They don't make 'em like they used to, a phrase we could probably say about most things these days with products and services fast declining in quality due to cost-cutting, cheaper manufacturing methods, cheaper or sub-standard materials and the fact things are simply not made to last as long; thanks consumerism.
This can be seen across many industries from clothing to vehicles, food quality, building products, general service standards and, of course, with electrical good like mobile phones, televisions and computers. It's the last one that has had me a little annoyed over the last few months.
I purchased a Microsoft Surface Laptop 3 in mid-2020 which cost me quite a few bucks. You can see it in the picture above and...I'll never buy another one.
It has an i7 Intel processor, 16GB RAM and a 512GB SSD and was pretty fast and performed well...at first. The problem is that after about a year some of the keys failed so I had to switch to an external keyboard. Then the battery began to give me less performance which I was able to deal with mostly, then it started running super-hot so I had to get one of those fucktard cooling pad things with the in-built fan...and then the mouse pointer got laggy and glitchy and...that's when I thought about cleaving the fucken thing in half with an axe.
It's an intermittent thing and I've tried different ports for the wireless mouse, bought a new one, updated the drivers and I've even had one of those home-visit PC techs come to look at it...the problem persists along with the others.
Back a while ago...
I started looking for a new laptop several weeks ago and decided Lenovo or Hewlett Packard were my two options. I'm not a gamer and don't use my laptop to watch videos or for streaming so was more interested in a robust and good quality unit rather than a kick-ass graphics card, speakers so on; I'd heard these two might fit the bill.
I eventually narrowed it down to the HP Probook 450 15.6" G10 which has the same specifications as my heinous Surface Laptop 3 although only has a 256GB SSD hard drive - not a problem as I use external drives mostly. It's actually a little cheaper than what I paid for the Surface Laptop 3 too; that's a good thing.
Only yesterday...
The HP laptop has been sitting in Hewlett Packard's online shop's shopping cart for a few days, with some other goodies as well, but I was holding off buying it.
I have a strong, need over want ethos and despite having the ability to buy what I want when I want it I always think about purchases and ensure the item is being purchased for the right reasons, not just because I want it. I've been super-frustrated with my laptop lately and it annoys me every time I get on it but it works, sort of, and so I have been holding off on buying a new one. My partner told me to just go and get it, as have a couple others - 
That was yesterday...but now...
I'm typing this post on my brand fucken new HP Probook 450 15.6" G10 which I purchased yesterday from the store, not online...and it's glorious! That's it below. #blameboomy
It all came to pass because my Microsoft Surface Laptop got so hot whilst charging yesterday that I was afraid it'd spontaneously combust...and that fucken glitchy mouse annoyed me one too many times as well.
I drove to the shop, did a deal (actually a little cheaper than the HP online store) and came back with the Hewlett Packard laptop...and some other goodies. I'm pretty chuffed with it to be honest; it's super fast due to the (ten-core) Intel i7 processor and despite it being fucken annoying to set up and get everything sorted it's good to go now and...no more glitchy mouse pointer or exploding laptop batteries.
I made a legit attempt to hold out on getting a new laptop, many months in fact, but I guess one needs to weigh up the frustration-factor of it all, eventually something's going to give and in this case I had no choice but to buy a new one as the old laptop wasn't going to suddenly get better, and I'd not like it to burn my house down. I should be good to go for a while now, hopefully longer than the three and a half years the Surface Laptop lasted, but who knows these days right?
Have you ever gone through this process with a computer or other product that wasn't working as it was supposed to? Do you give in to want buying over need buying? What's your thought process around purchasing big-cost items like computers, how do you justify it and, in fact, how do you justify any large purchase in your life? Feel free to tell me about it in the comments below.
Design and create your ideal life, tomorrow isn't promised - galenkp
[Original and AI free]
Image(s) in this post are my own