Ask HN: What are your best purchases in 2020?
It can be either hardware or software. For me,
1) Apple Watch. I have been moving a lot more since I got my watch. I also check my phone less often now. 2) Vari standing desk. Replacing my old IKEA desk with a sturdy standing-desk has been great.
102 comments
[ 0.21 ms ] story [ 204 ms ] threadCoffee: Kalita 185 pour over coffee maker. Inexpensive, high quality coffee. Also the porlex mini burr grinder.
Software: IntelliJ Ultimate/Clion for rust dev. Historically a VS Code guy but jetbrains products are great when you have enough horse power to run them.
Speakers: UE mega boom 3. Waterproof & great sound.
Book: Victor Frankls man’s search for meaning.
Food: Eggplant for this parm https://www.bonappetit.com/recipe/bas-best-eggplant-parmesan
Charity: Donating to Wikipedia. We need them.
Remarkable 2 - maybe it's first because I just got it 4 weeks ago, but it's amazeballs. I'm a paper notebook monster and I've replaced them all.
Udemy Course: Artificial Intelligence Reinforcement Learning in Python (by Lazy Programmer)
Elixir accoustic guitar strings 0.13
I made many other purchases, but as you state, but for better or worse, the charity makes me truly feel the best, so my wife and I donated to.
Wikipedia Humane Society local college radio station A small zoo Movable Feast My alma mater
It just makes things so much easier such as taking handwritten notes and sharing it
Digital notes are totally different than writing on paper.
Beautiful as a notebook. Lackluster if you want it as an artist and you plan on using the drawings you make as anything other than a png.
I happy with mine :D.
All I wanted for 2020 was autonomous farm machinery..an Ag robot for small acreages. Maybe in 2021.
I also bought this one because of a sale. I think the same company makes both because of how similar they are. https://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/B08DKYBTPH/
It's definitely big enough to cook an entire chicken. If a single person were asking, I'd probably recommend a 6qt or even 4 just for space saving reasons.
Buy the kind with a basket, not the kind with doors and pull out trays. I had this one also, https://m.ninjakitchen.com/exclusive-offer/SP101WBKT/ninja-f..., and I hate everything about it and sold it finally. Cooks worse, impossible to clean, hard to shake. With a style similar to the first two links, just pull the basket handle, shake, reinsert. Easy.
The main issue I have had is the cooking tray gets gross fast and it seems very difficult to properly clean.
Surface Pro 7. Such a lovely piece of engineering. Great lightweight laptop, although the tablet mode of Windows 10 needs some love and care from Microsoft.
Nvidia Shield. Great device for streaming media. There were always limitations with using the LG WebOS and the Shield made all of those go away.
Now I don't have any problems! I thought given it was relatively cheap (last time I looked half a decade or more ago they were closer to €100), it would not be very good and wobble, but it's rock solid. 10/10 would buy again.
[0]: https://www.amazon.com/Single-Monitor-Mount-Articulating-Adj...
The books "you, I and ReactiveUI" and "rx.net in action" - yet another Bible for developers like "clean code/coder/architecture"
[1]: https://www.mi.com/global/mi-laser-projector-150/
This being said, it’s such a fun device.
- iPhone 12. The 5s was showing its age.
- Oculus Quest 2 (want to move more when gaming)
- TempurPedic pillow
- Serta iConfort 4000 plush mattress. About time I invested in sleep.
2) Wobble stool for the in-between standing and sitting height at my standing desk.
Between 1 & 2 my back health is so much better it is hard to believe. My old home office furniture was horrible. Best investment I made early in the 9+ months now working from home.
3) Elektron Model:Cycles FM Synth. Making happy bleep bloops.
4) Almost to the front of the line to order a Concept 2 Model D rowing machine to lose my 'covid 19' pounds I've gained whilst isolating - set to order on Dec 30.
Also, guns. I'd never shot a gun before this year, and now I own a bunch. They're tight.
And an XSR700. Moved to Colorado this year, and the is no comparable way to taking in nature than riding a motorcycle. It wasn't my first bike, but it did reinvigorate me.
Subnautica. If you haven't played, you should.
2) Affinity Photo and Designer. I rarely use them, not enough to throw money at Adobe and they’re good!
3) iPhone 12. The 6S was more or less broken
4) A libro.fm subscription to get away from Audible
Life-changing event -- as my chronic nagging RLS has finally gone, and I can finally sleep like a baby again, after many years.
I'm taking now ~1000 mg/day, for time being, self-medicated.
I should have measured blood levels before and after.
https://examine.com/supplements/magnesium/
I have the kindle and pocket apps. It has its own reader for ePub pdf etc.
https://www.boox.com/boox-nova/
Absolutely fantastic, though I have a few bright spots because I am very blasé about just throwing it in my bag, so I'd probably think about getting a flip cover for my next one.
The only annoyance is the mobi format restriction, but it's quite easy to convert epub in calibre and then you can just email it to your kindle. Having the app on my phone too means I can continue a book in a queue/taxi/bus if I've not the kindle with me.
It's not worth getting the one with internet connection if they still have that, the rare cases I want to buy a book on the go, I just make a hotspot with my phone.
Basically my favourite bit of tech.
I chose to purchase a Rakuten Kobo Libra H2O, which is pretty good for my uses. I imagine the equivalent (but higher priced) Kindle Oasis to be as good or better. I went with the Kobo with the idea that I'd rather competition in this space not shrink further (though I doubt my actions matter much).