I would never buy the subscriptions that most people buy (YouTube Premium, Netflix or similar). It’s just too easy to pirate.
After building my first pc I will never buy a pre built again. I might never buy a pc again (pc of thesius!)
At some point if you decide you want a significantly newer or more powerful CPU or GPU (for example), there’s a solid chance you’ll need to replace the motherboard or the power supply. At that point, we’re playing Theseus.
Then again, mine was a 10 year old budget build and my hobbies changed significantly, so you might not actually need to upgrade at all if your computing needs aren’t hungry.
Yeah, replacing the motherboard is when I begin to consider building a new one and repurposing my current one. Because if I’m replacing the mobo, I’m probably going to have to replace the CPU and RAM, because the sockets will be different. And at that point, I might as well just go ahead and replace the PSU too, so the rating is up to date. Now I can rip out my old GPU and move it over, but that would leave my old build without one… And what if I wanted to use it for something that would potentially need a GPU, like a 4k Plex/Jellyfin server? My cooler can probably be repurposed, at least?
I might as well just go ahead and replace the PSU too, so the rating is up to date
A good PSU will have an 8-10 year or longer warranty so that’ll should a couple of refresh cycles or more usually. Especially if you’re upgrading every 3 years (I’m on a 5-10 year cycle, or more accurately a “whenever a key component dies or is truly no longer up to the task at hand” cycle)
you’re only saying that because you have the one computer
wait until you start running your own servers and whatnot. used prebuilts with some expansion room are the most cost effective
for my gaming pc, though? fuck no. just keep changing parts out as required
wait until you start running your own servers and whatnot
Oh yeah I forgot about that, I’ve already bought several computers by that metric.
I built my PC in 2003. I upgraded it 3 times. I still use the same case.
I don’t know if never.
But I don’t want a smartwatch.
I’ve never carried a watch in general and I don’t see the appeal of it when I carry a smartphone all day anyway.
I was in the same boat until I started running. It’s very nice to monitor heart rate so you can stick to a target heart rate.
I have been happy with my Garmin. It is functional without having to connect to anything, and data can be easily exported to a computer for more advanced processing. It is a handy GPS receiver that lets me monitor heart rate and log running metrics.
I freaking love wearing a wristwatch, but it’s most useful for stuff when you’re running around grabbing stuff trying to get kids out the door, or carrying a ton of stuff while setting up/tearing down a display for an event, basically situations not condusive to most smart watches where you have to do a gesture of some kind to wake the screen, you just want to quickly glance and continue
Also having been getting heavy into fitness (biking specifically but also some running and hiking), I get how cool having heart data and whatnot is, but ehhhh. Kinda not really necessary. I get handy GPS data from my phone and that’s sufficient. I can’t do anything meaningful with the heart data, but I can make very useful decisions with distance/time metrics! Or when lifting just knowing the weight I’m working with, how many sets & reps is more than enough
Streaming subscriptions. I swear the average nowadays seems to be like 4 per person because ppl don’t know how to torrent anymore
ppl don’t know how to torrent anymore
I’ll admit I was guilty of this until a few years ago, when I started learning the proper, safer ways.
Any advice? I’d love to stop paying for streaming services
I highly recommend the /c/piracy / /r/piracy wiki. Has guides, advice and links to the better public sites.
See the links on the sidebar of https://lemmy.dbzer0.com/c/piracy
Others have suggested FMHY and piracy communities, but besides the normal advice of having a trustworthy enough VPN and not g••gling something like “free movie torrent” and just clicking on the first link/links, one thing I’ve learned is just, assuming the file is somewhere around 750Mb, I think, seeing what VirusTotal has to say about it is advised.
Also, avoiding programs like BitTorrent in favor of things like Qbittorrent or Transmission is probably a good step. Last I checked, one of the communities said that at one point BitTorrent, or one of the old torrent clients, had become a virus ridden shell of its past.
Speaking of torrent clients, binding your client to your VPN is a good idea. You definitely don’t want your torrents to continue when your VPN disconnects you for any reason. Different clients may have different ways of doing it, or the setting will be in a different spot, so looking up how to do it for your client is a good idea, if you don’t know how to.
Though, I think this final part is real important for your safety when visiting certain sites to find torrents: have some form of working adblock! Because no reputable business want their ads on a piracy website, you might get caught up in a situation where you might get invisible full-screen ads that will take you to porn sites or other probably virus riddled sites just by clicking, sometimes without any way to get rid of said ads. That, or you’ll get lucky and the site just has normal ad placements, but they’re still not something you should click on.
not g••gling something
If you’re censoring because it’s a horrible company name, I just say “searching”.
English speakers (and in some cases even other language speakers) can watch pretty much anything nowadays through free streaming sites. Been binging myflixer for over a year.
✨alternative✨ streaming services are moral.
My country has a huge piracy tradition, we have counterfeit of everything and no one gives a fuck. I have this satellite decoder that let me watch any satellite-broadcasted channel in the world, and the guys who made those are so awesome that they also offer a streaming service they upload everything from all major streaming services, and it’s completely free, no subscription, you just buy their device and you have access to their private streaming
Yo ho
Adding to this, anything where I’d be paying a publisher middleman. Avoid whenever possible, pay directly if you’re in a position to support the creator/s of smaller projects.
This also applies to other things, like food ordering and travel accommodation. Some places offer a significant discount if you go directly to them - both of you get a bigger cut.
Tickets to sports events. Yawn.
Sometimes, I find it interesting to watch short clips of professional athletes doing exceptional things that most humans can’t do, but I don’t have the patience to sit on my ass for hours watching a ball go back and forth.
And concerts. I haven’t seen a concert since the 90s. I’m lucky to have grown up in the era of cheap tickets.
In the 70s, I worked in a record store that sold tickets for the local outdoor summer venue. Lawn seats were $3, and it took 45 minutes to get there. If we worked the day shift in the summer, and got off at 5, and that nights show wasn’t sold out yet, we could grab a $3 ticket, and be at the show before it started.
I was also a fan of the local orchestra, who played there every week, and never fully sold out. I went to a LOT of those shows.
Hadestown is coming to town, and I’d love to see it, but the cheapest seat in the last row, off to the side, is about $70, so they can go fuck themselves. Entertainment is for the rich. I’ll just pirate the show, if there’s a proshot of it. Besides, I love the original concept album much better than the Broadway version anyway. Hades is far better in the original.
Honestly even at the current going rates of $50-100 a ticket going to some good concerts is still a blast and still worth it. Also usually there’s going to be at least one opener and depending on the show they might have 2-3 bands performing. Personally I’m happy if I get to do 1-3 big concerts a year, and that’s really not that much to budget for even at $100/ticket, and some bands are freaking incredible to see live.
Also worth poking around to see if there’s any free/cheap music events near you or comparing with the cost of tickets to a music festival if you really want to be cheap/picky. There’s a couple of free music events I try to go to every year at nearish cities to me and it’s literally free entry and they’ll have a full lineup of bands for the full weekend. I’ve seen Bobaflex, Powerman5000, The Haunt, Black Stone Cherry, Taproot, Red Jumpsuit Apperatus, Fastball, Fozzy etc. all at these free music festivals
I used to work for a major record company, and part of my job had me handling backstage events at many concerts by many artists of every genre, so before my “retirement” from concerts, I had seen far more shows than the average person. Easily hundreds.
It wasn’t unusual for m to see three concerts a night - a classical concert in the early evening at the concert hall (over by 9), race over to the arena for a big rock show (probably miss the opener, but catch the headliner), then off to a small club for the the second jazz show after midnight (which is always the hot set). I would do that three or four times a month, with plenty of other one-show nights between.
It was a cool job, but I got pretty burned out on shows for a while. In the 21st century, I’ve been more into Broadway shows, which are also quickly pricing out of range.
I’ve been following this cool little band called High Fade, and I saw their post announcing their tour, but I was too late. Tickets were only $15, but they had been to my city 2 weeks earlier, and I missed them. It would have been my first non-Broadway show in decades. I hope they come back soon, they’re awesome.
I’m feeling like live music more lately, so I’m going to follow your suggestions, and start digging. If youre at a show, and see an old chubby guy rocking out next to you, say Hi.
In context that makes a ton of sense for why you don’t want to go to concerts anymore! Burnout is a bitch! But there’s something beautiful about once you’re past the burnout and try the thing again, where it’s been long enough it’s like trying it again for the first time except with the knowledge of what to expect and how to best enjoy it already there.
Rock on and enjoy yourself! 🤘
100%. I think I can finally go to a show again, and not feel like I’m at work.
Not that I’m complaining, it was literally the best job in the world, and I loved every second of it, but it does get tiring.
It took me a long time to view music as enjoyment again, and not as a way to make money. I got back to playing guitar during the quarantine, for personal satisfaction only, no plans to gig, and that’s allowed me find my musical passion again.
Thanks for letting me talk about it. I have nobody else in my life, who shares my love of music, that I can talk to about it.
My local B league hockey team does discount nights with cheap seats and cheap options for beer/soft drinks and snacks. My wife and I will get tickets, have a few drinks and snacks and spend a total of maybe a little over $20. Even on full price nights it’s maybe $50 for the same.
Plus there’s the fights that almost always break out. Or, as the saying goes, there was a fight and a hockey game broke out.
Lottery tickets.
They’re basically just a tax on the dumb. But man the slogans — all you need is a dollar and a dream, you gotta be in it to win it, etc. — sheer marketing genius.
Its not about the odds. Youre temporarily renting hope in a hopeless world.
I call it the stupid tax. I pay it knowing I won’t win but it would be nice to get some fuck you money.
I don’t mind spending 10 a month to maybe pay off my house years early.
The lottery people aren’t looking for one person to buy all the tickets.
If you are buying 10 a month and a significant amount of people think like you then they are going to make bank on that.
If you win I expect a “Fuck You” reply and a picture of a ridiculous amount of cash
At least it is a crown corporation so the money goes to the province not to a private company.
If I ever win, I will track down this comment of yours and show myself posing with an incredibly large pile of loonies($1 coins with a loon on them).
I will buy one but that is it. It enhances the fantasy when there is a non zero chance something could happen even if ridiculously unlikely. That being said all the big, dreamworthy jackpots are no longer a dollar and much like fast food that has become to rich for my blood.
I buy one maybe a few times per year. Its also a very good gift to someone. You get a bit of excitement together and there is always that tiny chance of winning.
That tax goes both ways.
There are moments where the potential payout for a ticket is greater than the value of the ticket.
In that mathematical moment, buy exactly one ticket.
There are moments where the potential payout for a ticket is greater than the value of the ticket.
Has this ever happened in recent history?
In that mathematical moment, buy exactly one ticket.
I’d say buy as many as you can within the amount of money you’re ready to waste. Same as with investing, pretty much.
The expected payout is negative so no, not similar to investing. It becomes the opposite, pretty much.
Apple anything
You must buy $1600 iphone to support failing US economy.
Please don’t look at all the alternatives that are 3 years ahead in tech and 1/3rd of the cost.
Ahhhh but those devices don’t have ‘the ecosystem’. You know, that bloated software that locks you into apple everything by making a handful of tasks marginally more convenient for the tech layperson.
TBH nowadays android is becoming just as guilty of the walled garden bullshit. We need mobile linux and we need it now.
Hard agree!
The only Apple stuff I use are phone, watch, headphones. I don’t use Google products or services and haven’t for a decade, so it’s my other good option. I don’t wanna fuck around with custom ROMs, and my last phone lasted almost six years.
Windows and Linux for computers. Unfortunately I have a game that’s extremely important to me that is impossible to run on Linux.
Even if you’re not in Apple’s ecosystem, I think iPhones are pretty great phones. Expensive yes, but they last a long time.
Yes, buy a secondhand google pixel, it’s better for privacy/security etc with grapheneOS installed. But if you like apple hardware, nothing wrong with a secondhand iphone
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Why would you need a VPN? Is it for pirating content?
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So I first learnt to use a VPN on holidays at my grandmothers lake house in the Middle of now where.
She showed me how to make VPN the traditional way and after that i went on a holiday to France where I perfected my way of making VPN.
That’s not really where the story starts though in this recipe I will show you all the tricks I have learnt. It all started 13.8 billion years ago…
Obviously.
Thanks to Technology Connections - Dishwasher/Laundry pods. Soap with pretty colors, and probably more soap than you need per load. I’ve swapped to powder and literally cannot tell a difference at all, and instead of 8 dollars for 10 loads I now am getting an entire box with like, 40 loads for $8.
And if you want something convenient for laundry they have the laundry sheets that don’t release plastic into your water so that’s nice.
But personally if I want a known amount each time for each load I just use a scoop.
I bought a massive box of dishwashing powder a bit over a year ago and I’m maybe halfway through it, it’s like magic. Thank you technology connections!
Is liquid detergent still a bad deal? I have no qualms against using powder instead, but my family always stuck to using bulk laundry detergent liquid (I forget the unit size of the 100 load bottle exactly), and I thought that was a good deal.
I’d say it’s better, but not great. Environmentally it still comes with a giant plastic jug that needs to be disposed of, and we all know how plastic recycling is. On your wallet, if you think bout it, you’re not just paying for the soap, but the water and the weight/shipping of that water to get to your home from the factories.
Powder is really the same thing, but you have water at home to mix it with, that happens in your washing machine. So, naturally it is going to be cheaper.
- Phones on contract payment plans
- New monitors: Maybe my eyes suck, but my set of two 21-inch LCD monitors from 2005 is still going strong
- Third-party meal delivery: I’m fine sitting down with a microwaved meal or some canned soup if I don’t feel like cooking
- A new car every x years: My car of choice is old and relatively cheap, so I could afford to pay in full in cash. Bonus of being spyware-free, so I’ll just maintain it for as long as I can.
- Stuff from Aliexpress, Temu and the like: the user experience is horrendous, customer service is nonexistent, and discount codes are pure gimmicks
I was with you up until aliexpress.
There’s definitely junk on there, but if you look for high purchase volume plus good ratings you’ll get plenty of high quality stuff (minus the middle-man markup).
Am wondering, how do you complete a transaction on Aliexpress? On Librewolf and Firefox, something always goes wrong for me at some point, usually a bogus security check failing or buttons mysteriously ceasing to work.
Huh… FF is my main browser and I’ve never had an issue. Could it be an extension issue?
New monitors: Maybe my eyes suck, but my set of two 21-inch LCD monitors from 2005 is still going strong
Your eyes don’t suck. You just want to abuse them for some reason. Modern display tech is way easier on your eyes.
How so? I’d expect two monitors showing the same thing at the same brightness would be physiologically identical.
The monitor my work provided me is much more recent and it touts:
- Reduced blue light emissions (thought I don’t know how that should be achieved without affecting color accuracy)
- 90 Hz refresh rate
- Potentiometric brightness control to avoid PWM flicker
Some individuals are much more sensitive to the latter two, but I don’t feel much of a downgrade when I come home to my crappy old monitors, hence I joke that my eyes suck.
I got a OLED monitor and it gives me more eye strain then my old monitor. I’ve tried software and hardware setting and it still persists. Flux, dark mode, high contrast settings, brightness settings. Tried it all, unless there is something I missed.
I use it sparingly now while playing FPS games (picture is amazing by the way, wish my eyes weren’t like this)
Am I the only one that would never change a car? Like you buy one, shouldn’t you keep it for 60 years? Why should anyone want to change a car? I had to change my car once because I’m Canadian so it rusted. It was awful.
Yeah, my 1st car died a rust death due to its winters in Syracuse (basically a Canadian climate). I’m 40 y/o and my 2nd car is still going strong (much to my wife’s dismay)
My last car was 30 years old when I ditched it, the underside was rusted to a point of no longer being safe. Plus the exhaust kept falling off.
my problem is I can’t even find a car to replace my old one. been trying, but when 2012-2014 is the newest model they make of what I want… hard to find for a reasonable price
I just want a small wagon
I might end up looking at newer stuff, but… how tf am I going to avoid shitty touchscreens, spyware, LED headlights, and all that garbage?
As a fan of sedans and hatchbacks…car shopping is very interesting right now
how so? like just because nobody fucking makes them anymore?
Yup many manufactures stopped making anything other than trucks and SUVs in the US, and if that doesn’t make it enough of a challenge, many buyers (especially locally to me) prefer larger vehicles so I have fewer used options to choose from (and I’m too cheap to buy a new car)
I might end up looking at newer stuff, but… how tf am I going to avoid shitty touchscreens, spyware, LED headlights, and all that garbage?
And going to get harder to avoid a lot of that stuff once enough of them eventually get into the much cheaper levels of the used market. Though by then (and even currently in the higher priced used levels) most of the stuff will no longer even be supported to use (even if you for some reason did find a need to use them and be okay paying).
I got a 2015 Rogue SV that stuff like nav or whatever other stuff doesn’t even have access to the apps from Nissan to set them up. And was like one or two years behind Android Auto or even Apple’s stuff. So can’t just have the main screen just cast my phone’s maps. Really only irritates me when I need to go into settings and see stuff for features I can’t use if I wanted to do so. But the backup camera and phone pairing over blutooth for calls and music works, so that is nice to have and useful daily.
I am torn on replacing the head-unit like I did with my much older cars in the past. But those were so much more easy and “normal” to replace. I mostly worry that since it is much more integrated, that beyond just not flowing with the design, that there would be more problematic issues caused with the electrics (especially after seeing how much just replacing headlights with LEDs messed up a lot of cars when they were not a standard part) and the main computer.
Had really randomly bad issues with my last car’s computer towards the last four or five years that I never had with much older cars before. But is also possible that aside from my much more abusive driving while being younger, that I just hadn’t had something with any computer element (just the main one as it wasn’t anything built-in with lots of features.
ewwww LED headlights
This guy frugals.
To this day, I’ve never been tempted to buy a nice display, I’m right there with you. Like, I go to electronics stores for whatever and am dazzled by the bright colours on the modern ones, but not enough to need it when I’m posting on Lemmy, let alone pay an arm and a leg for it.
A 144hz monitor has been the biggest upgrade to my computer since switching from an HDD to a SSD. It’s that big of a difference.
I bought a 144hz 4K 32" monitor a few years ago, it wasn’t cheap (800€) but I don’t regret buying it, everything just looks better on it than it ever did on the previous monitor.
- Nestle products (I am bad at explaining why, and would just again end up researching their shit for 2 hours)
- Alcoholic drinks - kills braincells, and I’d prefer to keep both
- Cigarettes or vapes
- Closed-source software licenses (for personal use)
- Digital content that does not come on physical media
- Hardware with license-unlockable components (e.g. some networking equipment may limit throughput unless you pay more)
Agreed on all points, but especially #1. Fuck Nestle. Every time I buy a new product at the grocery store, I check to make sure they’re not made by Nestle or a subsidiarity of Nestle.
I’d also like to adhere to the feeling: Fuck Nestle. Nothing more to add.
Pre-built computers. I’ve just been building PCs for so long I can’t imagine buying something that meet my specifications within a reasonable budget. And it’s fun.
I built my own because I wanted a gaming computer with a blu-ray drive. That was the only way. I also added a floppy drive for shits and giggles.
I have never tried building a PC myself but I have gotten into reviving old ones. I haven’t bought a computer in over a decade. I just inherit people’s old ones and bring them back to life with linux, maybe replace a dead PSU or something. I’m new to hardware stuff. I really wish I knew a way to get these computers into the hands of people who can’t afford to buy one and don’t know how to do this themselves.
Wouldn’t a pre-built secondhand pc be cheaper, if your just starting out?
Pretty unlikely to find a second hand system with the highish specs I’d want.
But if you mean if someone just needed a computer, then yes used would be much cheaper given how quickly things advance.
I went this route. I don’t need something powerful to scroll Lemmy and watch downloaded TV/movies.
Made sure it had two display port outputs for dual monitors. Added another 16GB of RAM because why not. It is way more than I need. Probably could have gotten away with used micro PC.
I also have a NAS and micro PC “server.”
Yeah me neither. I found a charity that refurbished oldish desktops for students and pensioners, for around $35 USD. It was a 2017 lenovo with 8gb ddr4, decent inbuilt graphics, and it came with a monitor, screen, keyboard and mouse. I just put linuxmint on it, and it is working well for some low end games
CSB: Years ago when my kid was in after school care I fixed a couple of their busted PCs. Nothing major, just made sure the hardware was OK, reinstalled Windoz, and then installed some FOSS games on them. I had enough stuff from the work scrapheap and mine to make a third. Kids loved it. I was a very-local semi-celebrity.
Just because the hardware doesn’t make the cut for heavy work doesn’t mean it cannot handle the needs of others.
- P*rn premium subscriptions
- Tinder premium
- Paper news subscription or any printed magazine
- Paid tv channels
The maps are better in the print copy of National Geographic
NatGeo was the finest magazine on the planet for generations, then Fox got their hands on it and made it a religious rag, then sold it to some other company that managed to make it worse.
What an ignominious end to one of the greatest publications in the history of man, and that’s no exaggeration.
Paper news subscription or any printed magazine
I’ve only bought printed local zines/papers as a form of donation to alternative media, the same material is published by them online for free anyway.
P*rn premium subscriptions
If you can afford to pay for the content you consume it’s generally better to pay for it, especially with regards to the porn industry which takes every scummy practice of traditional media and is 10x worse because it’s not really happening in the open
any printed magazine
For some hobbies printed magazines are still the Pinnacle of media related to the hobby, so as long as the media company behind the magazine hasn’t changed hands and significantly degraded quality (looking at you Kalmbach publishing!) paying for a magazine so you get something fun to look at in the mail each month/quarter/whatever can be quite enjoyable
Anything apple
Apples are my favourite snack!
Software subscriptions. I’ll buy a perpetual license if there’s no decent open source alternative as long as it will run offline. For example, $300 for Marvelous Designer back in the day was reasonable, but they can fuck right off with the subscription-only model.
