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Cut experts out there. Are these two diamonds equally cut?

No they are not but why are you limited to only these two stones?
 
Not limited if we could find better
 
No, not in my opinion. The 1.73 looks a lot nicer.
 
tyty333 said:
No, not in my opinion. The 1.73 looks a lot nicer.
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Thanks so much, you have been very helpful. Now just have to weigh up if its worth it to go bigger for a reduce in clarity and a little in cut.
 
DiamondSEEKER 1452 said:
Thanks for that. Why do you prefer it? It is worse in colour grade + clarity than the 1.73 GIA and it is more expensive
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It is an H color, VS2 clarity which is a nice combo - a white, eye clean stone. I am not sure of your price range; both of the other stones say unavailable so their prices aren't listed. It probably is more expensive (by how much I'm not sure) but it is a super ideal cut stone so it takes the guesswork out of the cut which you seem to be going back and forth on. Compare the idealscope image to the two you are looking at and you can see the difference. WF has a much better trade in policy should you ever want to do so as well. The other two stones are .20 apart and we don't really know your price range - if you can narrow down the size, color and clarity parameters along with your budget them we can look in earnest for other stones for you.
 
MissGotRocks said:
It is an H color, VS2 clarity which is a nice combo - a white, eye clean stone. I am not sure of your price range; both of the other stones say unavailable so their prices aren't listed. It probably is more expensive (by how much I'm not sure) but it is a super ideal cut stone so it takes the guesswork out of the cut which you seem to be going back and forth on. Compare the idealscope image to the two you are looking at and you can see the difference. WF has a much better trade in policy should you ever want to do so as well. The other two stones are .20 apart and we don't really know your price range - if you can narrow down the size, color and clarity parameters along with your budget them we can look in earnest for other stones for you.
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Thanks for that! 1.70 or bigger, G or higher colour, no florescence, under a 2 on Holloway, clarity is a hard one but has to be eye clean, $17k budget
 
I agree with MGR that I'd prefer top cut quality over all else and I would go with Whiteflash, personally. But of the two stones you linked, I'd choose the first, because the clarity would bother me on the second one.
 
Definitely go with the 1.73. Anything eye clean and G on whiteflash will be way, way more expensive. Even dropping down to H will be out of your budget. That being said, if you want to go bigger down the road, you are basically locked in with this diamond (unless you win the Powerball.) With WhiteFlash, you could upgrade even if its a dollar more. For a future anniversary, you could drop 3000, and get a much larger diamond with the same characteristics.
 
island21 said:
Definitely go with the 1.73. Anything eye clean and G on whiteflash will be way, way more expensive. Even dropping down to H will be out of your budget. That being said, if you want to go bigger down the road, you are basically locked in with this diamond (unless you win the Powerball.) With WhiteFlash, you could upgrade even if its a dollar more. For a future anniversary, you could drop 3000, and get a much larger diamond with the same characteristics.
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yes, Whiteflash has a great upgrade policy but they charge you a few thousand more for that luxury. That could be worth it BUT they don't have the same technology as James Allen where you can see the stone + their showroom is in Houston. Hard one.
 
James Allen prices are available on the mobile site even if they've been previously reserved.

To be honest your options are quite straight forward, if there's even a possibility you want to upgrade, WF / GOG are your only options, unless you want to pay another 17.5k with JA. You are concerned about VS2 be VVS2, but if it's eye clean, it doesn't matter, the only difference is bragging rights, there is 0 effect on beauty/sparkle. Very subtle difference G and H, did you set that arbitrarily or through looking at diamonds physically in a shop?

You need an honest chat with the wife to be, is there a possibility she'll ever want an upgrade or is this her forever stone. If the answer is yes, then it makes no financial sense to use JA. If it's definitely no, choose whichever vendor you please.

Please don't choose JA over WF if there's a chance of future upgrade because of invisible clarity improvement and 1 colour grade or you may regret it later, 5, 10,15 years down the line
 
DiamondSEEKER 1452 said:
yes, Whiteflash has a great upgrade policy but they charge you a few thousand more for that luxury. That could be worth it BUT they don't have the same technology as James Allen where you can see the stone + their showroom is in Houston. Hard one.
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Whiteflash doesn't have the same technology as James Allen? Huh?

I'd take a WF stone over JA one 90%+ of the time due to the fact that all technical imagery is already provided for you the buyer instead of having to bug JA for it (and they won't even provide ASETs nor will they even guarantee that they will have IS images for all stones they list). Plus WF does have video (though I do prefer JA's video tech slightly more than WF's, but I prefer BGD's upgraded video tech even more than JA's).

Of the two you originally posted, the IS on the 1.73ct looks better to me than the higher weight one. VVS2 is usually overkill (unless it is a very good deal) given that most stones VS2 and higher will be eye-clean.

DS1452, would highly recommend that you take gm89uk's and island21's advice seriously. If there is any chance that your future Mrs wishes an upgrade to her stone, you better have deep pockets if you choose to go with JA. WF, GOG or heck, even BGD, have better upgrade policies.
 
Diamonds prices fluctuate over time. Yes, over the last few decades, they have risen well over 100%, but there has been a slow but steady decline in prices over the last few years. I am not an expert in this area, but DeBeers continues to lose market share (and therefore price controls.) The one advantage of WF's upgrade policy is that if prices continue to decline over the next 5-10 years, you may be able to spend 100 bucks, and get a MUCH better diamond for an upgrade. It's just a way to protect your investment.

That being said, you can't go wrong with the 1.73 from JA. It's a great stone from the information provided.
 
Ditto bmfang but I go 99.9%...Whiteflash provides way more evaluation tools than JA. Granted their
video may be a little harder to see the stone because it is showing fire/brilliance/sparkle.

Whiteflash stones are considered Super Ideal Branded. They are AGS000 (Ideal Light return) graded
H&As (images to back it up) with very tight specs. Idealscope and aset images are included to
verify light return. Basically, there is no second guessing with an ACA. When you buy an ACA you
know you've bought one of the best.
 
I'd go one step further than what tyty has said and state that if you purchase an ACA (heck, even a WF Expert Selection on occasion), any Brian Gavin Signature/Black, Crafted by Infinity, GOG Ascendancy H&A or Victor Canera Ideal Hearts, you are buying one of the best performing diamonds available on this planet. Period. JA's True Hearts range, some are, some aren't. YMMV.

And the funny thing is, all of these vendors I mentioned before the JA True Hearts range use AGS as their grading lab (GOG at times use AGS, GIA or both GIA/AGS). There is too much variation in what GIA considers to be a triple excellent cut diamond IMHO compared with how AGS do cut grading. And AGS have developed a speciality in this aspect of diamond grading.

It is a mission of mine to make it known to friends and work colleagues that are searching for a diamond that if they really care about how brilliant and sparkly a diamond is, they should care about cut quality above all else and that AGS is the ONLY lab that I know of that does cut grading scientifically to ensure that they get the best performing diamond on the planet. So because of that, I always end up telling them to shop online rather than a local B&M vendor who only tell their staff that GIA is the best, blah, blah, blah without them knowing what AGS do. Heck, I've had to school some sales staff on cut quality when I've gone in to just look at what stock they have available in-store (and then I've had their managers ask me whether or not I want a job there - not with the salaries that are on offer).
 
bmfang said:
I'd go one step further than what tyty has said and state that if you purchase an ACA (heck, even a WF Expert Selection on occasion), any Brian Gavin Signature/Black, Crafted by Infinity, GOG Ascendancy H&A or Victor Canera Ideal Hearts, you are buying one of the best performing diamonds available on this planet. Period. JA's True Hearts range, some are, some aren't. YMMV.

And the funny thing is, all of these vendors I mentioned before the JA True Hearts range use AGS as their grading lab (GOG at times use AGS, GIA or both GIA/AGS). There is too much variation in what GIA considers to be a triple excellent cut diamond IMHO compared with how AGS do cut grading. And AGS have developed a speciality in this aspect of diamond grading.

It is a mission of mine to make it known to friends and work colleagues that are searching for a diamond that if they really care about how brilliant and sparkly a diamond is, they should care about cut quality above all else and that AGS is the ONLY lab that I know of that does cut grading scientifically to ensure that they get the best performing diamond on the planet. So because of that, I always end up telling them to shop online rather than a local B&M vendor who only tell their staff that GIA is the best, blah, blah, blah without them knowing what AGS do. Heck, I've had to school some sales staff on cut quality when I've gone in to just look at what stock they have available in-store (and then I've had their managers ask me whether or not I want a job there - not with the salaries that are on offer).
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I agree with cut being above everything else...but why would any BM store offer you a job after you've basically talked down their staff and inventory? It's not like they'll start carrying AGS000 stones from then on.

OP, between the 2 stones...I'd go with the first one. The second stone has symmetry issues similar to a stone I recently bought but contemplating whether to keep or not.
 
koolio2017 said:
I agree with cut being above everything else...but why would any BM store offer you a job after you've basically talked down their staff and inventory? It's not like they'll start carrying AGS000 stones from then on.

...
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That particular store (which is the flagship store of the chain) is considered to have the best selection of diamonds (and watches). While they do not have AGS000 stones (I'm in Australia and GIA graded stones have a major market presence here alongside IGI Mumbai graded stones and EGL USA) they have a decent selection of GIA graded stones and have the ability to custom source stones for clients.

The manager there was surprised at a consumer having that much knowledge compared with his staff who were there on the day and was glad to have found someone who was enthusiastic about product lines they were selling (the vast majority of staff in that store are sales staff who only have the most rudimentary knowledge of products they sell there, be it jewellery or watches). My other hobby of watches also came into play as well as they had recently lost their watch manager, I had made a purchase of a timepiece from them the week before and the store manager and I were engaged in some rather upbeat banter about new watches that had just been announced at Baselworld). But that distracts away from the OP's post.
 
koolio2017 said:
I agree with cut being above everything else...but why would any BM store offer you a job after you've basically talked down their staff and inventory? It's not like they'll start carrying AGS000 stones from then on.

OP, between the 2 stones...I'd go with the first one. The second stone has symmetry issues similar to a stone I recently bought but contemplating whether to keep or not.
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Thanks Koolio, can you notice the symmetry issues to your naked eye?
 
DiamondSEEKER 1452 said:
Thanks Koolio, can you notice the symmetry issues to your naked eye?
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No, I cannot...but it really bugs me that it's there. It is only visible when you are taking a picture of the arrows (with a white cone and camera directly on top)_...it persists on the IS and ASET. It was a big purchase for me and I hate to spend that kind of money and not be happy.
 
koolio2017 said:
No, I cannot...but it really bugs me that it's there. It is only visible when you are taking a picture of the arrows (with a white cone and camera directly on top)_...it persists on the IS and ASET. It was a big purchase for me and I hate to spend that kind of money and not be happy.
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Thanks for your response. Most definitely, you have to be happy when it is thousands of dollars spent.
 
DiamondSEEKER 1452 said:
Thanks for your response. Most definitely, you have to be happy when it is thousands of dollars spent.
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There are so many factors that you will not be able to get everything within your budget...lol...sigh. I just don't know why that spot bothers me so much...everything else is good. Anyways, good luck in your search for the perfect one!
 
Hehe yes, our very frustration! Thank you! My advice back to you is definitely return your diamond if you can. If you are bothered now you may never be satisfied. Just my 2 cents. Good luck also :)
 
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