Ignoramus30509 wrote:

A week ago I posted a surprised message about a $6 watch from walmart
that seemed to be accurate.

I have a little more data now.

About 2 weeks ago, I set this watch very accurately to time that is
kept by syncronizing with an NTP server (atomic clock), to the second.

Today I checked time again whiel trying to be very good at catching
the right moment. I typed "date" and pressed ENTER just as the arm of
the watch passed :00:00.

The result is that the watch is not even by one second off!!!
Obviously, there are limits to my own precision in how I pressed the
return key right when the watch ticked :00, plus the OS delay in
starting "date", but in any case I could not detect any difference.

I find it rather amazing, really.

The watch is a quartz watch with hands, "water resistant".

i

Yes, the Borg-Mart need accurate watches to synchronize their minions...

Pete C.

I can't believe the amount of "going on" about time
to the second. If I'm within 5 or 10 minutes I'm
perfectly happy.
Buses are always late, Trains even moreso, and
airlines, you have to be there anywhere from 1 to 2
hours early anyway. I can't see any place that
requires that kind of timing. :-)
Even the various TV stations don't seem to be on
the same time. :-)
...lew... (of course I'm retired)

Lew Hartswick wrote:

I can't believe the amount of "going on" about time
to the second. If I'm within 5 or 10 minutes I'm
perfectly happy.
Buses are always late, Trains even moreso, and
airlines, you have to be there anywhere from 1 to 2
hours early anyway. I can't see any place that
requires that kind of timing. :-)
Even the various TV stations don't seem to be on
the same time. :-)
...lew... (of course I'm retired)

I'm sitting here in the home office surrounded by computers with
Internet NIST synchronized clocks and my three WWVB NIST synchronized
wall clocks for east, central and west. It's oddly amusing to watch the
hands on the wall clocks all step in sync and in sync with the
computers.

Pete C.