I often hear, “You should never cheap out on a good office chair, shoes, underpants, backpack etc…” but what are some items that you would feel OK to cheap out on?
This can by anything from items such as: expensive clothing brands to general groceries.
No idea why you’re downvoted. Seasoning a cast iron pan sufficiently enough to fry an egg is challenging, whereas most chefs will use a non-stick pan solely for this purpose. It’s basically the one thing that non-stick is good at.
I’m with you. Started working to eliminate Teflon from the kitchen and went full cast iron, but eggs were still a challenge… Until someone turned me on to carbon steel.
It’s lighter (not as light as an aluminum pan with Teflon, but significantly lighter than cast iron) and takes the same abuse and seasoning as cast iron.
Do people really buy pans for just eggs though? I’ve always used my regular pans for cooking eggs and if I’m storing them in my home I’d want them to cook more than just eggs.
Some people do, yeah. I’ve always used stainless steel cause it’s what I had. Takes a little practice to get it to not stick, but after that it’s fine. I heat the empty pan on medium, medium high until it’s pretty hot. If you add a drop of water, it should bead up and roll. Then add the oil, wait until it shimmers, and add the eggs.
Enameled cast iron is nice too. It’s non-stick and not as heavy as a regular cast iron.
I’m gonna disagree. Cheap nonstick pans are horrible and just contribute to unnecessary waste plus you have no idea what’s in that coating. Carbon steel or cast iron, when properly seasoned, are just as non stick as a “non stick” coated pan and will literally last forever. They’re also WAY more useful than a nonstick since you can use them with almost any heat source and any temperature.
I’ve never had a nonstick pan I’ve personally owned go bad, because I use it for the right things. Low heat only, hands wash, and only use silicone utensils. Whenever I see other people with shitty non sticks it’s because they abuse them horribly. Searing things and using metal utensils and throwing them in the dishwasher or scrubbing the hell out of them. I love cast iron too, but I can never get them to not stick with low heat.
Cheap nonstick flakes nasty teflon chemicals into your food.
All Teflon coatings will degrade if abused. Getting expensive nonstick just makes you want to use it longer than you should (sunk cost), and abuse it because it’s “more durable”.
So get a cheap T-fal, be very careful with it, always handwash, never use metal utensils, dispose if damaged at all, and only use for eggs.
Lastly, If you can’t use a nonstick pan carefully every time, just don’t use nonstick at all.
Look at the three of them. They bear a striking resemblance, don’t they? Makes sense for the Porter Cable/Craftsman ones, both brands are currently owned by Stanley, Black and Decker…but Wen has nothing to do with them, yet they’re selling the same fuggin’ jointer. Admittedly without the speed control, but what do you need a speed control on a jointer for?
It’s the same tool made in the same factory in China, the cost difference is what logo you’re willing to pay for.
Just kidding. I can’t afford Festool. If the Hercules breaks I get Makita. So far I haven’t had one break. Though I probably need to get the corded circular saw because even the best battery ones choke on wet treated boards.
In the US, DeWalt and Milwaukee are tradesman-grade tools if you get the 18V-20V versions. But I agree that the average person can buy any Ryobi or Harbor Freight special and get by fine.
yeah thats a great stategy. Not sure where you are but in Europe, Aldi and Lidl have the notorious “center isle” where one can buy hand and bench tools, all the way up to band saws.
I broke my shitty center isle heat gun and now have a makita, outgrew my butane soldering iron and now have a webber, but I’m still rocking my center isle reciprecating saw and circular saw cause they work just fine and I dont use them enough.
At minimum the cheap ones have lower QA tolerances on components. Sometimes they straight up swap in shittier components (eg: plastic instead of metal, etc).
Not saying you always need the most expensive option when choosing power tools, but looks same != same.
I agree. For power tools, especially where decent accuracy is key like it is with a jointer, definitely more of a “do your research, price is not equal to quality,” not “you can do fine with any cheap one.”
Always have a trusted mechanic who doesn’t work for the dealer look it over before you buy. Usually new car dealerships are reputable and are looking to move their trade-in inventory, especially at the end of the year when they need to clear the lot for the next year’s models. You can even find deals on vehicles that are only a year or two old like a returned lease, with a moderate number of miles on them and little to no wear and tear. Those are usually just as good as new but so much cheaper.
Be super cautious of the used car dealer chains, like Drivetime and Carvana, they have loads of customer complaints and legal problems in a couple of states (basically, if it seems too good to be true, it is). Do not ever buy a former rental car, unless it’s true love at first sight or you’re desperate… even then think about how people, who’ve only paid like $10-20 for rental insurance, have probably treated that vehicle and reconsider.
The newest and most expensive car I ever bought was a previous model year’s dealer demo. A dealer demo is what it sounds like, it’s the car the dealership displayed in the show room, used for test drives with unsure buyers, running office errands, and showing off at the mall or in parades. Cons: There’s only a few of them, they’ll have a couple hundred miles on the odometer, and you don’t get to pick the color or options. Pros: They’re usually at a decent trim level, in an agreeable color, and well maintained… for thousands less than brand new because they’ve already left the lot a whole bunch.
I rented a corolla to do Uber in, and I ran that car like a motherfucker. I don’t drive like an idiot, (optimizing for rider experience, which overlaps a lot with minimizing car wear) but I did push the car in a way I wouldn’t push my own.
See I drove my last car 16 years, always went to the dealer I bought it from for maintenance, and they were always forthright every time. He finally told me the last time I took it in for service that he was really starting to cross his fingers when he put it on the hoist, and that it might be time to stop throwing good money after bad. I never felt pressured.
Well, what I meant was don’t just take a dealership’s word for the maintenance of a car they’re trying to sell you. But yeah, dealer mechanic shops can be some of the best out there especially for their particular brand.
I’ve bought a couple former rental cars and they were fine. While people might drive a bot more aggressive in them, if it didn’t have body work done it’s likely still fine. The big plus for rental cars is they generally get proper maintenance so they are mechanically solid.
Free computer operating systems are great these days.
I regularly spend hours designing electronics to be cheaper. Not worse – just cheaper. Electronic components sometimes vary in price by two orders of magnitude for the same performance, so it’s worth cramming datasheets in your head as a professional or hobbyist.
For tools, I’ve found good midrange Chinese brands, and stuck to them. I could never afford things like Tektronix and so on.
I don’t strictly require clothing to be cheap, but I do require it to be fungible – this works out similarly though. When I find something that’s good value for money and looks good, I buy a bunch and rotate them. That way I don’t have to think about what to wear, and it always looks decent.
I also prefer cheap laptops. I don’t need a supercomputer to work. When I do need a supercomputer, I rent one from google cloud for a few dollars an hour.
I also prefer cheap laptops. I don’t need a supercomputer to work.
I’ve been feeling this one lately. I recently had a very large, super heavy laptop stolen, and I’ve been wondering why I even had such a mammoth to begin with.
I have a desktop with all the overhead I need for large tasks, any laptop I get basically just needs to run remote desktop with decent latency.
Yup, I do the same – although my remote desktop is just SSH, so even truly ancient stuff is completely fine. I’ve been looking at getting a portable terminal as an alternative to even a laptop, which is a bit of a pain to lug around if I’m on vacation.
This technique failed disastrously one time though. A billing dispute between the person renting me office space and the building owner meant my AI workstation got seized for a year once. That was a real pain – I never expected to see it again. Thankfully it did return to my possession. Eventually.
Mascara. I’ve spent $20+ dollars a few times for some high-end Sephora brands, but I’ve never thought they were any better than the $8 Maybelline I can get at the grocery store.
Alcohol that you are supplying at an event. You should always have a good case of beer or wine, or spirits, or the appropriate refreshment for your honored guests, but anything beyond 1st/2nd round should be the cheapest hooch on the planet and it should run out fast. Every social gathering seems to attract booze hounds that will suck you dry, no need to pay premium dollar for their habit.
Try growing up in the late '70s early '80s, when adult behavior at social gatherings was almost a contest to see who could get the most obliterated-drunk, both men and women, and “one for the road” wasn’t just an expression.
I’m of the children of that generation, and when we were young we modeled our socializing after that, going out for the night involved getting hammered, didn’t matter who you were.
I’ve become quite relieved to see that in a last decade or so, the drinking culture of social gatherings is largely gone Even in people of my age range.
Of course, there’s always one or two out of 20 people that are 9 drinks deep within a couple hours and not realizing that nobody else is consuming.
The plan is in place not for toxic drinking culture, but to deal with those people. Once the precise amount budgeted for the first few quality drinks is gone, that’s when you bring out the low-bottom budget cans of expired beer, still on the plastic ring but with 2 missing and they are only basement cold.
Its sad that we invite people that we seemingly dont know that well, which is nice, but behind the excuse of drinking. Like, inviting people and planning with them unconsciously abusing what you offer, or themselves, or whatever, is strange
If you live in an area with a store like a dollar store/tree/general, getting snack foods from there is cheaper than going to a normal grocery store like Walmart. At least it is where I live.
I don’t know if it’s changed prices in other places with these types of stores, but at $1.25 for generic thin mint cookies, that isn’t a terrible deal at all if you ask me.
I remember reading that they purposely shrinkflate packages specifically for those stores so you end up paying more in the end. Maybe it was just an isolated thing though.
I’m not sure I’d call this “cheaping out” but unless you can’t even afford that or you have a specific reason you need a more expensive one, you should buy mid-range ($200 - $400) phones. The early '10s are over and mid-range is more than adequate for the average phone user. Plus quite a few mid-ranges still have expandable storage and/or headphone jacks.
And the cameras on phones these days can lose orders of magnitude of quality and still blow any photography setup the CIA owned in 1995 out of the water.
I bought mine for a bit over $500. It has a headphone jack, IR Port, 1200 lumen light, and I only have to charge it 1-2 times a week depending on usage.
Left Samsung’s ever more expensive Note and Galaxy S lines for Motorola’s cheap ass G series like three or four years ago and haven’t looked back. I buy a new phone once a year on my tax return for like $200-250. I gift my previous device to my younger cousins, nieces, nephews, and mother. Keeps everyone from having to pay off devices on their phone plans and the phones are still running rather well year over year. The only hold out, claiming to “need” the latest and greatest, is my older sister who insists she needs the new iPhone every two years.
Soap of any kind. It’s fine if you want a certain smell, but at the end of the day it all works the same. Goes for hand soap, shampoo, detergent, body wash, etc.
I buy 10 bars of Irish spring for $5. It works great. I shave my head, so it functions as shampoo too. Unlike a lot of the expensive soaps it isn’t like lotion, which is a plus for my oily skin.
A lot of people seem to agree with you, so I’ll reassess my stance on the shampoo.
As a person with a short cut, every run of the mill shampoo has done its job. But of course your hair needs to last longer when you grow it out; so adverse effects have more time to pile up.
Not true. Most soap series my skin, and the nice soap I buy doubles as shampoo. Normal shampoo destroys my scalp and I get crazy flaking. And I love the texture on my skin from this soap. Definitely worth the 5 bucks a bar
Which soap? I’ve been using Dove for everything for the past few years. Apart from the fact that it’s really handy for travelling I’ve never had any issues with using it as both shampoo and normal soap but maybe I’m doing it wrong and I should have dedicated conditioner and shampoo
Yeah… I have something similar to eczema (serrobhreic dermatitis, I just have Google autocorrect it for me when I need to put it on a medical form.) All the beauty blogs and subreddits say “stay away from salicylic acid” so I tried all the alternatives in the literature, up to and including literal tar shampoo. Brackish, sticky, thick, smelly tar. Nothing in the medical literature works anywhere near as good as salicylic acid, and I have one brand (shampoo) that works for my face and scalp that’s more moisturizing, and another (bar soap) that works for my body. If I skip showering for 1-2 days, my red scaly oily skin starts to return and I get face acne and bacne… It’s not fun. But as long as I keep my regimen (which also includes a specific lotion and a specific cleanser) and get enough sun (tanning in winter months) you wouldn’t even know I had a skin condition.
It took me many years (including over a month using NO products as many suggested the products were the issues) to find this regimen. So I’m sticking to it.
If you want a good printer, look for an ex-lease laser printer. It may not be suitable for a whole department to use any more, but good enough for an individual.
Ex lease laptops and monitors are also often very good deals!
The monitors often come with very well adjustable stands that are much more ergonomic. The laptops are often very high build quality and perfect for regular home office use.
I don’t think that off-ease laptops are very good as they are sold. The batteries are often on their way out and so that’s an additional expense (and some, like Macs, are very expensive to replace).
There are some incredible deals on off-lease desktops, though. Most modern computers are way overpowered for what the average user needs. You can get a perfectly serviceable machine for doing email, serving the web, and office work, for $100 or less. Just don’t expect to play any games released within the last five or more years.
My off lease laptop is literally my three year old work laptop. It is a very sturdy HP laptop with 16 GB of ramm, a 512mb SSD and a pretty decent i7 processor. The body is very sturdy and the screen is excellent. I paid about 180 dollars for it.
Store brand foods are good a lot of times. They used to be garbage, but nowadays they’re pretty good.
Frozen veggies instead of fresh is usually okay if you’re steaming or roasting.
Automotive parts off Amazon have worked alright; Rebuilt my suspension for, like, $120. That’s tie rod, sway bar, shocks, and struts. No issues for the two years since that repair.
A ton of hobbies have perfectly respectable aliexpress alternatives. Keycaps, Fountain pens, 3d printer parts. They rob intellectual property, but I like linux ISOs, so I don’t exactly have a history of respecting that type of property.
Software in general can be cheaped out on; I don’t think I need to champion FOSS on here.
Refrigerators and washing machines can be cheaped out on, as long as you do a bit of research about their reliability.
Lots of stuff is easy to DIY if you have some work space. Furniture, fish tanks, thermonuclear warheads. Learning to sew is valuable, not because you should make your own clothes -fuck that- but because you can mend the stitching on your current clothes.
Services can usually be cheaped out on. Youtube videos and a can-do attitude can get you through manicures and toilet repairs. Court clerks will sometimes be willing to walk you through basic legal stuff like name changes. Things you should educate yourself about beyond a short youtube video: Electricity, flammability (from heat sources), and anything involving significant pressure (pistons, compressed air, and power washers, mostly.).Also be a little careful with chemical reactions: cement hardening, for example, will produce a bit of heat. Usually this isn’t a big deal and you can ignore it, but there have been idiots.The world’s information is at your disposal. Provided you’ve got some common sense, and you never fuck around with the capacitor in a microwave, you should be fine.
Lots of stuff is easy to DIY if you have some work space. Furniture, fish tanks, thermonuclear warheads. Learning to sew is valuable, not because you should make your own clothes -fuck that- but because you can mend the stitching on your current clothes.
Good catch, but that’s a common misconception. You can actually use woodworking tools on glass, such as drills and saws, but you need to go a lot slower and make sure to keep vibrations under controll.
I mean it’s an incredibly difficult job to refine the chemicals enough to produce a usable product. There’s a finite number of instalations which can actually pull off the delicate chemistry. The materials to make it are fairly common enough; essentially just SiO2,Al2O3, Na2O, and K2O, but it’s much easier to obtain it from the hardware store. I’m definitely not suggesting you attempt to make your own clear glass.
Depends. That’s about what I paid for my previous phone second hand and it lasted me 7 years and I loved it to bits. But I was pretty broke and only could afford that. New phone, I decided to buy a brand new fairphone, because i think that the moment I get enough disposable income, I have a moral responsibility to use it in ways that encourage more ethical practices, for all the people who can’t. Doing that is bloody expensive, but if it somehow helps make this dystopian hellscape a little more bearable, I’ll invest.
Indeed. And that’s a great point, I would love a fairphone (or idealy a true linux handheld) for my next mobile device.
The key to my post is that purchasing $1500 sansungs and ios devices is ludicrous in this market, unless you are developing on the cutting edge or are a luxury tech enthusiast
It is, yeah. Especially if it’s to change it after 2 short years of use because if you keep it longer than that you look like a bum or whatever. I will never understand that tbh.
No I meant the ones that turn into tablets. I’m fine with my Z Fold 3 for the next 5 years or so. Was just curious to see if there were any cheap options on the scene yet.
That’s only cheap if you don’t consider how long it will survive and the replacement/repair cost. A slab phone with no moving parts will last much longer than a foldable making the $/year cost much lower.
I can’t wait until my device and destructively scan, then re-print objects, so fast and effortlessly that I can have a folding phone that is my card carrier too. I just swipe the icon for my debit card, the thing materializes at full speed feeling exactly like Im pulling it out of a billfold, then when I push it back in it just gets chewed up again.
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