Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Review broken products instead of new ones

buyforlife.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

71–80 of 125 posts

Re: Review broken products instead of new ones

#71

Post by dagw »

ed25519FUUU wrote: post #40

Speaking of repairing, learning a little bit about electronics and soldering has greatly improved my ability to fix various electronics. Usually it’s something small like a bad cap or mosfet. I really believe they should teach basic electronic repair in school. A tiny bit goes a long way.

I really believe they should teach basic electronic repair in school. A tiny bit goes a long way.

Yea, learning some basic electronics and how solder in school (England, early-mid 90s) was one of the most useful skills they taught me.

Re: Review broken products instead of new ones

#72

Post by wojciii »

hubraumhugo wrote: post #2

For most people, the majority of positive reviews are noise on any product and they evaluate them by reading negative reviews. For once, let's turn it all upside down: We should build a collection about how things break - review broken and worn-out products to teach how to identify cheap products (where are the stress points, what manufacturing techniques exist to alleviate those). Then compare those with used produc…

Will I own the review after I create it?

Will it be shared by the community?

I don't trust your company .. or any single company. This task should be done a Wikipedia kind of company and the data should be available for anyone for free or a small fee.

Re: Review broken products instead of new ones

#73

Post by eigenvector »

hubraumhugo wrote: post #2

For most people, the majority of positive reviews are noise on any product and they evaluate them by reading negative reviews. For once, let's turn it all upside down: We should build a collection about how things break - review broken and worn-out products to teach how to identify cheap products (where are the stress points, what manufacturing techniques exist to alleviate those). Then compare those with used produc…

Hi there, I checked out your website. It's a cool idea and one that is needed.

What do you think of the fact that many of the products are in fact disposable by backed by a "lifetime" warranty precisely because they're so highly marked up that the manufacturer can give you a new one for free instead of attempting even trivial repairs? Osprey is the king of this. This seems to be the opposite of the buy for life mentality - things should be repaired if economical, but no one repairs what they can get replaced for free.

Re: Review broken products instead of new ones

#74

Post by buster »

Answerawake wrote: post #6
hubraumhugo wrote: post #2

For most people, the majority of positive reviews are noise on any product and they evaluate them by reading negative reviews. For once, let's turn it all upside down: We should build a collection about how things break - review broken and worn-out products to teach how to identify cheap products (where are the stress points, what manufacturing techniques exist to alleviate those). Then compare those with used produc…

Interesting idea but is your site curated for some items or just 100% autogenerated/crowd sourced? For example, you have listed the Thinkpad X220 which is a 10 year old laptop. Furthermore I also noticed the Magic mouse and is that really considered buy it for life(in terms of repairable)? Speaking as someone who has purchased and accidentally destroyed multiple Magic Keyboards by liquid spills, I love their products…

My current private laptop ist 7 years old and still running fine. It's some dell laptop and I suppose it will fall apart at some point but so far I don't see why I would replace it. I wouldn't mind it lasting another 10 years.

Same for mice. I'd certainly use a mouse for 10+ years if it's good enough. I've invested in a quite expensive ergonomic, mechanical keyboard and I have a very old mechanical cherry keyboard at work and I do expect them to last forever.

If you don't need the latest sh*t (touch bars and what not) you'll probably be fine with current characteristics of laptops for quite a few years.

Re: Review broken products instead of new ones

#75

Post by adrianN »

throwawayboise wrote: post #42
Answerawake wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Interesting idea but is your site curated for some items or just 100% autogenerated/crowd sourced? For example, you have listed the Thinkpad X220 which is a 10 year old laptop. Furthermore I also noticed the Magic mouse and is that really considered buy it for life(in terms of repairable)? Speaking as someone who has purchased and accidentally destroyed multiple Magic Keyboards by liquid spills, I love their products…

Maybe I'm taking ths site name too literally, but I would think that computers, along with most electronics, are just one of those things that would never be a "buy it for life" purchase. I actually do have a Casio calculator from High School (30+ years ago) that I still use, but no other computing devices that are more than 10 years old. Even if they still work, there just isn't much practical you can do with them.

My Mid-2009 Macbook Pro is still good enough for most things.

Re: Review broken products instead of new ones

#76

Post by theshrike79 »

adrianN wrote: post #47
notatoad wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

AvE is fun to watch, and full of cool insights into the underappreciated details of tools. but you've got to take his reviews with a few grains of salt. He's coming at it from the perspective of somebody who buys tools to use in heavy industry. If you're buying a cordless drill to hang pictures or maybe build a desk or a fence once a decade, the things he derides as being "not very skookum" will likely last you a lif…

My heuristic is to first buy the cheap version of a tool. If I use it enough to break it, I then buy a more skookum version.

Are you me?

This is the exact same method I've used to buy tools for ages. Still using the same 19€ corded hammer drill I got 20 years ago to punch some holes in a concrete wall.

On the other hand, my cordless drills is the more skookum version after the cheapo one crapped out on me mid-drywall.

Re: Review broken products instead of new ones

#77

Post by theshrike79 »

ryandrake wrote: post #43
jonah wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Picture a Canadian who's spent his career doing technical (equipment repair) work in mining and other heavy industry. He has a pretty deep knowledge of many things though.

He did a great and hilarious teardown of that failed Juicero product that came out a year or so ago [1], noting how ridiculously overengineered and expensive it is to produce. 1: https://youtu.be/_Cp-BGQfpHQ

The Juicero the physical embodiment of Ego and CV-driven development. People wanted to make the coolest shit possible, using the coolest tools, with no regard to cost or practicality.

People do the same thing in software, but it's not as readily visible as with physical products.

Re: Review broken products instead of new ones

#78

Post by theshrike79 »

CoolGuySteve wrote: post #63

I recently had to replace a Bosch washer because the crappy plastic pump was too annoying/messy to replace. I wish Consumer Reports or someone would do teardowns each year of their recommended washers/dryers/dishwashers/etc to look for shitty but critical moving parts and rate them appropriately. Finding anything about how these items will fail is an exercise in frustration since model numbers are frequently shuffled…

> I wish Consumer Reports or someone would do teardowns

...so iFixit, but for appliances? I'd pay money for that.

Re: Review broken products instead of new ones

#79

Post by schrijver »

pavel_lishin wrote: post #7

This is a good idea, but a lot of products are only sold for a few years before being discontinued; reading a review for a printer that's no longer sold (except secondhand) is unfortunately not very useful.

You could then buy it second hand no? Buying second hand is the best possible outcome from the environmental perspective. One of the downsides is that there’s often no warranty. This site could help alleviate that because you can pick out the products less likely to need that warranty in the first place.

Re: Review broken products instead of new ones

#80

Post by rusk »

eigenvector wrote: post #73
hubraumhugo wrote: post #2

For most people, the majority of positive reviews are noise on any product and they evaluate them by reading negative reviews. For once, let's turn it all upside down: We should build a collection about how things break - review broken and worn-out products to teach how to identify cheap products (where are the stress points, what manufacturing techniques exist to alleviate those). Then compare those with used produc…

Hi there, I checked out your website. It's a cool idea and one that is needed. What do you think of the fact that many of the products are in fact disposable by backed by a "lifetime" warranty precisely because they're so highly marked up that the manufacturer can give you a new one for free instead of attempting even trivial repairs? Osprey is the king of this. This seems to be the opposite of the buy for life menta…

Depends what they’re doing with the old ones ...
Post reply on HN