What tech product would you buy if you were not locked into an old one?

FAST6191

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Go descriptive titles.

General premise though.
Many of us buy technologies that are what we find the best at the time (for the budget) but however long down the line and there is better stuff out there, however because of accessories, software, incompatibility with other workflows and so forth the idea of swapping becomes hard.
What then do you have that were you coming in cold today from nothing you would pick differently?

Common ones around here I imagine will be phones. Did you go IOS but now because of years of paid software don't want to swap to Android? Or maybe you went the other way and long to be a filthy mac user for a home computer/laptop.
Another might be tools. Everybody seems to have gone battery powered/cordless in recent years for a lot of things, including trades I never expected (I seriously met mechanics that barely use air line gear which is unheard of really). Of course every company does their own mutually incompatible batteries and chargers for them. That then sees some buy into one brand for everything even if they would otherwise mix and match. Personally I have been delighted to get everybody's now old and "useless" corded or air line tools for nothing.
Did you train yourself on a software you wish you hadn't or had picked another for?
Do you have a kitchen appliance that is built in and bothers you accordingly?
With some caveats a computer is basically its motherboard. Replace that and you replaced the computer. Did your last motherboard limit you to certain hardware? Did you screen limit you to something or cause some wallet pain come upgrade time?
Car is car is car but there are things that might change that, especially if you work on them yourself.
Do you regret buying a given game console and wish you had gone for another but now also have a stack of games for the first one?

For myself. I don't really have anything. I tend to roll with whatever scraps I find or buy cheaply, and pretty much all software I use is open source or free, which makes things hard for some of the ways above but nothing I have any great investment in. Part of that is a deliberate choice though to avoid the being locked in issue.
 

Flame

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i have tech of almost every company expect apple. because it feels like if you use apple, its apple or nothing.

i know people who think apple created electricity. i love tech, and using tech of different companies and don't want to be one only.
 
Last edited by Flame,

Alexander1970

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Hello.
1111smiley_emoticons_seb_zylinder.gif


I tend to roll with whatever scraps I find or buy cheaply

Yes,that is my Attitude for "Tech Products".
I do not care if it is the pre-pre-year Model or used (the main thing is cheap).
The only Condition - It should work.:)

Brand ? Is completely irrelevant to me.

Thank you.:)
 

subcon959

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Since you mentioned kitchen, one of the worst decisions we ever made was to go integrated appliances as we are now stuck without redoing most of the kitchen. That was the first and last time I ever get tied down like that.. everything free-standing next time.
 

Seliph

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This may not count but when I first got a guitar about a year ago I bought a Stratocaster because I thought it looked cool. It's a fantastic guitar however didn't really fit the punk music I wanted to make but I used it anyway and it was mostly okay. I thought about buying a new guitar but I just ended up modding it by putting a humbucker pickup in the bridge (I never used the bridge pickup anyway) and now it sounds amazing.
 
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Silent_Gunner

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Not going with Ryzen for my what is my current build. Granted, I made my current build back in 2018 and Ryzen wasn't quite to the point where they were definitively the better choice, as I remember reading that the earlier Ryzen chips didn't play nice with certain kinds of RAM and various other issues. Still, seeing as the new consoles have just come out, it'll be nice when my next build will have superior hardware to both of them, as the adage about hardware that releases to market being outdated already by the time it does so goes.

*evil laughter*
 
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Ryccardo

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In general I am not a fan of the direction the modern tech industry is going (in fact I bought a top notch 2010 laptop in 2018 and I am sure as hell not changing it until it's totaled, you can't get anything with comparable build quality for 180 € for sure) AND I don't have the time I had as a teen to try two operating systems a week so I may be biased, but:

I can't find any Linux distro I would use for more than a week - despite Devuan being the #1 candidate, there just isn't any direct alternative to Paint.net (Pinta, which aims to be a clone, isn't one on the basis of gross instability and different features) and of course all the closed source programs for console modding and assorted chinesium gadgets...

@Flame
Apple stuff... Yep, as an owner of two iPods (a Mini 2G and a Video 5G) I can say that there are, in fact, good alternatives to iTunes (for music at least, a little less for videos and pretty much nothing for photos, but none of them are as intuitive as "the real deal"

As for the examples in OP, I actually have changed multiple times between all three major smartphone OSes - not a big deal (have some paid apps for each, but only Apple has ever got money from me - the others were credit from a legitimate sponsored-surveys-for-digital-money site - and even then less than 25 € total), if anything it has proven that the winner in format wars never is the technically superior one :(

Drill batteries - also not a big deal, we've owned one 2004-2012, and a different brand 2015-today, for a grand total of two batteries (now if we were takling laptops...!)
I was definitely amused by a friend with a Makita boombox that of course takes Makita batteries, though!

I technically still have two 3DS-compatible consoles, but haven't actually played with any of them for two years!
 
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Stwert

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To be honest, nothing at this point. Although I’m pretty much an Apple guy - yeah I don’t care, slag all you like. I spent years working with, repairing, programming for and using as a consumer, only Windows systems, and I just got so sodding sick of them that I switched to Macs for my personal use.

I do still have a Windows desktop as well as my iMac and MacBook, along with a Linux server. I buy iPhones (mainly) because I like them. I have had a fair few Android phones (and still do have a few) because every now and again one comes along and I go, oooohhhh, nice. So I buy it, inevitably use it for a few months, before selling it and buying another iPhone.

I don’t give much of a shit about being locked into any ecosystem. If I want something, I’ll get it, no matter who makes it. I have no particular fondness for any company, I use what best suits my needs and that’s all there is to it.
 

KleinesSinchen

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i have tech of almost every company expect apple. because it feels like if you use apple, its apple or nothing.

i know people who think apple created electricity. i love tech, and using tech of different companies and don't want to be one only.
That is my stance on this too. Apple is compatible to Apple. Apple sets questionable trends – and if they get away with something (and they generally do) the others start copying the trend leaving the consumer with no choice to not participate. Examples: not easy replaceable battery, general bad repairability including DRM preventing replacement of parts, removal of wired connectors (including headphone jack on phones), locking devices forcing an OS and a store.
In addition to that Apple products are not worth their very high price (NOT durable) and even on the used market prices are ridiculous → No Apple technology for LittleSinchen. Real apples taste better anyway.
==========

What @FAST6191 mentioned with the cordless things and battery power everywhere is also a bad trend. Headphones? Two tiny batteries. Cable is big no-no. Bluetooth loudspeakers. Also large batteries in powerful tools like vacuum cleaner, lawn mower… Producing electrical energy storage is resource-hungry and I mostly avoid battery power if possible (even if less convenient).
==========

For my entertainment electronics: I hardly buy anything new anymore (was different up to 15 years ago). The longer somethings lasts the better and when it fails I try to replace it cheaply (My Dolby/DTS amplifier is from 1999, lacks HDMI but meh: Works!). Not buying new but taking whatever comes first for a reasonable price makes sticking to one brand impossible. Giant tech companies are generally not very likeable for me so I try to not support any of them directly more than needed. The flea markets are a good source (not this year though) for getting perfectly working things for very little money. Just thinking about that I got a lot of (S)NES/GB(C) games at the end of the 1990s for literally less than (converted) one Euro per cart… I wish I bought MORE.

Normally I like XKCD, but this one wasn't very convincing making fun of the smart guy: https://xkcd.com/606/
Yes, I think the guy playing games with a delay is the smart one and the other two persons are… let's say… not so smart.

Devices connected to the internet: Open source software whenever possible but I'm not dead set against starting a VirtualBox running Windows if this makes something easier (happened twice this year).
Devices not giving me full/root permissions → They may burn in hell.
 
Last edited by KleinesSinchen,

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