Ender 3 3d printer about 6 years ago. I bought it used for $100 on a whim with no knowledge on how to use one. Now it’s the most useful tool in my house. Need a slightly bigger hollow wall anchor? You can print one. Custom desk organizer? Print one. Name plates for a dinner party. Stamp to impress into wax or leather. Fantasy scatter terrain.
There is certainly a learning curve but if you can get proficient you can make countless helpful things that would would not be able to buy.
I agree but having a more reliable printer you don’t have to fix is even better. It allowed me to start teaching myself CAD and now I spend time designing stuff around the house rather than fixing or upgrading the printer. I use Alibre Design, allows you to buy outright and no subscription if you don’t mind being on an older version.
Oh, I agree. I use a different printer now too for most things but I still have the original one. The technology has really advanced in the intervening years.
Actually ended up meeting someone in vrchat. She moved to my state and we’ve been together since. Started with a Quest 2. Got a Pico 4 a year later. Looking to get a Pico 5 next year.
They (I actually bought two) are some no-name chinese scooters off Amazon. I’d link them but they’re no longer available.
Basically, wide deck, dual shocks for each tire, headlight, tail light, break lights, horn, twist throttle, 500W motor, folds down to easily fit in an RV storage compartment/trunk. Get around 12 miles on a charge at 20mph.
Perfect for small grocery runs, short trips, exploring areas where traffic/parking is shit.
Often times my gf and I will take the RV somewhere, use that as home base and travel the area on scooters. Great way to visit tourist traps without the hassle.
Noise cancelling headphones. My work requires a lot of air travel and I have trouble with loud noises in general. I bought a pair a year or so ago for just under $70 and it's as good or better than the more expensive one ($150 refurbished) I got in 2017. It also has a mode to let the external sound through if someone is trying to talk to you.
It really does eliminate some of the annoyance of air travel.
A decent blender. Not anything industrial like a Vitamix, it’s a Magimix which was about half as much but still durable and has replaceable parts. It’s fine for what I need and is lasting much longer than the pile of crap I had before.
Vacuum pack bags for clothes is another one. I like to keep my wardrobe seasonal but I don’t have much space, so packing it down helps.
Also anything reusable: PTFE/silicone baking sheets, rechargeable batteries, reloadable floss handles. All of these have saved recurring purchases, money over time and reduced waste (which made me feel good.)
How much is a Magimix? An entry-level Vitamix is “only” $300, but when I compare that to the amount I spent on my Ninja and various other sub-$100 blenders that I’ve burnt through or broken down in the amount of time I’ve owned my base-model vitamix, $300 is a fucking bargain.
Ah, it might be a regional thing. In the UK, the cheapest Vitamix is almost £400 where the Magimix was about £200 at the time. They might be pretty comparable but the prices don’t quite work out the same here.
Totally agree though, I was getting through a £50-75 blender each year for really silly breakages with no spares available.
I grabbed this Vitamix 3600 plus at a thrift store a couple years ago. I’m not sure how old it is, somewhere in the 50 year range I believe. Best blender I’ve ever owned and you can sometimes find them for like $30usd. https://lemmy.ml/pictrs/image/66ef65e6-d834-480a-916b-d7e93509e798.png
These are some items which I have purchased. which I’ve gotten alot of practicality and enjoyment out of
oculus quest 2
alliexpress h61 lga 1155 motherboard
aoc gm500 mouse
stadia midnight blue controller
i7 3770
macbook air 2012 4gb
They’ve served me well especially that little old but still gold quadcore and the motherboard highly recommend it to anyone looking to build a gaming beast would combo well with 16gb,rx 570
Proper leather boots. I got the red wing irons rangers. Took 3 months of to break them in but it was worth it. Now I have boots that will last me half my life if I take good care of them, plus they fit like a glove!
Proper chef’s knife and vegetable cleaver. Most of my military surplus clothes. A vaccuum sealer. Second hand books. My Traynor YBA-1. Some good boots. There’s definitely stuff i forgot, i don’t really buy items anymore.
It is worth learning. A single two sided whetstone and some basic skill will give you sharp knives for the rest of your life.
Bonus, keep your cheap knives. They are typically a softer metal that will require maintenance more often so you can practice.
Also learn when you need to sharpen and when you need to hone. Your knife may be sharp but the edge is out of shape (folded, bent over). A few swipes of a hone and you could be back to 80-90% sharp.
At this point I use medium value knives and sharpen them once a year. I have no regrets regarding learning to sharpen with a whetstone. I also typically don’t sharpen beyond 1000 grit and it’s still enough for people to remark on how sharp the knives are.
That’s no longer true. A dishwasher safe trend took over, most cheap knives are extremely hard now. I’ve a nice old set of not quite stainless that sharpen very easily and the ten thousand grit polish stone I have actually does something. Most new knives I sharpen for people I don’t even go over 3000 because they are far too hard to take much effect. My personal favorites are old Wiltshire 70s wood handled inox cleavers and Opinel knives, those opinel especially turn into a razor incredibly easily.
I bought some knife set that cost like 1000 dollars. It was an impulsive buy when I won an award at work.
Damn I learned expensive knives are worth every penny. I’ve had them twenty years. Normally I’d buy a knife and have to throw it away after a couple of years because they couldn’t be sharpened as they were cheap.
You can sharpen every knife. Better knifes stay sharper for longer, but they still need to be sharpened regularly. This also applies to ceramic knifes, which stay sharper even longer, but also need to be sharpened after a lot of use.
I’ve heard that, but I’ve only ever cut myself with the really sharp knives and yeah it’s clean, but when the knife is dull it just kind of pokes my finger and that’s it
In the last two years, its gotta be our air fryer/ convention oven. No preheating time for anything that needs to be cooked in the oven, exceptional heat distribution due to the convection and super consistent. If I cooked something at 400f for 15 minutes it will always come out the same way every time. I never use our big oven anymore. I love it.
We have the one that the Wirecutter recommends which is the Cuisinart Chef’s Convection Toaster Oven TOB-260N1.
I don’t eat hash browns so I can’t say for certain but I’ve made fries, onion rings, calamari and chicken nuggets in it and they all came out perfectly crunchy so I’d image hash browns wouldn’t be a problem.
I’ve held off because that’s the best recommended one I’ve always landed on but it doesn’t use a basket. My stove also has a small top oven already but I know the air fryer would be awesome. The only people I know that have them have basket models and I’m worried I will have buyers remorse if I end up with just a third oven that sits on my countertop.
We purchased it as both a counter top oven and air fryer all in one sort of deal so it was worth the purchase for us since we didn’t have a counter top oven prior to it. If you already have a counter top oven then the purchase may not be worth it as much. The reason why this purchase was excellent for us is because it’s an extremely good counter top oven and it can air fry.
Doesn’t help that the official one is on aliexpress with a bunch of knock offs. But the actual pinecil works really well with the same 60w charger I use with my pixel 4a.
I can use the same wall plug or portable battery for my laptop, phone, and soldering iron, and it has a bunch of nice qol features.
There’s an accelerometer built-in so it can detect when you put down/pick up the iron for sleeping the heater and also for orienting the display. The new version also has Bluetooth so you can monitor/control the iron from your phone/PC.
The heating element is in the tip so you are less likely to burn your fingers and it’s also far more efficient so it’s able to heat up very quickly and handle large pads for its size.
It can draw up to 85W through a barrel jack or USB-PD.
I paid $25 for it and have gotten a ton of use out of it.
I put away my expensive soldering iron and use this one exclusively now because it’s just more convenient to use.
I would definitely recommend it for new or experienced users, it’s a great value for the price.
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