Pepsi Comparo - CF vs Noob (pic heavy)

[OldNavitimer]

OK, just got CF Pepsi delivered yesterday and wanted to compare it to the Noob. Nothing scientific here; no measurements or weights, just visual and on-the-wrist feel comparison and contrast.

Let's get stuck in!

Noob

CF

Even, identical 5500K LED lighting shows subtle differences in bezel insert colours. Noob is more purple in the blue and more brown in the red. Overall winner for color goes to CF.

These two outdoor shots show the colour difference to be a bit closer. Still, Noob is purple and brown, but not by much.

CF on the wrist in natural light. Wow. Just Wow. I know the flaws, but still.

Direct natural light makes the CF colours really pop!

Case comparisons: Noob on left, CF on right

Here you can see differences in overall thickness, crystal height, case lug shape, bezel knurls, etc.
The engravings between the lugs are much nicer on the CF.


Noob 6 & 18 transitions under macro:

CF 6 & 18 transitions under macro:

Noob bracelet SELs:

CF bracelet SELs:

Overall impressions: CF is clearly better, but not by as much as I would have thought. The Noob is still a great build. There is a reason why it was so flippin' expensive when it came out. But today, I'll take the CF, as it's 10% better in every direction, despite some flaws. I'm not even comparing xtals here, because they both suck. Going gen or Prof is a given.

Build quality on the CF feels excellent and the bracelet is a bit nicer than the Noob. Having had four Noobs since they were released, I can attest to massive differences in bracelet quality. This Noob bracelet is the best I've had, but the CF is better (clasp code Y8C).

Upgrades? Crystal for sure, but not much else. I'm over the pixel jockey nitpicking. No one will notice any of this stuff, not even ADs. Fat lugs, missing bezel lip, wrong bezel knurls....none of this is noticeable on the wrist. The CF is very, very good. The Law of Diminishing Returns will kick in hard after the crystal replacement. Everything else is just a waste of money, IMHO. YMMV.

 

[brantzim]

Fantastic comparison. Love the detail in the pictures and explanations!


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[KJ2020]

Great review bro, your pics are excellent as always. I know how hard it is to show detail clearly without unwanted reflections or blurriness and that challenge is even greater when you have two subjects. Really well done!

I think your assessment will be in line with a majority of buyers, there's just no need to sweat the small details. Some of them can be easily fixed if people are really bothered by it. I just modded in a bezel lip just to see how feasible it would be. It's not a big deal.

Congrats on your new awesome piece and thanks for the great post!

 

[OldNavitimer]

....And it looks great on blue RubberB too!

 

[saucin]

Great comparison and awesome pics. Thanks for taking the time to post this! Love that blue RubberB on the CF!!!


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[Wolex]

Very nicely done pal! Picture tells a thousand words and this comparison is no doubt useful for would be buyers like me! Thanks a tonne!

 

[senator]

great review bro, thanks for that!!

 

[StreetFighter]

Lovely pics, they are very similar but as you say the difference is in the build quality. If you say one is more blue the other more purple - my gen mk3 has a bit of purple about it for sure, it's more blue than the mk1 and 2 though.
I'm not sure about that rubber is doing it any justice, hmm.. Pepsi really suits the jubilee imo.

 

[subhunter101]

What I wanna know, is….after all those hours and money they spent to design and engineer the bezel and watch in general…how did they miss the obvious bezel ring that goes around the insert? The gen has a way bigger “lip” around the coloured insert

 

[GrandmasterChime]

What I wanna know, is….after all those hours and money they spent to design and engineer the bezel and watch in general…how did they miss the obvious bezel ring that goes around the insert? The gen has a way bigger “lip” around the coloured insert

They didn't miss it, the reality of making one bezel for the pepsi and one for the other gmts would not be worth the cost. Going forward I doubt rolex will continue to have a different bezel either. It may be that this came about in the first place because the original was white gold so it was made a little thicker because of the softer material. I'm speculating.

Sent from my SM-G988B using Tapatalk

 

[subhunter101]

They didn't miss it, the reality of making one bezel for the pepsi and one for the other gmts would not be worth the cost. Going forward I doubt rolex will continue to have a different bezel either. It may be that this came about in the first place because the original was white gold so it was made a little thicker because of the softer material. I'm speculating.

Sent from my SM-G988B using Tapatalk

It’s such an easy tell that it’s a replica then…it’s silly. Why pay 1:1 prices for something that has its main feature completely wrong

 

[GrandmasterChime]

It’s such an easy tell that it’s a replica then…it’s silly. Why pay 1:1 prices for something that has its main feature completely wrong

It's not a main feature. Are you asking why pay $500 for a copy of a 10k watch if it's not perfect? Really

Sent from my SM-G988B using Tapatalk

 

[KJ2020]

It’s such an easy tell that it’s a replica then…it’s silly. Why pay 1:1 prices for something that has its main feature completely wrong

It's a simple fix

Post 1472

https://forum.replica-watch.info/fo...si-picture-leaks-blro?p=10059234#post10059234

 

[shigetty]

Thank you for the great review! I can't wait for mine to arrive.

 

[OldNavitimer]

It’s such an easy tell that it’s a replica then…it’s silly. Why pay 1:1 prices for something that has its main feature completely wrong

It's not an easy tell on the wrist, at all. You can't even see it unless you are less than six inches away and even then the light has to catch it just right. Having both CF and Noob on my wrist, its basically invisible at normal reading distances. In order for someone to call you out on it, they would have to make you take your watch off your wrist. In the real world, this detail is a non-issue.

This is part of the point of doing this comparison. We are so used to pixel peeping at 5x + magnification, we can't see the forest for the trees. There's a lot more to the CF being the better watch than what you can see. It simply FEELS better, more refined. Not that the Noob wasn't great - it was/is - but this is better.

Funny enough, the one true tell between the two that would make me call it out as a rep is the datewheel being left-justified (in typical Noob fashion). But that's been talked to death, so I didn't mention the obvious. The datewheel, the color split at 18, and the brownish red in the bezel insert are the only immediate things that anyone could notice while on the wrist. Everything else is pixel peeping.

 

[watchguyusa1]

Don’t forget the cf has a proper vr3186 clone movement! Where the noob has the old CHS timebomb eta shit movement!

 

[mrlemonjello]

Thank you for the comparison. I’m wondering what you think about the rehaut engraving between the 2. I have a Franken LN built off of a Noob V11 base, and I’m considering upgrading the case to the CF. It looks like the only thing better about the Noob is the case (shape, CG, rehaut alignment), but the CF is better with everything else (and maybe rehaut engraving quality and finishing)? Does that seem about right?

 

[NFleischer]

Well done ! That CF does look like The Bomb, congrats. Noob ain't too shabby but not quite as good.

 

[OldNavitimer]

Thank you for the comparison. I’m wondering what you think about the rehaut engraving between the 2. I have a Franken LN built off of a Noob V11 base, and I’m considering upgrading the case to the CF. It looks like the only thing better about the Noob is the case (shape, CG, rehaut alignment), but the CF is better with everything else (and maybe rehaut engraving quality and finishing)? Does that seem about right?

Here's both macro of the rehaut, Noob on top, CF on bottom. In macro you can see how total shit the CF engraving is. It's like someone did a crayon tracing of the Rolex rehaut font and used that as a template. It's pretty bad. So yes, I would use the Noob (as long as the serial doesn't have 3s or 5s in it) case and bezel, and use CF for everything else.

 

[banditeleven2]

Thanks for the comparison. Great pictures. Noob looks more gen to me though.