What has brought you joy?
Companion to the last question :)
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My Nintendo 3DS. I don’t use it often or regularly but when I do I’m glad I have it.
I love the 3ds. It had such fun & interesting features.
Might get cooked here because it’s an apple product but I bought AirPod max 2’s and I initially hated them for the first day or so. I recently flew over 8 hours with them and god damn are the incredible. The noise cancellation is top notch, I couldn’t hear anything on the plane or in the airport. I wear them for hours at home in transparency mode and I really enjoy listening to music with them. I also use a MacBook for work and iPhone for personal use so the ability to switch devices so easily is a nice touch as well.
Formerly steam deck, now unseated by my AYN Thor. It can play 70-80% of the games the deck can in a package that fits in your pocket.
My breville coffee maker and bratza burr grinder. It makes the best coffee and doesn’t complain.
Also, my dolphin pool cleaning robot. Vacuuming a pool manually is such a hassle. Outsourcing that to a bot is truly amazing.
Anything that buys me back my time.
I recently got an AYN thor. What sort of things have you been playing on it? I’ve not ventured too far into a gaming library yet and was wondering how others are using it.
A Tribit Bluetooth speaker. It’s waterproof, loud enough and lasts for many hours. I use it in the shower mostly, but it’s been a car speaker, landed in mud and been washed in the sink. Is good
Kinesis Advantage360 Pro
Why? Because it saves my wrists but the real reason is because it makes me feel smarter. The same way using neovim makes me feel smarter. I use vim btw.
Sorry I know I’m not special for using neovim on a Advatage360, but also you gotta try it. Guaranteed to make you feel smarter
my lg g2, best phone i had. still using it as a daily driver after more than a decade
recently a used panasonic cf-rz6, extremely lightweight/tiny machine and runs linux perfectly
I loved my lg g2, but a tiny scratch ruined the touchscreen sensor after a couple of years. My literal “perfect phone” would be the lg g2 form factor with a newer SoC and GrapheneOS on it.
yeah, sadly the issue is coming to mine as well since about 2022. right now the dead zone is in the upper area above the keyboard and below status bar, so it remains usable… but if it kills the keyboard, i’ll have to switch :(
g2 with modern specs would be wonderful
Had the Nexus 5 version and loved it.
PRK eye surgery. Does this count!
A portable power supply.
Enjoy the looks of envy when the people fighting over an outlet notice you’re plugged into your tiny, little power supply.
How big of a power supply are we talking?
I love my modular synthesizer, although the cost of it is not good value for money so probably can’t count as my best tech purchase.
My sim racing rig has the same issue, it’s bought me thousands of hours of joy but is prohibitively expensive.
My ergodox mechanical keyboard is a solid contender. The original model, Hand built, cherry MX clears. It’s lasted easily 10 years and I hate typing on anything else.
But I think it’s probably my headphones. Beyerdynamics DT770 pro’s. They sound great, they’re super comfy, and not terribly expensive. I’ve had them for probably 10 years and I see no reason I won’t have them till the day I die
Nice, I also mentioned my DT770s. They’re basically invincible.
Edit: I also had the original ergodox with mx clears, sadly I never could get used to the layout so I passed them on to a friend.
I bought a Lily58 DIY kit a couple years ago. I don’t think I could ever go back to using a full keyboard. It’s just so comfortable. My shoulders aren’t tense anymore. My hands aren’t bent out anymore. I’m not scrunched up like a ball when I type. Then switching layouts to Colemak-DH was another plus. The two things combined really helped my body relax in front of a PC.
Number 2 is an electric vehicle.
Number 1 is a non-smart TV
Honorable mention; The Apple Watch SE 2 I bought for my wife so she stops thinking she’s going tachy or having a heart attack 9 times a year. Considering the cost of an average ER trip, and the hit to my sanity when these things only happen at like 3 AM, I’ll gladly upgrade her to the pro version or whatever when the SE kicks the bucket.
I’m in the market for a new TV, what would you recommend for a dumb screen?
I got an Insignia from BestBuy a few years ago. There was a smart version that was 2 inches bigger for 25 dollars less, and I opted out of that. To say the salesman was floored by this decision would be accurate.
an ereader (a decent, 3rd party software compatible one, not amazons ewaste)
I recently went on a trip to Italy and my e-reader was the unexpected MVP of that trip. Any downtime at the hotel or on the plane instead of staring at a tiny screen I was reading books and felt refreshed instead of drained afterwards, and it took up less space than if I brought just a single book with me. I also didn’t need to charge it once on the entire 10 day trip because eink is so freaking amazing
My favorite tech buy is a good 3D printer.
The ability to imagine something, model it in 3D, and then send it to a box and have it “magically” become real via 3D printing will never not amaze me or stop being cool.
Plenty of other useful tech toys like a jellyfin PC or a 3D scanner, but the printer is the thing I enjoy the most.
Which printer did you buy?
X1C. The new version looks even better. Pretty happy with the XIC’s performance, though. Way better than my old Lulzbot.
Another one for the Steamdeck pile. Honorary mention to the SNES mini I got my hands on years before that, which is what got me back into gaming.
Steam Deck OLED has been pretty great. Also the HTC Vive VR headset, back in 2016.
I also bought the Vive back in `16. Can’t believe that was 10 years ago! I moved two years ago though and never set it back up. I figured at the time that Valve would have a new headset that didn’t require base stations soon. Finally coming this year, so if someone wants to buy an OG Vive…
