Retro LED Watch : Take me back to the 80s!

"LED watches first came onto the market in the early 1970s. These were the first watches to use the current advances in modern electronic micro-circuitry, utilizing what was then the state-of-the-art display technology -- the light emitting diode (LED). A few years later, the technology behind liquid crystal displays (LCD) would advance enough for them to take over (mainly due to their reduced power consumption, replacing the "power-hungry" LED displays)."

Since fashion has a way of recycling things that were old and things that were daggy, we now (again) have the LED watch.

The watch from the LED-watch store (http://www.led-watch.com/) comes in four different styles. XRAY (BRUSHED STEEL), TX5 (GUN METAL BLACK), SPACE

(STAINLESS STEEL) and TX4 (CHROME SILVER).

I "test-watched" the TX5 (gun metal black). It is a very chick looking watch and from the weight, you can tell the quality of the band is of high standard. The display is a simple red panel with one line of 4 diodes.

There are two buttons on the right: one for the time, the other for the date. Yes, you have to press them to get the time/date to display for a whopping 3 seconds.

The official reason returned from an email enquiry: "...you need the push the button to illuminate the display, this is correct for all LED watches. It is to ensure long battery life and would be impossible for LED display to remain lit."

For some people, less is more. If that is you, then this is your watch.

By J.Sulte (aka Ramboy & friend of Mr.Gadget)