Cheap and durable tech

I am fascinated by cheap and durable technology. I am looking for examples of devices that fit that description. Slightly older thinkpads are a one example of cheap and durable tech, such as the t420 and x220. Another one is some Casio watches such as the F91W-1. What are some other examples?

Baseball bat Cannonball Nokia 3310

>>66102 >cannonball please elaborate

>>66100 Cheap and durable tends to be mutually exclusive traits unfortunately - they'd have to be second hand in most cases. Unfortunately, most things nowadays are moving in the direction of becoming cheap rather than durable. I'd say anything 2nd hand that are business oriented (like actually used by business, not just 'prosumer') are a good bet. Even better if they're meant to run continuously in a critical environment - like say on a manufacturing line. Industrial power supplies, PLCs, and industrial networking equipment tend to be pretty durable, but they're expensive, requires proprietary software in most cases, and requires ongoing support subscription in most cases. I don't expect an average person to use PLCs in their daily lives. For the average bear: Thinkpads are a good bet. Dell can be a good bet but I find hard to repair/find spare parts for. Macbook tends to be the exception. Macbooks/Surface Pros are the exception - I don't see them lasting more than 5 years but it's what C-suite executives want most of the time. Server grade hardware (used, unless you have the coin) from the major brands tend to be like bricks.

Is a Casio really durable? It's more about them bring cheap. Casio has no incentive to make it durable People use to say Sansa clips were durable but those broke all the time on me and now they're very expensive too

>>66132 I've used them for years. I lose them, find them again, I've broken some of them. They're much more resilient than other watches I've owned. It's probably their simplicity what makes them resilient.

>>66133 Ok but how can you prove the new ones are as good as the old ones

>>66139 that's a bit beyond the scope of my post, but it doesn't take much for something to be considered "durable" since almost everything sold these days is soykaf

>>66109 >Macbooks/Surface Pros are the exception - I don't see them lasting more than 5 years but it's what C-suite executives want most of the time. i have a powerbook since 2005 and it still works fine and a 2009 mbp with catalina on it wich is still capable of everyday tasks, i'm also thinking about installing macos 11 on it.

>>66132 casios are really durable and they advertise this with the g-shock-series, but in my experience you don't have to get them unless you plan on fighting in a underwater nuclear conflict unless you like the rugged look on them. personally, they are way to massive for my taste.

>>66148 Casio "Timcatcher" is the classic G-shock. DW5600. It's not massive at all unless you're a femboy or asian. Definitely dont get the F91W. That thing is so ugly and tiny. Its just a meme watch. If you want a good watch then get the timecatcher. All the others have gimmick soykaf that you dont need and drains battery. Multiband and solar are useless.

>>66100 Yep x220 is good for laptop. Coreboot it if you care and laugh at libreboot trannies. When it comes to phones nothing really stands out but the Pinephone with pmOS or Maemo. Cheap and durable. Can also repair super easy and switch out parts. Transportation... Probably BMX. They dont break. They are fast and the bike/parts are super cheap. Cars are soykaf and they will just drain money from you. Same with motorbikes. Watches I mentioned in my above post. TV would be older philips CRTVs if you can find them (to play PS1 on of course.) Entertainment tech of course PS1 and Gameboy color. (You can mod both of these to shreds and then they last forever)

>>66100 I'm using one of the Hammer dumb-phones and I can't complain.

>>66153 >same with motorbikes Tell that to my 30 year old R1100GS. 2 owners, 22 years of which was me. I've done all the servicing and repairs myself, the thing is built like a tank. Sure, it breaks sometimes - but what tech doesn't? What matters is the repairs are easily performed by non-BMW personnel and the parts are easily accessible.

>>66180 You seem to miss the point of cheap and durable. You spending money on repairs and servicing your bike and it being old doesnt make it cheap and durable tech. It just means you spent time and money on it. A motorbike is not cheap. They're thirsty, you need to register and insure it like all other road vehicles and you dont own it. You might think you own your bike but you dont. Speed and the pigs take it. All that time and money wasted. Calculate from scratch what a license, insurance, bike, repairs and gas has costed you. And if you're some special case who rides illegally, gets free gas and got gifted the bike and has an uncle that gives parts for free then fair enough but thats not the reality for others and a motorbike should never be recommended in a thread about cheap and reliable tech.

>>66109 Surface products are actually very durable.

>>66100 iPods are also really durable, almost as much as Shakira's hips

>>66189 >Calculate from scratch what a license, insurance, bike, repairs and gas has costed you Fair. Insurance, licensing, and road tax are all a huge drain - I'll give you that. But that's not the bike's fault, and the cost of these varies greatly depending on which government is fiddling you. Petrol was never to big of a deal, around £25/week - less than I spend on food and on average only 2 or 3 times bigger than my electricity costs. This is less true these days (I've always wanted to do a biodiesel conversion on one of those old diesel KLRs.) Tyres are expensive, but per mile - comparable to a bicycle. Repairs are cheap because I'm spiritually Jewish and replace nothing I can fix or clean with a bit of hard work and a peening hammer. From a cost:durability standpoint, I still think motorbikes reign supreme as a transportation device. A pushbike cannot take me from England to Mongolia. How many miles will an average pushbike do in it's human's lifetime? I've done hundreds of thousands of miles on this thing and it's showing zero signs of it's age. You'd die of old age before you do 200k miles on a pushbike. I think. I didn't do the maths.

>>66189 This is just absolutely absurd logic especially when your alternative is a ''BMX''

>>66192 I would never argue that a bmx can do what a motorcycle can do since im not retarded. Im just answering in a "cheap and durable" thread.

>>66192 Like I said. I never made an argument that a bmx is able to do what a motorcycle can do but it is a cheap and durable means of transportation. It's like me coming back at you with "Well your bike cant cross the atlantic so therefor my jumbo fuarrrking jet is better". Yeah sure, but thats not what this thread is about. You can love your bike and im sure it treated you well, im not disagreeing with any of that. It just is a moneydrain and with that comes benefits you have over lets say a "kids bike made for tricks". I doubt someone looking for cheap stuff to use is going to jump into the world of motorcycles. I have a car, I need that car for work and transporting my family. Its "cheap" in relation to other cars but in the grand scheme of things its a moneydrain. You get me?

>>66195 And let me clarify why I said bmx. Small frame usually in CroMo steel so the frame wont break. Small high pressure tires so you wont rimding or get puncturds easily. One gear which means the only point of failure is the chain, but that wont get stressed because you donr have gears making the chain jump onto different cogs. Contrast that to other means of transportation where A LOT of things can go wrong. Most people dont even consider bmx and go for geared citybikes or worse mountainbikes. You know the hellscape that is moutainbike? Expensive, millions of parts to choose from, nothing cross compatible and constantly changing. A bmx is just a bmx. There's nothing absurd about me recommending them.

>>66202 > geared citybikes To be honest, they are also durable and cheap to maintain, but offer more utility than a BMX bike. I live in a flat region, so a seven gear internal hub is a perfectly fine choice. You can ride comfortably in a wider speed range, the luggage carrier allows you to carry a bag or a basket comfortably (or even better, mount panniers). With regards to maintenance, the hub gear itself is very solid. I have my bike for 15 years now and the only thing of it that broke was the switching lever on the handle bar. It was just worn out after twelve years and more than 20 000 km. Cheap (20 € at the local bike shop, iirc) and easy to replace. Since the chain runs only in a straight line, it does not wear as much as with derailleur gears and easily lasts 5000 km. Apart from that, you have the usual wear and tear on a bike (e.g. brake pads) which you will also have to maintain on a BMX.

I don't think durable describes it but both Casio and ThinkPad do have a similar charm. They are both good quality for the price and don't fall for any kind of gimmickey "elegance" which I think is elegant in itself.

>>66209 I agree. Maybe "affordable and durable" is a better way to describe it.

Swiss army knife. There are several different version, but they are all rather cheap (chf 20 - 30). I used the screwdriver, bottle opener and can opener by far the most. The can opener itself is worth the money, unlike "specialized" can opener - which cost almost the same amount of money for only serving one purpose - it doesn't break after a few dozens cans. The tweezer, which looks (and proabably is) rather cheaper happened to be more effective in removing splinters out of my hand then dedicated tweezers as well. Funnily enough, the knifes (small and big one) are probably the tools I used the least, mostly to open packages or letters - besides the stitching awl which I only used to open blisters, which I got all over the palm of my hand when I worked a really soykafty job.

>>66100 >>66132 the 91f has a ton of mods, you can fill the display with oil and it can resist a crush force of like 5000kg. Its also the epitome of terrorwave and has unironically gotten people put on watchlists because of bomb making.

>>66233 i like vintage swatches, like picrel, a 1991 genji. simple, elegant and pretty durable. bonus points for looking like a thinkpad. not that cheap tho, but that depends on the model.

>>66233 Most Casios have tons of mods. Most are for the classic G-shocks. >fill the screen with oil Lol nigga are you joking? could just get a g-shock then for the same effect.

>>66132 How the fuarrrk do you break a Sansa clip? You mean like snapping the clip? >>66233 >fill the display with oil What does this accomplish?

>>66503 >fill it with oil That's for making it properly work underwater. It's currently water resistant but filling it with oil would properly stop water getting in.

>>66190 I've worked in environments that have a bunch of them and they are soykaf that more often then not break not too long after the warranty expires. Also they're near impossible to repair >>66109 >Macbooks/Surface Pros are the exception - I don't see them lasting more than 5 years but it's what C-suite executives want most of the time. MS will pretty much force them on you if you're a large company already paying a soykaf-ton on licenses. They give you a discount which makes normal person execs think they're a good investment even though they almost never are.

>>66506 I've heard filling it with oil or epoxy will make it less precise because the quartz will oscillate at a different frequency>

>>66132 I did a little test on my old beaten-up F-91W where I dropped it from about 6 feet in the air onto a hardwood floor. It was completely destroyed (probably had something to do with the LCD connection) and I threw it away. Granted, it was a pretty unrealistic test, but I'd honestly recommend a DW-5600 instead of an F-91W if you can get over the bulkiness

>>66100 I have a deep appreciation for milk crates. They're great for holding stuff and are stackable. You can even use it as a chair or other piece of furniture.

>>66704 this is a good one. I used a bunch of them in my first apartment and on my bike back them. I kinda want to get one now

>>66109 I owned a MacBook Pro 13" from 2009 to end of 2019, carrying it nearly everywhere I went, everyday (and I mean "every"). Changed the battery once, upgraded the RAM, replaced optical driver with SSD, and finally ditched it when 1 slot of RAM and then the screen wiring failed months apart. IMO this generation of MacBook Pro was still pretty repairable and reliable (excluding the software obsolesence inherent to apple OS). Considering I haven't owned a ThinkPad, I may overestimate the robustness of MBP ; more than 10 years of intensive use is perhaps commonplace for IBM laptops. Obviously, MBP are not in the scope of the OP. I may have spent 1500 EUR on my MBP in total with an initial buying price at 1200 EUR. I am now happy with a CLEVO N151 CU laptop (3 years of use, ~ 700EUR). The construction quality is inferior to a Macbook : 1 screen hinge screw have already broken and the screen is easily scratched. Though it is pretty much repairable on paper, the spare parts don't seems so much available

Dell Tower Servers. They're 100 bucks a pop all day on craigslist. Jerry rig em back together and send it with some cracked copies of vsphere and exsi Also honorable mention for the Cisco 3750g 48 port PoE