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PS community's most highly recommended online for diamonds?

rich2012

Rough_Rock
Joined
Jul 11, 2012
Messages
6
Hello Everyone,

So glad that I found this site as it has been very informative. I attempted to perform several searches but I failed to find a post that served my purpose.

Doing some online browsing and research I've found Adiamor and James Allen were among the top sites in terms of customer satisfaction and price/value. My motivation when it comes to purchasing anything is that I get the most value for my money. In other words, if I want a 1.25 carat, excellent cut, H color, VS2 clarity diamond, I want to ensure that I didn't miss out on a diamond on another site which had identical specs, identical quality, and the same customer service levels at a lower price.

Do James Allen and Adiamor qualify as among the most highly recommended for my needs? I've also heard WhiteFlash ranks highly in terms of customer service and value.

Thank you in advance for any feedback that you might have on this topic,
Richard
 
Re: PS community's most highly recommended online for diamon

Whiteflash and James Allen are the top contenders that I see the most here on PS, so I know they are highly recommended. I have not seen Adiamor but then again, there are a lot of great sites that I have yet to see. As always, if you are shopping for a diamond go ahead and tell us the details on what you are looking for. Everyone here is fantastic about finding those hidden gems.

Edit: I just checked out Adiamor and they are similar to Blue Nile in the sense that they do not give you actual photo images of the diamond. This will make it difficult to compare the actual performance of diamonds from their site. Have you tried contacting them to see if they can send you photos or idealscope images of any that you are interested in?
 
Re: PS community's most highly recommended online for diamon

Thank you both for your reply. As for the diamond, the more I read the more my preference changes. I guess that's all part of the learning process. :tongue:

So far I like these ones:

1. http://www.jamesallen.com/diamonds/H-VS2-Excellent-Cut-Round-Diamond-1461128.asp
2. http://www.jamesallen.com/diamonds/H-VS2-Excellent-Cut-Round-Diamond-1441102.asp

...as they meet my desired specifications:

1. Carat is equal to or greater than 1.25
2. Cut = Excellent
3. Clarity = VS2 or better
4. Color = H or better
5. Price = in the neighbourhood of $10k

I understand that clarity for most/all VS2 or better are almost always "eye clean", while color H or better is essentially colorless to the naked eye. I also have come to understand that cut is the most important in terms of giving the diamond it's shine/brilliance.

Then I find that simply dropping the color requirement to I, and the clarity to SI1 gets you this diamond (a 1.51 carat diamond):

http://www.jamesallen.com/diamonds/I-SI1-Ideal-Cut-Round-Diamond-1451192.asp

Decisions, decisions... :oops:
 
Re: PS community's most highly recommended online for diamon

I've been really pleased with JA. If I'm not mistaken, WF charges return shipping on any stones that you have brought in for idealscope / gemologist review (which for the 1.5's I was looking at was roughly $150 per stone)?

I am currently looking at 3 choices through JA and got IdealScope images of all 3 within 24 hours of request. Also the followup and information provided by their reps has been wonderful. Best of all, no penalty for returning stones!

When looking at a $10k purchase, it's not the end of the world to pay $300 to return the two that I didn't choose, but if going through JA first means I save that $300, that's a win in my book. That's why I chose JA as my first option.
 
Re: PS community's most highly recommended online for diamon

I'll also say that after shopping in your price range, you can find some very good performers in the 1.5c range that meet your budget.

I dropped my color requirement to I, clarity to SI1 (which isn't so bad depending on the inclusions). When you do that, you can easily find a 1.5c, 7.3-7.4mm dimension stone with GIA XXX, HCA <2, SI clarity, I color for 10-11k. Then it's just a matter of finding one that shows eye clean.
 
Re: PS community's most highly recommended online for diamon

tampabull|1342041041|3232522 said:
I've been really pleased with JA. If I'm not mistaken, WF charges return shipping on any stones that you have brought in for idealscope / gemologist review (which for the 1.5's I was looking at was roughly $150 per stone)?

I am currently looking at 3 choices through JA and got IdealScope images of all 3 within 24 hours of request. Also the followup and information provided by their reps has been wonderful. Best of all, no penalty for returning stones!

When looking at a $10k purchase, it's not the end of the world to pay $300 to return the two that I didn't choose, but if going through JA first means I save that $300, that's a win in my book. That's why I chose JA as my first option.

WhiteFlash has an outstanding stock of diamonds in-house for which they post idealscope images, magnified images of the stones and ASET images! This costs nothing extra! They have their own stones cut and that is why you can get consistently outstanding stones there. I wouldn't ask them to call in stones. James Allen is partly owned by a diamond supplier so they can access a lot of stones but they aren't all to the cut quality of WF's in-house stones. WhiteFlash has a much better trade-in policy if you ever want to upgrade the diamond. You pretty much get what you pay for with all of the vendors.

WhiteFlash, James Allen, and Good Old Gold all supply images and information regarding clarity, etc. which places them above drop shippers with no images for me.
 
Re: PS community's most highly recommended online for diamon

PASS on the first two stones!

Before you make a decision use this tool to help you weed out fugly stones:
http://www.pricescope.com/tools/hca

input the table, depth, CA, and PA - a number will be given to you. Usually stones that get a score of 2.0+ means you should reject it depends), and anything under warrants more investigation (Ideal-scope image).

For example... the second stone you chose:
ugly_stone.jpg
the red arrows indicate where the stone looks dark, and this is from the fact the crown angle and pav. angle are not optimal to produce a nice, bright stone.

This is an ideal stone:
nice_stone.jpg

see the difference? =) Might I add both are H VS 1.25 stones.

If you post what you want and your budget, many can help you find a great stone!
 
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