Your most "Bang for the buck" purchase

…that’s not a household item that everyone already has, like a computer, microwave, etc.

What novel/cool items have you found yourself using all the time or with great benefits (in other words, novel items with high utility)?

  • I recently bought an hourglass and use it all the time. GREAT way to see the passage of time in a visually reinforcing way, and get back on task.

I bought a micro-sd reader for my car stereo. It fits into the USB port. Replaces hundreds of CD’s.

Well, I guess today a ton of people have a GPS but I bought one of the early ones many years ago (a Garmin, about $800) and it saved me more than that in aggravation and panic.

Also a frying pan with holes in it to use on the grill.

Not sure about novel, but as far as I know none of my other coworkers (from my past job too) have one in their home. I have a professional size laminator at home. It makes work easier (times when I take work home) and I use it for personal stuff, too.

While most people probably have a printer or an all-in-one, most that I see in people’s homes are inkjet printers with a flatbed scanner. I bought a Brother multifunction laser printer with an auto document feeder (very similar to this but I can’t find my exact model online) and it instantly made all work at home 100% better and easier.

While there’s a nice copier/printer at the office, for a long time at home I just had your standard inkjet based all-in-one with flatbed scanner. There were several times where I’ve had to manually scan in 20+ page documents one page at a time. Additionally, since it was inkjet based back when I started working at home I went from using my printer maybe once every 2 months to using it every day and I found out that inkjet cartridges essentially empty instantaneously.

Now that I am using a laser printer I have to buy toner something like every 20,000 pages, and with all the electronic document exchanging we do at work having the ADF has made it a breeze to scan in entire contracts or other lengthy documents.

Anyone that does any serious amount of working at home and still has to do any business in hard copy should seriously look into one, they aren’t much more expensive than a decent inkjet and are just vastly superior in every meaningful way for generic business use. (For certain types of fancy color work you might want an inkjet, but really if you’re printing off something fancy and colored for business purposes you may need to actually get it printed professionally if you’re very concerned about its appearance.)

My handcycle.

Not only did it give me a means of exercising after my accident but it was also partly responsible( besides the time in the gym) for my being able to walk.

When I first came home, my arms and shoulders were too weak for me to stay in my walker for the time needed to work my damaged leg.

The increase in endurance enabled me to use the walker more and wheelchair less and give the leg the work it needed.

We have a commercial popcorn popper we brought home after we sold our Mom&Pop store. It makes awesome popcorn in massive quantities, we use it often for get togethers. I also have a commercial meat grinder I brought home from the store, I make all of our ground beef and sausage with it.

I like being self-sufficient!

Does a music album count? Because boy oh boy, have I listened to the hell out of Drawing Dead.

interesting particularly with the auto-document feeding ability. Do you use this to store all records electronically? I’d love to get rid of my filing cabinets, and all associated skimming and searching

Waffle maker. Woke up one morning with a itching for some Belgian Waffles something fierce. So I drive down to the IHOP and after ordering the Belgian Waffles, side of Biscuits and Gravy, and an OJ the bill comes to like $25. I feel violated.

Fast forward 23 hours and it appears my waffle cravings were not completely satiated. Instead I head to Walmart (hate the place but Target ain’t open at 8AM), get myself a $12 waffle iron and some pancake batter.

Thing is dangerous as hell. As you would expect from a $12 waffle maker, corners are cut and all but the tiny plastic handle will burn your hand off if you touch it, but damn if 5 years later it still doesn’t make waffles like a boss.

You made me think of my college sweet heart. He went to a party school and they decided it would be a GREAT idea to have a make your own waffle day. :rolleyes: They almost burnt the building down. Hang over undergrads and waffle makers don’t mix.

Some years ago, my wife had to have–simply had to have–a printer/copier/fax machine. I thought it was a little frivolous, but she paid for it.

Now, as a lawyer in solo practice, I’m finding that it is quite valuable. I always need to send and receive faxes, make copies, and print documents. This machine does sterling service.

Note that my wife is now my ex-wife, and she moved far away, and she left me with the printer/copier/fax machine in the settlement. Given that I paid basically nothing for it, I`m pretty happy with it.

This is a very little thing. I bought one of those wire metal baskets for the grill. My husband was always complaining that hot dots and sausages would fall through if he wasn’t careful. Dollar General had a square basket that’s just big enough for about 4 small or 2 large burgers, or half a dozen sausages, for three bucks. Bill uses it constantly. It’s not particularly well made, nor is it particularly attractive. But it gets the job done, and it was only three dollars.

$500 for a Sous Vide Supreme. It gets used at least 3 times a week. Does amazing fish, excellent chicken, steaks are done just right. Had fun making artichokes, asparagus, did an interesting variant on pommes anna. Next up is something fruity, not sure what.

My “bang for the buck” purchase actually goes bang. I bought a Ruger Mark III 22/45 bull barrel for the princely sum of around $300 about two years ago. It’s a great training weapon given the grip angle and controls, which are designed to be like my 1911, and because it shoots .22LR you can buy a bulk pack of 500 for the same or less as a box of 50 of virtually any other caliber and shoot all day long, working on your accuracy and technique all the while.

That’s about as good as it gets for a shooter. The only way it could be better is if I had gotten a .22 conversion kit for my Kimber, but those cost much more.

No doubt it’s the Tiger Shark automatic pool vacuum I got 4 years ago. The house we bought then has an in-ground pool and the yard is heavily wooded with very tall oaks. The slightest wind brings a lot of leaves into the pool. The Tiger Shark is electric, and can do a quick 1-hour or a full 6-hour cleaning. Plug it in, drop it, and it does everything by itself. Climbs the walls to scrub the water line and everything. It was expensive (~$1000) and if it broke tomorrow I’d go buy a new one immediately. Before I got it I spend more time vacuuming than enjoying the pool.

For my wedding, we had a simple affair at a coffee house. We did want, however, to have a champagne toast, and struggled with the issue of glassware, as the venue did not have 100 champagne flutes. Enter IKEA, and their 6 for $4 champagne flute, got our 100 glasses for about $70, great deal. Enter the coffee house, and their offer to buy the used glasses from us to add to their inventory, at $1 per glass. We got our toast, and the glasses cost us -$30, that’s value.

My arcade games. Spent $25 apiece at an auction about 18 years ago, and have Satan’s Hollow, 1943, and Karate Champ.

Now, sometimes they’re a pain. Whenever I get into a new relationship, I’m always wary about what the girlfriend will think (I’ll never forget the look on one girlfriend’s face when she was chasing my cat… the cat ran into the back bedroom, the girlfriend followed, then came out with “that look,” the one that says “why am I dating you?” and “please tell me you’re getting rid of those if we get married”). They’re heavy and a pain to move when I get a new apartment. I have no idea what I’ll do with them when I go off to grad school.

However… I have arcade games! It’s fun to fire them all up and turn off the lights, a mini-arcade in my back bedroom. I’ve gotten free pizzas from delivery drivers for letting them play a few games. I pulled in about $75 in a month when I placed them in an acquaintance’s role-playing house, so they’re essentially free. They’re a pain to move, yes, but friends who’ve helped me move simply ask for a few plays in payment. Every guy I know is jealous (and all offer to “store” the machines for me when I go off to school).

It’s a service, not an item, but the couple times in the last decade that we’ve used professional movers. The first time was like $250, the second time was more like $500, but not having to lug 25 boxes of books or bruise the shit out of myself carrying furniture was amazing. I loved not having to call in favors and impose on friends. It’s such a small price to pay for being able to start unpacking immediately instead of having to spend a day recovering and a week with a sore back and shins.

I’d have to agree with this one. I’m getting a lot of use out of my meat grinder right now.