will spend most of her life taking up space in your garage that you could be using for other stuff, and that's just the way it is. You cannot use a convertible as a daily driver, and anyone who says they do is outright lying.
Carmakers know how bad convertibles are and would love to stop building them forever. I honestly believe the only reason the convertible still exists is just to shut people up.
Should carmakers stop making cars with sunroofs?
YES.
Sunroofs aren't even special anymore. Heck, it's available as an option on a Chevrolet Spark. Yes, the frickin' Spark has a sunroof option. The fact GM even offers a sunroof on a $13,000 commuter runabout car is just stupid. If you ever needed proof that a sunroof isn't a luxury option anymore, there you go.
But wait, there's more!
The "joy" that awaits anyone who has a car or truck with a sunroof is a moldy interior. All sunroofs inevitably leak, and once the moisture gets in, the mold starts.
How to clean out the mold? Use Sporicidin solution to get rid of the fungus (which is what mold is), an ozone generator to sterilize the air, and then DampRid to eliminate as much moisture as possible.
But even when all the mold is cleaned out, none of it matters if your sunroof continues to leak because the mold will come right back.
Sunroofs need to go the way of the t-top
In the GM lineup, the t-top lasted all the way to 2002. The '02 Chevy Camaro and '02 Pontiac Firebird both had t-tops as options. After '02, t-tops disappeared. The same needs to happen to the sunroof. It needs to be phased out and not return.
Whenever I see a car with a sunroof, I know it's junk. I don't care if it's a cheap $13K Chevy Spark or a $115K BMW 7 Series. If the sunroof is there, the car is total garbage.
Don't own a car with a sunroof. Ever. Just don't do it. Get a hardtop. You'll be glad you did.
Buying a Squier guitar just for the color
Every now and then, Squier will release a guitar in a special color. Is it worth buying?
Yes, it is.
Take the limited run Bullet Strat in red sparkle finish. It costs no more than a regular Bullet Strat. So in effect, when you buy this special red one, you get it just for the color since the electronics and all other specifications are identical to the regular model.
The reason why it's worth it to go for one of these is very simple. Look at how much Fender charges for one of their guitars with a sparkle finish. Big time sticker shock there.
Are there any MIM Strats in sparkle? Not at the moment, or at least none that I could find. If you want the sparkle on a Strat, it's either Fender USA Custom Shop or Squier.
The Squier is obviously the much more affordable choice by a mile. If you like red with a heavy metallic flake, get the red Squier.
Has a successor to the Casio F-91W finally arrived?
After all this time, Casio may have finally released something that's a proper successor to the F-91W, the Casio W217H.
The watch is cheap at just 20 bucks. Yes, I considered buying it but didn't just yet. I don't know if I will because I'm heavily favoring my A158WEA these days. That's a watch I wear pretty much daily now.
But I have to admit the W217H really does look like a modernized-just-right version of the F-91W. Very similar but bigger and heavier. The F-91W is 37.5mm lug-to-lug, 33.5mm wide, 9.5mm thick, weighs 20g. The W217H is 43.1mm lug-to-lug, 41.2mm wide, 10.5mm thick, weighs 32g.
The W217H isn't huge by any means, but it's noticeably larger than the F-91W. The digits are also taller and thicker but not really that much wider.
There is one thing that annoys me about the W217H. A very minor thing. The functionality of the top left and bottom right buttons have been flipped. The night light is now the bottom right and the button to switch from 12-hour to 24-hour or use for start/stop on the stopwatch is now the top left.
Why did Casio do this? Probably to address a common complaint of the F-91W. Many say it's too easy to hit the bottom right button and accidentally switch from 12-hour to 24-hour. I've personally never had that problem with the watch, but evidently a lot of other people have. So with the W217H, Casio just flipped the functions of the buttons, problem solved.
Aside from that button change, the W217H is functionally identical to the F-91W. I don't know what is being used for the night light. Most likely a green or amber LED but I know it's not EL. Another improvement is that the watch is 50M water resistant instead of just the standard 30M.
This model is obviously made to look very much like the F-91W. It uses the same battery, boasts the same 5-to-7 year battery life, has the same chrono and single alarm functions, looks good and has a larger-but-not-too-large case.
I love the plain styling of it, and again I might get it. Maybe. I really don't need another watch. But the styling of this works so well...
Fender American Pro Stratocaster with rosewood neck
This is a stupid guitar.
Two things before continuing. First, this is not the first time Fender has done this. Second, yes there is a Telecaster version. More on that in a moment.
A very common mistake guitar players say is "my guitar has a rosewood neck" when in fact the guitar has a maple or mahogany neck with a rosewood fingerboard.
This Strat however does have a 100% real-deal rosewood neck, meaning the entire neck is made from rosewood and not just the fingerboard alone...
...but that doesn't take away how stupid this guitar is.
Why is this guitar stupid?
1. You can't see the Fender logo unless you look up close at the pegboard. Yes, it's there.
2. The guitar looks cheap but costs 4 figures to get one.
I could forgive Fender if they released a Mexico version of this guitar, because then it would fall into 3-figure price territory. Probably $899 in 2017 money. And for an ugly special edition guitar from Fender, that's acceptable, albeit just barely.
But this is an American Pro Strat. It's not Fender Custom Shop. You pay $250 more for the "privilege" of having that all-rosewood neck.
If you really want one of these...
Why you would want one of these over a regular American Pro I don't know. But let's say you do.
My suggestion is GET THE TELECASTER. It's the better looking of the two guitars, and it's not just because of color. The Tele Pro just suits the stark contrast of light-color body vs. all-rosewood neck much, much better than the Strat does.
The only reason anyone buys one of these is to play casually at home from time to time, keep it a few years and then sell it later to make a few bucks. I don't agree with that, but if that's your goal, fine. The better moneymaker of the two is the Tele. The Strat just looks stupid and guitarists, myself included, don't like stupid looking guitars. If you buy the Strat, you will not make money on it later whereas with the Tele you will.
If you need further convincing the Tele is the better look at the two, examine special Strat and Tele models where the pegboard (as in the headstock) has the same color as the body. The Tele always looks better with that color treatment, whereas the Strat always looks best with a maple-colored pegboard whether natural or light tint.
Again, if you must get one of these all-rosewood neck guitars, go for the Tele. You'll be glad you did.