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Ask HN: What sub $200 product improved your 2022
514 points by Dicey84 on Jan 6, 2023 | hide | past | favorite | 1547 comments
Curious to know what thing / product / service improved your 2022?

For me it was an Elgato stream deck.

Initially bought it on a whim (probably more as a gimmick) but now find myself using multiple times a day in the office (sales) environment.




An air fryer.

It’s really a badly marketed product. Its real utility isn’t that it uses less oil, but that it cooks incredibly fast. Essentially an oven on steroids.

It’s made cooking so much easier. I usually toss some boneless chicken in with a light coating of soy sauce and cornflour. While the chicken cooks, I prep a basic Asian sauce on the stovetop.

The chicken and the sauce are both done within 10-15 minutes. Never have to check on the chicken (unlike a pan) or wait too long (unlike an oven). Mix them together and dinner is ready.


> It’s really a badly marketed product.

I think the marketing is really smart.

It's positioned as a new category of product. Oven on steroids won't sell because people already own ovens. It has to be a distinct appliance otherwise it's competing against a full sized oven. That's not the comparison you want a consumer to make.


I think you and the op are wrong (or maybe right?) for different reasons. Positioning it as a new category with less oil was right initially to get the thing off the ground but now it's maturing into a broader market with an installed base and that installed base has produced a ton of content, most of which is not for use as a less oil fryer, it's for use as a quick oven for when you aren't making enough of a dish for a family bigger than 4 people/aren't making something that will have leftovers for days.

The next wave of people buying these things are not going to be fryer junkies looking to cut oil, it's going to be people like me that looked at it and realized instead of waiting 20-40 minutes for my oven to heat up I could throw enough food in the air fryer to finish a dish in 7-12 minutes, which changes the dynamic of how I live my life culinarily for the better by a large margin. With the airfryer I can plan meal timing way less, have less pressure to be in the kitchen earlier, have flexibility to cook something like a roast in the oven on lower heat while polishing off fancy veg or multiple fancy veg (because the run time to cook is so low) in the air fryer, plus I save a lot on cleaning at the end because there aren't multiple big dishes to wash.


I agree but the next wave as you’ve described has already happened a year or so ago.

The majority of people I know have an air fryer at this point and that includes, of all things, a lot of senior citizens which is a disproportionate amount of my social circle due to my profession.

These things are out there in a big way. Lots of frozen products already have air fryer directions on them specifically.

I think it’s already the open secret that all they really are is a small convection oven.


The only issue is that people may get misled into buying an oven sized air fryer which defeats the whole point since their advantage is that they are a much smaller oven.

If they were called 'tiny oven' people probably catch on a bit better.

I have an air fryer which is literally a double walled cooking pot with a fan forced heater bolted on top. It's amazingly fast to cook and trivial to clean since it is small and fits in the sink but i fear many people hearing how good 'air fryers' are might do something dumb and buy an full size fan forced oven that's badged as an 'air fryer' which defeats the whole point.


> If they were called 'tiny oven' people probably catch on a bit better.

Tiny countertop (often convection) ovens (including, but not limited to, ones marketed as "toaster ovens") are very common, but a lot of them are under powered for their size compared to those markets as "air fryers", as well as having other design differences. And they existed long before air fryers, which needed to differentiate themselves from them.

> The only issue is that people may get misled into buying an oven sized air fryer which defeats the whole point since their advantage is that they are a much smaller oven.

Actually, I think it’s probably going to be pretty common for people to have multiple convection ovens / air fryers and use them for different purposes. The “whole point” of an air fryer is not the size: the convection oven + cooking basket setup has fairly great utility at all sizes. Yes, an oven with a powerful heating element relative to size is going to have the added advantage of coming up to speed faster, which has some additional utility. Yes, the particular design of the cooking pot + top fan you describe (or the InstantPot models with air-fryer lids that interchangeable with the pressure cooker lids) have some unique utility (“pressure cook & crisp” for certain recipes). But ones the size of a typical microwave (or combined with a microwave, as some are now) or a typical full-size range oven also have unique uses that smaller ones lack.


The whole point of them is that they cook quickly, and without oil. Small units are good for 1-2 people, but it won't prepare enough for a family of more than 3, thus the existence of larger units.


I think there's a point where you need to accept that you should use a fan forced oven. Air Fryers are literally a small fan forced oven in terms of tech.

The fast heating is due to the size. A fan forced oven is the same tech but slower due to being larger. Nothing more.

So if you are buying a large air fryer that's essentially a fan forced oven i have to ask "why not use the oven?".


I don't know that is true. I have always presumed the air circulation in the air fryer is far higher than that in my convection oven, since when they are both preheated, the cooking times are certainly much lower in the air fryer. Not only that, but some ovens have a specific air fryer mode now, indicating it is not just a typical convection oven. Should every oven maker add an air fryer mode to their convection oven, as some have started doing? Of course!


The tech is pretty hard to argue against. I mean you can literally look at what it contains and it's a heating element and a fan. Nothing more. You can Google this for yourself if you don't believe me but you'll find a lot of people patiently explaining this exact same point.

There may be a case that there's better circulation in most air fryers vs most fan forced ovens. In fact that's true in my case as my large oven and my air fryer have fans the same size (so more relative circulation in the smaller air fryer).

But they are the same tech. The difference in relative fan size probably has some effect but it's not a rule, it's really just a case of how big the fan in the device is and you may have air fryers with smaller or larger relative fan sizes and ovens with smaller or larger relative fan sizes.

If you're wondering why ovens now have 'air fryer' mode that's because marketing. I suspect it spins the fan a little faster.


> If you’re wondering why ovens now have ‘air fryer’ mode that’s because marketing. I suspect it spins the fan a little faster.

From what I can tell (and the detail provided on this is sketchy) differences include some or all of (varying between models):

1. Different fan position vs. ovens without air fry mode,

2. Faster fan speed in air fry mode,

3. Using “true” or “European” convection (heating unit behind the fan) in air fry mode, rather than “American” convection (bottom heating unit plus forced circulation fan), which may or may not be used in “convection” mode in a convection oven with an air fry setting.

I haven’t looked, but I wouldn’t be surprised if more peak output from the heating element was part of air fry settings, especially the ones where that is specifically marketed as, or has an additional mode for, “no preheat” air frying.


My usb fan and the blower on my central furnace are the same - both just move air. And yet my furnace with much more fire and a much bigger fan is not a convection oven, or an air fryer. The amount of air blowing around my air fryer is likely at least 10x the amount in my convection oven per interior volume (ACH or whatever they use for ovens), and 20x what my convection toaster oven moves. And the results are nothing alike. The differences are so stark, I can only see someone who has not used a good air fryer claim they are basically the same.

But of course, up the fan speed and the element size in relation to the interior volume, and make sure you place everything to get optimal air circulation and turbulence (my air fryer has several aero-vanes in its base to create turbulence in the air cyclone, and push it up through the bottom of the food), and you can make an oven that does what an air fryer does.


I don't know, I have heard that a lot of the newer ovens with an air fryer mode don't work very well at all. I wonder what is different.


Are you sure that "air fryer mode" isn't just marketing for clueless people who don't know it's the same as convection?

Air fryer is called "fryer" because of the basket comparison to an oil fryer.


Thanks for the great contribution of snide condescension, mixed with more than a bit of confidently incorrect.


Oven is still a LOT slower than a large air fryer.


Our new oven has an air fryer setting. Haven't messed with it yet, but this is encouraging me to.


Technically accurate doesn't mean good marketing, and in fact oftentimes quite the opposite


> it's for use as a quick oven for when you aren't making enough of a dish for a family bigger than 4 people/aren't making something that will have leftovers for days.

How's this different from a classic toaster oven? Serious question, I've never used or even seen an air fryer, but I have been using toaster ovens to bake single servings of salmon for over 2 decades.


A lot (most?) classic toaster ovens don't have a circulating fan built in. The fan makes a big difference in cook time and crispyness.


20 to 40 minutes for your oven to heat up? The hell? Mine is heated to 180 degrees in 5 minutes.


Americans have giant ovens. It's one of the things I miss after moving to Europe. The downside to a large oven is the time/space commitment, but it is super convenient.

Convection is also not common in the US. At least where I am in the Netherlands, shopping for a new "oven" almost guarantees it will be some sort of combo microwave/convection thing. Then it's also common to have a countertop airfryer as well.


From Japanese people, I have the impression that they've largely given up on microwaves and toaster ovens, as inconvenient and space-wasting. Having an oven in a Japanese home is extremely rare, being regarded as professional bakery equipment.

Instead, they have a "deshi rehhhn-ji", which literally translates to "electric range". This will confuse people for whom "the range" is the thing you can place multiple pots and pans on to cook simultaneousely.

But a denshi rehhhn-ji actually is more like a combination toaster oven plus microwave with a single shared compartment, designed to use infrared and microwave power simultaneously. Attempts to market these in USA over 14 years ago failed, seemingly due to high prices and consumers' preconception that ovens, toasters, and microwaves are fundamentally separate devices. However, I've recently seen at a Target store in USA three different combination devices that may be similar, from different companies. Their marketing at that store was like "combination air fryer and microwave!" and "combination microwave and broiler!".

deshi reenji …but that the double 'e' is not an English "long e" but rather more like an English "short e" of double length.


That sounds like what I have here in the Netherlands. It can be used as a microwave, a small oven/toaster, or both simultaneously. It came with a special tray that is metal but also microwave safe for use with the dual mode.

The only way that it differs from a normal convection oven, is the lack of preheat options. If you want to "preheat", then you turn it on, wait 5 minutes for the compartment to come up to temperature, then add your tray of food.


Meta: I now see that primarily accessing HN from an Android client[1] has obscured from me that doing (cons thing asterisk) in a comment, and then at the end of the comment doing (cons asterisk description-or-explanation) doesn't do what I thought it does, because the actual site suppresses the asterisks and uses them as delimiters for italics.

[1] Materialistic, on F-Droid.


bosch 800 series wall oven, takes forever to heat up, especially if you are looking for 400+, as does pretty much every oven I have ever owned over here in North America, with the exception of the purely mechanical 1970's era electric oven I had in a rental at one point. That one was 10-20 minutes depending on temperature target. I suspect the newer stuff is afraid to throw maximum power at the situation because of all the stupid electronics we have put in ovens. The cleaning cycle on that 1970's oven would turn everything to ash. The cleaning cycle on the bosch is a joke in comparison.


This is exactly right. An "air fryer" is nothing but a small convection oven. Most people already own ovens that can do convection cooking. So this very cleverly creates a new category of appliances.


That's a great description of them, a small convection oven. I already bought an air fryer before I realized/discovered that, and it's a wonderful thing. I know convection ovens exist, but I don't know if anyone I know has one, so air fryers (as tiny convection ovens) are a new capability. And a pretty awesome one too!


> Most people already own ovens that can do convection cooking.

[Citation needed]

I can’t find any data about penetrations, but IME it is very common for people not to have a convection oven.


I don't know of a single home in the UK that doesn't have a convection oven.

Where do you live?


It's rare for households in the US to have convection ovens.


Do you have gas ovens or none at all? Seems crazy to imagine a giant McMansion that doesn't even have an oven in it!


I don't know actual numbers, but a lot of people have them and don't know anything about them, or even that they have one.

I only have 3 data points, but every time I have used the convection feature at someone else's house, they had no idea it was a feature, or what a convection oven even does.

Edit to add: These were all in newer homes, so could be a more recent trend?


> Do you have gas ovens or none at all?

Both gas and electric ovens without convection are common in the US; in 12 homes I can remember, as a child and adult, in almost 50 years, only in the most recent have I had a convection (gas) oven. (All have had ovens.)


> Seems crazy to imagine a giant McMansion

Are you under the impression that most Americans live in giant McMansions?

Gas ovens are common and so are electric, but I didn't have a convection oven until I owned my own home. It's not really worth it for most landlords to make this upgrade.


Gas and electric, but often the convection fans are missing.


It seems so ludicrous that I want to ask if you’re sure you don’t have them, based on my experience of never having lived in an expensive home or actually buying appliances.

But then again, I’m sure you are right. Perhaps this is an easy tell - check to see if the oven has convection features. If so, the house was built for living, if not it was intended for flipping.


> It seems so ludicrous that I want to ask if you’re sure you don’t have them, based on my experience of never having lived in an expensive home or actually buying appliances.

I get how it would seem that way. I think few enough people make home buying or renting decisions based on it, that most developers building (major appliances are often preinstalled) or landlords renting homes don’t bothers with the small added expense, and most renters don’t have the choice of replacements, and most homebuyers won’t swap out unless the old one becomes unserviceable. As a result, American recipes don’t focus on them, people don’t tend to know how to take advantage of them, and the cycle continues. Maybe the Air Fryer craze will chip away at it.


I checked mine (electric) Definitely not. My mom does on both of hers (electric).

I don't recall my last house having it (gas oven).


> Where do you live?

The USA.


Interesting! I assumed all modern ovens are pretty much convection these days but I guess the tech doesn't make sense across the pond (for whatever reason?)

From what I mean before, it's basically unheard of to buy a single oven without it being a convection oven: https://www.johnlewis.com/browse/electricals/cooking/built-i... -- If you buy a double oven then the top one will likely be a "traditional" oven (mine is like this).

Downside with convection ovens is the heating element can shit the bed if you manufacturer skimps out on the thermal cycling. Had to replace mine yesterday after only 5 years of daily use, but was a quick 5 min job and £15.


In Germany it is. Everyone I know has one.


If you can figure out which symbol it is. (My mom in the US bought a german oven, and each nob is a symbol, which means something fan, line, squigly line...). Once you know it makes sense, and this is a case where the internet helps.

(symbols like:) https://www.ebay.com/itm/173568522355

but in the US convections ovens are not that common.

I had in the 90s the faberware "turbo oven". It was too big for me but it was a convection oven and quite fast. Caterers that did functions at the museum I worked hauled them in to heat food.


Smaller is an important feature. It preheats and reheats more quickly.


simply because it is a smaller convection oven


Its not even a new product. Convection ovens have been a thing for years. But because standard toaster ovens and convection ovens look so similar people thought they were the same.


It’s much faster than most convection ovens as they existed, and so I think still smart to differentiate.


Only due to the small size though. That's literally it.

You know what a larger air fryer is called? It's called an oven.


The fan is much stronger too, so not literally it. Changing two of the most significant parameters gives it entirely new utility that ovens didn’t and don’t capture.

In effect it’s closer to a microwave meets an air sous vice. Much quicker heat up, much more even heat dispersal.

I have a convection oven too that’s the same size, we use the air fryer 5x more often and it’s almost entirely due to the fan not the size. Cuts cooking time in half comparatively.


> Only due to the small size though.

I think its not technically size at all, but:

(1) Heating output relative to size, and

(2) Fan capacity relative to size, and a less contribution from

(3) Arrangement of heating element and fan.


>I think its not technically size at all, but:

"It's not due to the size because they didn't shrink /all/ the components equally."

:)


I suspect shrinking all the components equally would preserve some of the effect, because my intuition without spending too much time is that there are scaling effects that would work that way.

But, I’m mostly saying that its not inherently the case that a small convection oven would have the advantages of an air fryer, and, a major reason for the name “air fryer” for the product categoriy is because countertop convection ovens without those advantages already existed, because they were optimized for other goals, so just calling them “countertop convection ovens” would have sent the wrong message to buyers familiar with the existing category.


That's why marketing works. If they called it a micro-oven, it would be too similar in consumers' minds to appliances they already own.


Also, AirFryer.

Fryers have oil, right? Oh, this one doesn't. Air??? Air Fryer??

Not an oven. Not a fryer?

I don't own a fryer anyway, they are gross with all that oil.

This fryer uses no oil?????!!!!

My oven doesn't use oil either. But it's not a fryer!

And then it gets bought.


And then you try it, still confused how this can fry. And after the first couple of cooks, you don’t care anymore and wouldn’t give up this gadget!

For me the USP is the slide in and out basket, ability to do a little shake. The convenience of that over a tray in the oven and the washing up and the turning and the burning one side of the items… is priceless


By definition you can't fry something without oil. The food would need to have some oils inside of it already or you would have to use at least a little bit of oil to fry the food. But you could fry something in an oven by putting oil on it too. Otherwise you are just baking it.


Exactly. If you ever have opened up an "air fryer", it's literally just a circular electric stove element with a metal fan above it blowing down.

Any way you look at this device, is substandard, not frying, and best saving your money elsewhere.


Haha. Funny, but doesn’t match widespread opinion. Personally it is the best money I have ever spent in my kitchen. Fantastic results. Food often even better than fried, oven baked, pan fried or grilled. I explicitly choose my air fryer for certain cooking even though all those other options available to me. So the opposite of substandard to be honest… there must be a word for that?


Strongly disagree. Maybe it's not "frying" in the sense of a big bucket of boiling oil, but there is a huge array of cooking that is vastly faster with my air fryer.

Roasting veggies, roasted potatoes, frozen foods like fries, things like that. I can be done with a batch of fries before my oven has even gotten to temperature. Massive time savings.


If it works and is capable of cooking your food better and faster than a standard oven, who cares what’s inside?


You can use oil - that works too!


> otherwise it's competing against a full sized oven

Even worse: a full sized oven that I already own.


The problem with the marketing is that every ad I've seen for it makes it seem only good for making healthier, less tasty versions of food I like.

What it's actually good for is cooking some things faster than a conventional oven, reheating fried foods.

I have had success making good homemade french fries with my air fryer, but I still thoroughly toss them in oil before cooking them. The end result is not really much healthier than if I deep fry them, but it is a lot easier and less messy.


Are you sure? Feels like totally less oil than deep fried to me, even tossed in oil, it isn’t sitting in that oil… put too much and that all drips off into the bottom of the pan the basket sits over. I agree to makes fantastic chips (UK), even with oven chips without adding further oil, much better than those oven chips when cooked in an oven.


I would absolutely buy a better, faster, crispier oven for $100-$200.

I honestly didn't understand what they were at first and didn't bother to find out.


Convection ovens have been around a long time too. Some have even started labeling certain cook modes as "air fry".


Also competing against many microwaves which function has a convection oven


Totally correct. The marketing category theory is sound


or just, people love fries

The real driver is the globally increasing number of single-person households tho


It's a small convection over marketed as an "Air fryer". It's genius marketing!


Air fryers blow significantly more air than a convection oven. Even my Breville toaster oven which is touted as an air fryer clearly isn’t - I find I need to cook foods somewhere between the convect instructions and air fryer instructions.


This I did not know. But besides the time, is there anything the air fryer does better than a convection toaster oven? Does the food taste noticably better? Otherwise, an air fryer strikes me as a unitasker that just takes up counter space. We get a lot of use out of our Cuisinart toaster oven because it can do a lot: bake a loaf of bread, roast a tray of vegetables, or broil a piece of meat. And, oh yeah, it makes great toast!


They usually have bins, which means you can pull the food out and shake it without worrying about burning your hands; or, plate it without touching it.

That's the big difference that I've noticed now that I'm reading about them.


It's got to be more than that, perhaps the bin shape creates a better air-frying environment? Why is there a difference in cooking results between the toaster oven "air fryer" and the bin type?


This. The pull out draw/basket is the true game changer.


We got a Breville at home recently and I couldn't understand what the hype was all about, it did exactly what my last countertop oven did even in Airfryer mode.... this is making sense now. We were already heavy users of the old convection only model, so this didn't seem like much of an upgrade. I think the marketing hype is just pushing people to realize a countertop oven of any sort is very useful. (That said, the Breville is very well made and we'll keep it around. It works well, just didn't quite taste much of a difference from what we had before - an older Cuisinart FWIW).


Be sure to use the basket and don’t overfill it. But yeah - I don’t have an air fryer but if I put some frozen French fries or the like in there the air fryer instructions absolutely do not get the food done.


Clearly it’s working for them but it also I think loses them sales from people who would absolutely buy an oven that evenly cooks (if you’re an apartment dwelling baker you know the pain) and preheats in seconds where “air fryer” sounds like it does something totally different.

It’s the same thing with instant pot where they probably lose out a bit by not marketing themselves as a serious electric pressure cooker that can also do other stuff.


They just need to say "it's an air fryer with OVEN FUNCTION"


I wouldn’t lose too much sleep for them, I think they are doing ok :)


Well, I fry food, using heat and air, without soaking it in oil, so why shouldn't it be called an air fryer? I also have a convection toaster oven that cannot do that.


https://www.oxfordlearnersdictionaries.com/us/definition/eng...

"to cook something in hot fat or oil; to be cooked in hot fat or oil"

Because of what the word means?


Not everyone has a convection oven.


> Its real utility isn’t that it uses less oil, but that it cooks incredibly fast. > The chicken and the sauce are both done within 10-15 minutes.

Normal sized boneless chicken breasts should cook in a pan in about 10 minutes or less, and you really don't need to do anything other than flip them once. If air fryers are convincing people to cook their own fresh food I would say that's a good thing, but I'm still struggling to see how they're actually better than "traditional" cooking.


After a lot of research I've come to the conclusion people who swear by these often eat a lot of ready-made food from the freezer. The air fryer cooks it faster and makes them think it contains fewer calories (even though most frozen ready-made food already contains all the oil it needs to cook well).


Or they're individuals without the need to make large portions. For example I make lots of stuff in the air fryer, none of which are frozen. It's simply that I don't want to wait 30 minutes to heat up my oven when I'm not going to be using all of that space and heat.


Does your over really take 30 minutes to heat up? Mine gets to 350 in about 7-10 minutes. It's a mid-range GE model. Nothing fancy. Preheat. Do your chopping, sauce prep or whatever. Oven is ready by the time you are really ready to put anything in it.

No doubt, an air fryer made my son's college dorm experience so much better but I don't see the appeal for anyone who isn't single or who has a proper kitchen already.


because of new laws in Vancouver about power (building is <3yo), our stove and oven take FOREVER to warm up. the building electrician said they had to buy purposefully underpowered ones that were slow or it would blow the breaker. it's faster to boil water in an electric kettle for example.


I think Salmon comes out just as good if not better in the air fryer than by cooking it in a pan, although you need to cut the filets to a very specific size.


It's a miniature convention oven. There are foods you can cook in a pan but also foods you can't and must cook in an oven, like pies. It's best useful for individuals that don't want to waste the time nor energy heating up their large oven just to make an individual portion, at least in my case.


I wish this was mentioned more often. Air fryers are tiny compared to ovens. In my case where I typically cook a meal for two days for a family of four an air fryer is utterly useless.


Air fryers definitely are very different than ovens or pan frying, it's hard to explain, but it's definitely more comparable to frying in that it crisps up food by removing the water from the outside of stuff quickly.

By this logic it's particularly good at cooking food that otherwise would be better fried, but outside of that it does vegetables like brussel sprouts or small filets of fish particularly well leaving the inside soft and the outside cooked.


Air fryer isn’t the best choice for Chicken breasts, so your point is valid for that cut. It will of course still cook ok. But chicken thighs on the other hand, probably better than a frying pan as you can get the crispyness all over and juicy still in the middle, just like deep frying. The fattier the raw product, the more the cooking choice swings to the air fryer.


I poach mine in the microwave with a bit of water, drain, then shred with forks and add salsa/tomato sauce/etc.

Dead simple. Super tasty. 10 minutes, easy cleanup.


Anyone with an electric oven can be done cooking that chicken in the air fryer before the oven is even up to temp. That is much better.


We got one in 2020 and we use it daily. Chicken, french fries, sausages, fish and bread is what we use it for most of the time. Some things like spring rolls are better fried with oil but overall we love it and it is a real time saver and of course less oil is used.


My partner is vegetarian and I’ve found that tofu and soy curls are near life changing good in the air fryer.

Cube the tofu, cook for 75% of the total time, pull out and dress in liquid seasoning, return for the last bit and the outside gets crisp while the inside remains juicy!


Thank you this is a killer tip I have to try it

Curious -- what do you use as a dressing?


Have a full recipe? This is interesting.


Press-dry tofu, cube, toss in a teaspoon-ish of tasteless oil (enough to make the cornstarch stick), cornstarch and spices.

Put in airfryer so that they're not clumped together. 180C for 10-ish minutes and you should have some tasty crispy cubes of goodness.

If you want to be extra fancy, you can toss them in a sticky sauce of your choosing at this point.

Serve on rice and enjoy.


How do you make bread with it?


We don't make bread. We just make bread from the previous day hot and crunchy again. It just takes a few minutes. We used to do this with the oven but that takes quite some time more.


Ah yes, croutons are another fantastic thing to use it for.


Interestingly, the Wirecutter recommends people just get a really good high end toaster oven[0] over an air fryer, since its just a convection mode cook.

[0]: https://www.nytimes.com/wirecutter/reviews/best-air-fryer-to...


That style of "air fryer" is just a convection toaster oven with an air fryer rack. Shameful marketing, if you ask me. A real air fryer (the ubiquitous basket style) cannot be replaced with another appliance, but replaces many, while doing a better, faster job.


I disagree. I bought an air fryer for my mom about five years ago, had an older breville toaster oven without the air fry capability I used for the better part of a decade, and moved to a new breville toaster oven with air fry capability about a year ago. The basket-design air fryers are a pain to store, don't have much space for food (we had to do fries in annoyingly small batches), and felt very one-note.

By comparison, the new breville I have does everything the old one did plus air frying, and the difference is distinct - I tried making fries in the convection baking mode on the old one and the result was noticeably worse than what I get from the new one in air fry mode. Noise and heat output approaches annoying levels with either air fryer, so I'm pretty confident the experience I get is close or the same as the purpose-build one. And the ability to space things out more gives better results, at least for my purposes. (I'll note that 95% of my air fryer use is for fries.)


For example, George Foreman decommissioned. Sausages never cooked any other way. Chicken nuggets, love them or hate them they cook great in the air fryer. Main convection oven only really used in our house to bake bread.


Why is the basket useful?


Baskets are useful because they allow the items to cook from all sides, and not require turning in the same way.

Personally, I use a separate metal basket in my convection oven. But it's entirely possible that more convection would be better.


If you like baking bread and you have the space, I would suggest getting a steam-convection oven, like the one from Anova.

You can also steam-slow-cook meat and get juicy tender chicken.


Same here I got one at the beginning of 2022, I cook steak, chicken, pork and more in mine. It has made it significantly easier to cook lunch and dinner instead of what used to be the much easier choice of just ordering out.


I wanted an air fryer, so I got the same one my friend has last year, one made by PowerXL. Mine produced this horrific chemical smell that filled up the whole house and soaked into the food. Reddit told me that it just needed to be variously washed or run a few times and it would go away, but it never did. I had to return it.

I suspect the plastics used were changed, or some preconditioning process was skipped to get more units out for a Black Friday sale or something. I haven't revisited the product category since.


It's a shame how you and your friend received very different products. An additional hypothesis: Could it have been a counterfeit?


I had multiple air fryer models over the years. The stirring functions (a rotating paddle that stirs the food) is an ABSOLUTE GAME CHANGER and a must for me.

Unfortunately those equipped with a stirring function come up as expensive. I would love to see a < $100 air fryer equipped with it.


What exactly does the stirring function allow you to do that you couldn't do before?

And which model of stirring air fryer did you end up going for?


I had both a De'Longhi FH1363 MultiFry Extra and a T-fal ActiFry.

You can throw in frozen vegetables, meat and seasoning, turn the machine on, come back in 25 minutes and your food will be cooked uniformly to perfection. E.g., frozen brussels sprouts, chopped chicken sausages, a bit of olive oil and sambal sauce.

Prep time under 30 seconds.

Bonus points: Both fryers come with dishwasher-safe paddle and bowl. You can detach and wash the lid too of the De'Longhi one.


But the basket shaking is half the fun of air fryer cooking! Sooo satisfying.


Agree, and actually less necessary than you think. Sometimes you forget and it’s usually still fine.


Wait till you cook some salmon or pick up an inexpensive slow cooker (Walmart had a 2 quart one for like $11 over the holidays)


What's a "basic Asian sauce"?

I'm not trying to be critical, but am genuinely curious as someone who's lived more than half the years since 1997 in Taiwan without hearing that term before.


Not OP, but I am half Asian and worked in various Asian restaurants growing up in the US. When I read the term "basic Asian (brown) sauce" I'd assume some combination of soy sauce, brown sugar, oyster sauce, and chicken/beef broth. With options for garlic, ginger, sesame oil, and rice wine, plus whatever else to tailor towards the dish.

I'd wager that having spent so long in Taiwan you've probably never heard the term because there it would just be "sauce" :P (or less tongue-in-cheek, it's just something that is implicitly and silently understood and recognized rather than having some kind of formal name).


Ah okay, so definitely more Chinese than Indian (or even Japanese or elsewhere).

Yeah, I’d tend to think in more specifically, in terms of which of those ingredients you listed are in it but all of those are familiar.


No reply from OP, but I know or know of a few people who do something along these lines. There are a set of ingredients relatively common though clearly not universal across East Asia and I suspect OP is making a pastiche of those. If it were a language you'd call it a pidgin. But it's food so I dunno what you call it.

Though the phrase "White Man's Teriyaki sauce" is running around in my head and yes I get the irony of that.


As someone else living in taiwan a long time, You wouldnt hear asian sauce in asia its just sauce haha 東亞醬 doesn't exist. We dont say american ketchup. But in usa numerous friends say make a quick asian sauce to dip the protein which as comments below explain is a concoction of personal tastes.


Ha, yes. 東亞醬 sounds hilarious! Then again, so does "dip the protein". It sounds like some crazy bodybuilder trying to make supplements taste good.


These do nice job with tofu. Cut into cubes, toss in some oil, salt and pepper, and air fry for 15 mins. Tofu comes out like that deep fried take out tofu!


Yeah this is it, right? People throw fries in airfyrers that just soaked up fat before put in their packaging thinking it's healthy, and it just takes 3x the amount of time to "deep fry" some french fries.

But that is really not it's strong point indeed! It's not an alternative to a deep fryer (but that is primarily the way I see it used), it a faster oven.


I just put fresh cut potatoes in mine, and they're done to a crisp in less than 10 minutes. So, it actually takes about half the time, when compared to deep frying them. And there's no mess or used oil to worry about. And I don't have to air out my house afterwards. So many benefits, including health!


> it just takes 3x the amount of time to "deep fry" some french fries

Perhaps if you have a deep fryer with oil that is already at temperature. But if you have to heat the oil it's definitely not 3x faster than using an air fryer. Also, no need to clean up splatter afterward, or monitor hot oil while it's cooking. Or figure out what to do with several cups of oil after you've deep fried some french fries.


And it certainly smells lot less than your heated vat of oil...


No need to pretend it’s healthier. Some things will be, some things won’t be. Definitely doesn’t take 3x in a home setting. If anything 3x faster start to finish in my experience.


How does an air fryer compare to a speed oven? I want to remodel my kitchen someday with a speed oven (convection microwave) over top a steam convection oven (for cooking things with steam without pressure). I'm not sure what I would be missing without an air fryer (and none of those are less than $2-3k, so the price ranges are completely different).


If you're looking to do speed oven stuff (use the heating elements and the microwave to cook the same dish), don't get a Bosch. I have the Bosch 800 speed oven and while it's convenient to have a single appliance that acts as an oven and microwave, you can only use the speed oven for pre-programmed dishes, of which I think there are eight seemingly random ones.


It's the exact opposite. The "air fryer" marketing lets companies present it as a healthy alternative to deep frying, and people eat that up (heh). If they sold it as what it really was – a toaster oven – there would be a lot less enthusiasm and demand, and people would definitely not spend multiple hundred dollars on one.


You obviously have not owned an air fryer, if you think it's a mere toaster oven. Or you got one of those convection toaster ovens with an air fryer rack, which really isn't an air fryer, like the basket ones are. I haven't used my stove, oven, or microwave since I got one.


I’ve had one before and I don’t really get the hype. It’s an oven that heats up faster. I see the value in that but it doesn’t seem useful enough to take up counter space when I could just wait a few minutes for the oven.


It's cut my cooking time down by magnitudes, but even more so, my cleaning time. But I suppose it all does depend on the use cases. I, for one, plan on never having to wait for anything to preheat in my kitchen ever again!


We got a Panasonic combination microwave/broiler/oven/air fryer/etc. I kind of assumed it would be pretty mediocre at everything, but during this past summer where temperatures were unseasonably warm and our kitchen has no ventilation or access to fresh air/windows/aircon.

The device itself was more expensive than $200, obviously, but the "small oven" aspect of it saved us from having to run our regular-sized oven at all. I'd been wanting a small (not quite toaster-oven style) oven for a while, but without the counter space we could only justify it by sharing space with the microwave.

Not a literal lifesaver, but definitely a figurative one.


The "air fryer" marketing is actually quite good. It justified a whole new class of countertop appliance, even though many already have convection ovens.

And if you've had frozen fried foods like mozz sticks, chicken nuggets or eggrolls in an air fryer, it really does live up to the name


Does the fan get all oily & grimy? Is it hard to keep clean? I like being able to wash greasy kitchen items in lots of hot water and detergent. I can't imagine it is possible to immerse the business end of an air fryer in water?


A good air fryer should have a pan/grill that's detachable from the fan/heater section. The pan/grill should fit entirely in a sink.

If you get an air fryer that's the size of an oven it will be as hard to clean as an oven and will take just as long to heat and cook as an oven since internally the tech is 100% identical to a fan forced oven (a heating element with a fan). Don't make the mistake of bigger is better for an air fryer.

Air fryers are meant to be small pots that have a fan forced oven element bolted to the top that can easily be detached for washing in the sink. That's the whole appeal of it. It's a teeny tiny oven that heats up extremely quickly for little power due to its size. It's easy to clean because the non-electronic part fits entirely in the sink. It's only the size that gives air fryers an advantage. If you buy an air fryer the size of a fan forced oven you have literally just bought a less good fan forced oven.


Not as bad as you might think. Splatter happens when moisture comes in contact with hot oil/shortening. In an air fryer you don't have much oil and it doesn't as easily splatter. It's relatively contained. AFAIK, there's no mist of oil droplets like with a frying pan or a fryer.


The fan, not that much. Out of sight out of mind :)


> oven on steroids

Aka convection oven.

Which is a fancy marketing term for having a fan inside your oven


Also small enough to make preheating near instant.


Exactly! Convection ovens are devices for roasting, not for frying.


The marketing for air fryers is fantastic.

It's a small convection oven, which a lot (definitely not all) ovens come with standard today. I bought 2 of the cheapest whole kitchen "packages" from HD and both came with a convection setting. The electric even called it "Convection/Air Fryer."

A friend saw that setting and busted with excitement "Your oven has an air fryer!?" Yes my oven has an oven.

Really good marketing.

Never underestimate the power of the oven.


I use mine daily.

It makes tofu better than any other method and is a staple in our household.

My only wish is that the basket style models had more robust options. We go through one every ~6 months.


I was thinking if buying an air fryer however cleaning seems like a nightmare. Can you please share some insights on how easy (or hard) it is?


They're all a little different, but this works for me. When it beeps to say it's done, in a single arm motion I pull out the tray, dump the cooked food onto a platter, and then rinse the tray in the sink. The key is to get the tap water on there while the oils are still hot.

But temper your expectations. If you need your cooking implements to be squeaky clean, an air fryer will be a lot of work. If you're satisfied with your regular oven having a few bits of carbonized food bits here and there, then you'll also be satisfied with a "camp clean" level of air fryer cleanliness.


Exactly this. It is kind of always a little bit greasy, a little bit crispy burnt crumbs inside. Really fatty foods like sausages, you dump the waste oil after taking the food out, and rinse it a bit. It’s hard to describe without sounding gross, but strangely seems not that gross when you have one.


Buy a small one. Smallest you can for your situation.

That might seem like a weird suggestion but remember the entire advantage of an air fryer is that it's a smaller form of an oven so it has less to heat and is thus faster for less power. Buying a big one makes it all pointless, just use the oven.

The small ones fit in a sink. Not much different than cleaning pots&pans.


I recommend a basket type and getting the biggest in area and power you can find. The surface area is important. More even and better you can spread the food better the result.

It works by forcing air from the top to the food, not slowly from the back like regular oven. So you get better result if food isn't piled up over itself.


The tray is usually two piece that separate. They're not hard to clean. https://www.youtube.com/shorts/P_nUcqzNi00

Airfryer doesn't get hot enough like pan over direct flame so food doesn't seem to get burned / stuck.


I put aluminum foil in between the grate and the tray. Makes cleaning much easier since you only need to clean the grate, which is dishwasher-safe.

Some think it affects the air fryer cooking but I haven't noticed a difference.


I just empty the tray and rinse with hot water. Since it doesn’t touch the food I figure it doesn’t have to be too sterile.


I have a Ninja Air Fryer and the baskets are dishwasher safe. They are also very easy to wash clean clean with a soft brush, warm water and soap. Easy cleaning is one of the major benefits of an air fryer versus deep/shallow frying via a dedicated or appliance or the stovetop.


Easiest thing ever. Just rinse the basket with hot water and a little dish soap, then rinse it again and dry. Nothing sticks to the non-stick coating once dish soap hits it. I don't even scrub, just rinse. So fast, that I don't even use the dishwasher for it.


I have one: all I do is take the basket out and clean it. Both parts of it are non-stick.


Cleaning mine is extremely easy. It's just a basket with a detachable grate.


Have a power xl and cleaning is just tossing away the parchment paper after


I have a small house/kitchen. I got rid of the entire oven. Replaced it with a two burner counter top and an instant pot that does 7 things (including air fryer). Certainly it limits cooking a bit and requires some creativity, but at the end of the day, couldn't be happier with all the extra space.


I googled air fryer and found out that is a second generation of kitchen tech. First generation was known as Air Grill and was good, but quite bulky, with big glass cover and not easy to wash after using, to be honest. Does anyone have used both and can share an experience?


The reason I love my air fryer is that meat and fish both taste great cooked in it and there's no need to stir it or even turn it over since it cooks all over at the same time. About the only thing it isn't good for is eggs.


When getting an air fryer, I'd highly recommend getting a rack-style one, not basket-style. It cooks better when not stacked together.


Fast is absolutely it. Quality cooking that's fast and requires pretty much no effort. Using my right now as I type this.

It's also fantastic at reheating most things that aren't soup.


I have the instant pot vortex, which is really cool. The weird thing is all the oil and grease that materializes on the bottom rack thing. Does anyone else use instant pot vortex?


We just got that as a backup to our (older, Polish-made model) Philips air fryer. The Philips is much better, although the instant pot is as serviceable as other brands of air fryers we have used. All air fryers get grease build up below. If it's the same recipe, you were likely eating that before, so I am happy to see it.


I like air fryers but my food doesn't stay warm for as long as when I cook it in the microwave, for whatever reason


Maybe it removes more moisture thus the cooked food is dryer with less mass.

Haven't noticed that myself. Then again I mostly only cook pre-fried or that kind of stuff in my air fryer.


Spent $150CAD on a combo Ninja air-fryer / pressure cooker. You pressure cook the food then air fry it. Crazy!


I have the same thing, makes the greatest roast potatoes.

Wash and cut the potatoes into whatever's the appropriate size, put in the frying basket, pressure cook on high with the timer set to 2 mins (timer only starts once pressures built), release pressure, remove basket and drain + shake roughly.

Leave to sit for ~15 minutes on the counter while doing other shit, empty and dry the main vessel.

Bit of olive oil (or other fat) and seasoning onto the potatoes with shaking to make more surface area by fucking up the surface, pop it back in and air fry for 20-25m on 200*C, shaking halfway through.

End result? Absolutely perfect roast potatoes. Glassy crunchy outsides, fluffy insides, every time.

Also functions as a dehydrator and is super good enough to turn harvested mushrooms dry enough to powderise to make seasonings.


so it is not a meme?


100% not a meme

I cube tofu, cover in corn starch, throw in air fryer for 8 minutes. (chicken wings can be made the same in 20 minutes -- way better than anything from a restaurant)

when tofu is done, i add a little water, toss in some broccoli, close for 3 minutes, done

nuke pre-made rice and i have lunch in no time

i still use oven for longer-cook items like potatoes, sweet potatoes, and brussel sprouts, but only if I have a main cooking in the air fryer. but the oven gets used a lot less these days.


Chopped brussel sprouts are really good in the air fryer if you like some of the leaves to crisp up.


It's mostly a meme. They are good at cooking some things, but frying is not one of them. They're basically an expensive toaster oven.

*Edit: 'are'


I disagree. I cook with a fairly wide range of techniques (e.g., sous vide, convection oven, slow cooker, smoker, pressure cooker), and my recently acquired air fryer has been a pleasant surprise. I was skeptical, but happy to be proven wrong. It is fast, versatile, and the results are often outstanding. It is great for things like fries, reheating frozen food, and fish. It is easily the best pizza reheating device I have yet encountered.


> It is great for things like fries, reheating frozen food, and fish. It is easily the best pizza reheating device I have yet encountered.

So the thing toaster oven/convection oven is good at ? Aside from big oven heating slowly of course


Yes, it's essentially a miniature convection oven. It cuts down a lot on preheating time. Life is short. It is also quite easy to clean.

edit: Also, I should point out that the "basket" form factor of the air fryer is helpful. In the convection oven things tend to lie flay on a sheet, and cooking is less even. Granted, I could put a basket-like container in the convection oven, but it would still be much slower to heat.


None of this changes the fact they more or less cook the same things as toaster ovens.


I hate to call it convection oven. In my mind convection oven is just bit better regular oven. Pretty much the same, only difference is that it is bit faster and you can put more stuff in if needed.


I have owned an oven, toaster, toaster oven, air fryer, dehydrator, deep fryer, microwave oven. Air fryers use a fan to circulate the heat. While a toaster/convection oven typically use radiant heat. Upside to air fryer is the speed. Downside is it will tend to cause fats to render out quickly making the food more on the dry side. Some foods/diets are suited to that style of cooking.

Growing up my parents almost exclusively used a pot shaped one with the fan/heater in the lid, to make roast chickens. The skin usually came out nice and crunchy and spicy. It would be tougher to get that same effect in a toaster oven or oven. They also tend to heat more evenly so for reheating they cook better than a microwave. But can not beat a microwave on speed.

Think of each of these as tool to get things done. Each one can mostly do what the others can. But some tools are better suited to cooking styles than others.


They're like... plus ultra superior toaster ovens, because they circulate the air.


It circulates air a bit harder than a convection oven in my experience.

It cooks things way faster.


It's definitely not a toaster oven. The fan is important - there's a reason CPU radiators have fans on them, and it's not because they don't do anything.

You can argue it's just a convection oven with a faster fan, but that doesn't make it a "meme".

They're also, like, very much not expensive at this point. It's a very commoditized, competitive market, and you can pick them up for <$50.


Exactly that. 100% correct


It's an oven with a big fan.


An airplane is a car with a big fan.


Any recommendations for one from OP or anyone else with one they’re pleased by?


You'll get some proper recommendations, but I'll mention that I have a very cheap no brand thing that cost under $50 at a grocery store. A skeptical, low investment purchase. It's amazing.

No fancy features, the design could clearly be improved, but chuck anything in this small chamber, crank up the timer and delicious food comes out 10mins later. I've gifted nice models to others, without feeling any need to upgrade my own. Maybe when it breaks.

I would suggest sticking with a small one though. Quicker to heat, better circulation etc


I recently got a "Breville Smart Oven Air Fryer Pro". I love it. It gets a little dirty inside, but it cooks so much better than a traditional over, is great for reheating food over the microwave, and the air fryer works really well. And it is a great example of user interfaces because it has no touch screens with dedicated knobs for everything. It is a breeze to use and a nice breath of fresh air when it comes to having physical knobs, which are additional quite nice knobs.

https://www.breville.com/us/en/products/ovens/bov900.html


I'm going to argue the above largely misses the point of what makes a good air fryer and what you have linked about is actually just a fancy toaster oven.

You did mention it yourself - "It gets a little dirty inside".

Compare it to the $30 air fryers that are essentially an insulated cooking pot with a detachable heating element. They do the same thing but are so trivial to clean since they are a cooking pot that fits in the sink.

It's one of those things in life where cheaper is better in my opinion and i do not recommend the above product at all.


I.e., pros and cons exist for products that do different things. I can't reheat items, such as pizza, in just an air fryer.


You can if you slice it


I got this one on sale for BF, and it's been absolutely amazing. I cook fish to perfect temp using the probe, without having to check it at all. And I cook my side dish at the same time, and this thing finishes them together with smart cook!

https://www.ninjakitchen.com/exclusive-offer/DZ550WBKT/Ninja...


If I were buying now and where to splurge I would probably go with Phillips XXL. Not necessarily the smart model, but bigger size.


Is it any better than a normal electric oven + ventilation?


The reason is that it's much smaller in terms of internal volume.


... and put them over rice that you made in your $130 rice cooker


We bought a nice one and it smelt terrible, like awful melted plastic. We didn't even use the thing, we returned it. From what I can tell, the insides are covered in some kind of PFAS and I do not want to eat something from it. My oven does convection just fine.


We had this issue at first also. The company told us to run it on the steam setting with a bit of water and some vinegar. Did that a couple times and hasn't made a smell since then.


I paid a guy a bit under $200 to pull Ethernet cables from my basement up to the attic of my house.

Now I can keep heat-generating stuff like my storage server and the cable modem (surprisingly heat-intensive) in the basement, have a WiFi AP in the attic for great coverage in the yard, and I can easily drop lines down into rooms on the 2nd floor from above by just drilling a small hole in the top of a wall and feeding the Cat6 down, or put one into a 1st floor room by going up from the basement. Cat6 anywhere I want it, basically.

It's something I've wanted for years and held off doing because I knew I was capable of DIYing it, and therefore I hesitated to hire it out. This was dumb.

It took him an hour or so using various specialized tools ("fish bits", "fish tape", tall ladders, drywall saws, etc.), when it would have probably taken me the better part of a weekend and I wouldn't have done as clean of a job. He also knew from experience where the easiest place would be to get all the way from the basement to the attic, given my house's construction style.

Definitely worth the two bills, and also now I have a "wiring guy" for future projects. I've already called him back to help run wiring for PoE outdoor cameras, another thing I've wanted for years but haven't bothered to execute on.


I built my house 4 years ago (with liberal use of subcontractors), and one of the things I knew I'd want is ethernet everywhere. So I ran the wire, bought a big patch panel, and now every room in my house has 2-4 ports for whatever I might want.

As a bonus, if I (or the next guy) wanted to have a landline phone, it's in the same closet and it can be patched to anywhere in the house by swapping a single wire.

Given the opportunity, even after the house is complete, it's a very useful thing to do.


A big+1

When building new,

Running 2-4 Ethernet cables to each room is a must and cheap. Kitchen islands, garages, you name it. Between different devices, multiple Vlans, being able to run PoE equipment, it’s indispensable. Helps avoid a lot of small switches.

Security cameras if they are your thing should ideally be poe and avoid wifi.

There are some good Ethernet to HDMI adapters as well so prewiring ceilings with a double run for projector plus Ethernet doesn’t hurt.


Another clean option is MOCA, if your house has existing coax runs. It has the nice benefit of not needing to be 1:1. You can have 3 MOCA devices on three floors that all communicate directly with each other, instead of needing a core switch.

$100 to connect 2 drops. Plug it in and it works. (change the admin password tho!) https://www.amazon.com/Hitron-Ethernet-existing-Backbone-Str...


For home use, this is likely to be fine. MOCA operates as a broadcast network, though, so all bandwidth is shared among all connected nodes. The performance characteristics are closer to an old hub than to a switched network.


but its 2.5Gb. Each ethernet port is only 1Gb. You'd need have what, three pairs, all simultaneously trying to transfer their nearly their full 1Gb to saturate 2.5Gb.

If you have 5 or less, it shouldn't be an issue.

But yes, it would not necessarily work great in something in like an apartment.


Ethernet (at least oveR twisted pairs) is a full duplex transmission medium, so two devices should be able to more than saturate the MOCA broadcast network.

Additionally, >1Gbps is starting to become common on consumer hardware.

Again, it is probably not going to be a concern for most home networks, and MOCA should still be better than mesh networks or powerline ethernet.


I suppose in theory, yes. I'm not sure how often, in my home network, I would have full duplex 1Gbps transmission, unless I've accidently caused a loopback.


We agree.


I have been running Ethernet cable through my house for 20 years. I even have cable running to my shed office which is about 15m away from the house. I recently unhooked the shed cable as WiFi has got so good. I have an external WiFi I point now mounted at the back of my house. My pet project over Christmas was setting up a Windows VM on my Ubuntu Server in the attic. I teach in different locations and now have my own remote desktop. Rather than go VPN to access my VM I created a cron job on my Ubuntu Server to check my Dropbox account every five minutes for a text file. If the file exists it adds the ip address I put in the file, updates the server's firewall to allow the ip, and then deletes the file. Simple but effective.


Same here. Once you get used to having Ethernet ports in all rooms and wired WiFi access points...there's just no going back. If we move to a new house in the future, the CAT6 will be pulled into all rooms before the furniture arrives even.


I've been making the same mistake. If anybody knows a good and reasonably priced "wiring guy/gal" in the Portland, Oregon area I'd be grateful.


I used http://freedomcustomcommunicationsllc.com/ when I lived in Hillsboro. He ran 4 or 5 ethernet cables for $400 IIRC about 5 years ago.


I recently hired Integration Engineers (ie-pdx.com) for a similar job in PDX. They were fantastic to work with.


I also transitioned to a hardwired connection. It is so nice not having to worry if it's the wifi dropping connections, etc.

It also makes it easier to experiment with Linux, etc.


I've wanted to do something like this in my condo but don't know how to find someone to do it, how did you go about that?


I'm tempted to say a pair of PLC plugs instead of wifi repeater.


Would Ethernet become obsolete like USB soon?


USB is obsolete?


USB-A wall outlets are. CAT5 is close to it, but I'm sure the OP ran 6, 6e or 7 which will be useful for a long time.


I'm gonna go against the grain here and list non-technical things!

I bought some new plants for my home, which makes the place feel a lot nicer.

I bought some outdoor-trousers - things that go on top of your jeans - when it is cold they keep me warm, and I can now roll around in the snow without getting wet as a nice bonus. (-10°C here today). That said it was only a couple of weeks ago that I came out of a sauna and rolled around naked in 30cm of snow. Bracing!

Other household things that have made my life nicer have included some decent concrete-bolts screwed into my walls and ceiling. Now I can hang plants, have an indoor hammock, and a hammock-chair too.

Finally I've started buying random paintings whenever I go to visit charity/thrift stores. Each time I go I buy a single painting, it must be "amateur", and it must have an artist signature and date on it. At the moment I've got a wall with about eight of these paintings hung on it. All different styles, colours, and levels of "goodness", but together they all look good, rather than a garish mismash. Kinda fun.


> I bought some new plants for my home, which makes the place feel a lot nicer.

I second this. My wife went through a health scare (she's fine now) early in 2022, during which she was a little depressed. one of her outlets was to go to home goods or lowes and buy house plants - one or two at a time, every week or two. those stores have pretty generous return policies if you kill the plant - homegoods 30 days, lowes - a full year!

I think we have about 25 houseplants now including a couple of large ficus and fan palm trees, she waters them all at once on the weekend and it doesn't take much time at all, maybe 15 to 30 minutes per week; there are some annual maintenance tasks as well like re-potting but the return on time investment is really fantastic. Guests always comment how lovely it is in our living room surrounded by plants, and she has a new hobby of propagating the houseplants and giving new plants as gifts. All in all, I'm sure it's more than $200 in total, but if you find good deals, $200 can probably buy between 5 to 15 very nice houseplants.


> outdoor-trousers - things that go on top of your jeans

Which ones?


Hi from another Brit living in Helsinki! In the same spirit as your trousers (toppahousut?) this year I bought myself a pair of Icebug boots for handling the icy footpaths after last winter’s horror show. Best purchase I’ve made this year I think.


Aussie in Lahti here, on my third winter, and also finally got a pair of icebugs. They make a big difference! I also highly recommend a pair of Halti (or whatever brand) soft-shell pants. With thermals underneath, I've been perfectly happy outside at -20.


Small world, but yes those are pretty good to have around.


By 'outdoor trousers' I assume you mean what hikers/backpackers/winter-folk would refer to as a 'hard shell?'

Just came back from an exceptionally cold vacation to Iceland and realized that despite years of backpacking and hiking in temperate weather, I knew not nearly enough about layering for truly cold weather.


There are also “snow pants.”


I'm honestly not sure what their proper name is. They're thin, and waterproof, is the best I could say - not particularly insulated, but I know there are some which are.

I mostly bought them to keep my dry, rather than warmer.


It sounds like these were also insulated, so they might have been more like a soft-shell snow pant.


Instant Pot. Can be used as a rice cooker, slow cooker, pressure cooker (mostly known for this last use)

Though probably not as good for rice specifically as an actual high-end rice cooker, it greatly increased the range of foods I eat.

Makes it easy to make nice one pot meals overnight for multiple days, you can make really good broth soups from chickens etc quickly, or slowly if you prefer.

If you like to try tougher cuts of meat, this is also a good reason to get it. The fact it doesn't occupy one burner is also helpful.


We got an Instant Pot and our Zoji rice cooker has collected dust ever since. It is great for brown basmati rice where the Zoji is weak and slow. Try 360g brown basmati rice (we don't bother rinsing it), 705g water, a quarter tsp of salt, 1 tsp of oil. Cook 23m on high and then let it sit for 10min before venting the rest of the pressure off. Remove lid, fluff the rice, and wait a minute or two before serving.

The one weakness of the Instant Pot is that most models won't go to 15psi and there is the odd recipe where a longer cooking time can't compensate. For example, there is a Modernist Cuisine recipe for pressure cooked root vegetables that uses a bit of baking soda to help bring a caramelized flavor to the party. Works great in a 15 psi cooker but is a disaster in an instant pot: the veggies just taste like baking soda. I suspect that stocks made in the Instant Pot might not be as good as well for similar reasons but haven't tried that yet.


If you're cooking both rice and a meal however, you might need that extra rice cooker (and cook the meal in the instant pot). You could also stack the portions in the instant pot, but that doesn't work for all types of meals.


I'm just the other way: had an Instant Pot for a couple years (which is great) but I bought a Zojirushi rice cooker and LOVE LOVE LOVE it. Japanese medium-grain rice in the Zoji is amazing. I cook 1-2 cups nearly every day to snack on.


Really easy to make yoghurt with too!

Dump in a gallon of milk, heat it up, let it cool, add a couple spoons of a store bought plain yoghurt (if you don't have some started saved from the last batch), put the lid back on and hit the yoghurt button and come back in like 8-10 hours. If you prefer a thicker yoghurt, strain it a bit before storing.

Gallon of yoghurt for the price of a gallon of milk and probably like 20 minutes of active work.


100%. I’ve been doing it for 24 hours lately.


Mine mostly sits because I find the instructions and UX inscrutable. I've made some great ribs, but just as often something goes wrong and the device doesn't warm up enough, or doesn't form a seal and cooks off the liquid or burns the meat.

You don't get any indication that things are going right until the timer starts going down, but that's many minutes after you start it. It also comes with two completely incompatible rice recipes, one of which doesn't use rice mode, and no explanation of why. Just terrible UX.


That’s not been my experience with mine, but I don’t use any of the program modes (except for Yogurt). I just follow recipes online and set the time.


InstantPot is fantastic. It is the only way I have made brown rice which matches the quality of my local Thai restaurant.


What's your brown rice approach? I've tried a few diff ones I've found online but none have turned out amazing


I do pot-in-pot with 1:1 ratio of water to brown rice. We have a number of small stainless steel bowls that we set on top of the wire trivet (don't forget a small amount of water in the main pot too). I cook for ~15 minutes for most brown rice and then let the instant pot sit undisturbed for another 10-15 minutes while the pressure naturally releases, and the rice has a chance to take up any unabsorbed water.

White rice is the same deal, though I usually go a few minutes less (~12 minutes). I like to add a very small amount of some sort of oil to the inner pot with the rice.


1-to-1 ratio of dry rice to water, by volume. I typically make 3-4 cups (dry) at one time.

Multigrain setting on the Instant Pot, shortest cook time. I believe it is 20 minutes at full pressure. I do not know if the multigrain setting is on every Instant Pot.

20-30 minutes of natural steam release once the pressure cooking is complete.

Turns out soft and minimally sticky every time. Perfect for my palate. I was eating it with just butter and soy sauce for a while.


Me too. Instant pot for the win. Haven't tried meat in it. It's been Indian curries and lentil soups & such. I also bought a 3 quart version for my motorhome!


Do you follow any recipes online? Those sound great and I would love to expand my instant pot game beyond pressurized rice making.


I've scrabbled together a pot roast recipe I follow loosely that gets praised every time I make it. I get a chuck roast (or something similar), evenly coat in salt and pepper to taste, saute it in the insta pot(about 6-7 minutes each side to brown it), deglaze with red wine vinegar, then put in half a small package of carrots and little red potatoes(onions can be added but nobody likes them here). I also add 2-3 pepperoncinis on this bottom layer, then I put the roast back in, put the rest of the carrots/potatoes/another couple of pepperoncinis on top and around. Then I add a cup of water and beef bullion, and set the pressure cook feature to around 1 hour 10 minutes or so. I use the keep-warm mode and while it's ready to go once the main pressure is done, it just gets better over time (and you can do it before leaving for work and come home to lunch or supper already waiting). I'm really lazy when it comes to cooking, but this has been easy, fast and delicious (plus leftovers!).

An even easier thing is shredded BBQ chicken. They can even be frozen and it's done in an hour. Would write the recipe but leaving for lunch now.


I do a very similar version, minus the pepperoncini. One thing that I've found can really take it up a notch is to add just a touch of soy/worcestershire sauce, maybe about 1/4 to 1/2 teaspoon of each. IMO it adds a nice savory background flavor.


I have a similar pot roast recipe, but I've found it comes out better in a slow cooker, or a dutch oven. I've never really been all that impressed with the results of the Instant Pot. Time savings? Even that depends - building and releasing pressure adds 40+ minutes to cook time.


This is a fantastic instant pot recipe -- it's an adaptation of a Colombian pressure-cooker stew to an instant pot by Kenji Lopez Alt.

Easy, fast, flavorful.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-riGSANPe3g



Just note that in 3:25 or so in the video, Kenji modifies the recipe to reduce cooking time (from 25 to 15 minutes).


Its wonderful for chilis, stews, pot roast, short ribs, etc. I've even made whole chickens in it and bone broth.


I just learned that I can make ten potatoes in about twenty minutes in my pressure cooker which has been a huge help for meal prepping. It's so great for so many things!


My Instant Pot-branded Instant Pot is pretty much useless as a slow cooker. Unfortunately, I donated mine upon getting the Instant Pot before realizing this. Maybe newer models have fixed this but the three times I tried, had to end up pressure cooking as it never got warm enough, even on high, to slow cook.


I love our Instant Pot! I keep finding uses for it. The other day I'd forgotten to thaw a 4-pack of pre-cooked chicken sausages. Threw them into the Instant Pot (steam tray w/ a cup of water under them), 5 minutes on low pressure (~10 min total), and they were totally warmed through.


I was using it as well, but after talking to my very knowledgeable dentist, pressure cookers destroy most of the vitamins from foods. Since talking to her I started using my pot without the pressure valve, semi open, and use it as a small simmering device, similar to a pot on a stove, but without needing to remember to turn it off.


What? That's the absolute opposite of what happens. More vitamins are retained in the food in a pressure cooker because of less water/more steam and less oxygen.


Pressure cooking has been a game changer for me!

The latest revisions of the instantpot do a good job of sous vide. I've tried a sous vide roast [0] so far, 24 hours later I had the best roast I've ever had. Incredible.

[0]: https://sousvideways.com/sous-vide-chuck-roast/


I especially like cooking pork via sous vide (in my Instant Pot). Pork is really hard to cook in a regular oven/pan without making it tough, but a couple of hours sous vide, and then quick searing makes it wonderful!


I haven’t gotten there yet. Do you have any recipes you can share?


I've had 3 Instant Pots die on me over the span of six months. I got a Yedi instead and it's kept working for two years so far.

https://www.amazon.com/Yedi-Programmable-Pressure-Steamer-Ac...


Yes! we got one last year and although we use it mostly just to cook beans (this being a mexican household) it has improved our lives enormously.


Mine is also an air fryer. :D


Space heater, 20 bucks. In the past I chose to heat the bedroom a little on cold days and otherwise suck it up and dress while shivering (no point burning a ton of gas to heat an entire bedroom). Now, I use 1.5 kW for ~3 minutes (0.01 kWh) to have hot air be blown on me while getting dressed in the morning.

Because it changes how warm I feel while going downstairs, I also don't need downstairs to be as warm to get warmed up again. I'm already warm and can sit in a normal temperature room to work.

---

Air purifier (40 bucks on offer I think). We got it for unrelated reasons, it didn't help for that. Unexpected uses:

1. Neighbours' smoke occasionally comes into our apartment somehow and now I can do something about it. Before, I would just suck it up and try to convince myself that the little residue coming through whatever wall isn't going to impact my health.

2. This winter, people seem to like to heat the house with whatever old painted glued rotting wood they can find (or maybe also dead bodies, it's hard to tell). I can wait a few hours, but if it doesn't clear up and I want some fresh air before sleeping then what I do is open the bedroom window wide for a few minutes to replace the air, doors closed, then close window and turn on purifier on high for 30+ minutes, and then go back in there to sleep.


I took this even further, put air purifiers in most rooms and hooked them up to air quality sensors.

Mostly they run on the very quiet setting (or not at all), but they’ll automatically spin up if someone cooks, farts, opens a window or hits a vape pen.


Also add a CO2 sensor (not CO, carbon monoxide, but carbon dioxide). It is staggering how much CO2 is emitted when sitting in a room working and which literally makes your mind react slower and make you more dumb, essentially.


Agreed, I use the cheapest monitor on this page (currently $69 USD) – a little awkward to change the settings, but runs on USB power, monitors CO2 and temperature, and beeps when you exceed a (configurable) threshold so you know to open a window. I keep it next to my desk

https://www.co2meter.com/collections/desktop


That's surprising how much it costs.

Did something similar recently for fun and cost was ~20e for co2 sensor, attached to a raspberry pi pico or esp32 and it ends up being 27-30e. (add some more sensors like co or gas for 10e each, a mini display for 5e, hook up to home assistant or telegram and ends up being more useful)

To be fair, QA on these things tends to be valuable, so perhaps cost might be justified.

Cost likely can go down if you know what to buy, I didn't and just bought what a reputable seller had.


Agreed, 70 USD probably has a healthy margin. But, I also value that it's been calibrated, tested for reliability, and is already designed/assembled.


100%, a $70 CO2 sensor made a huge difference for me. I live in Germany, and there is no ventilation unless you open the window. I noticed that when I worked all day in the apartment, at the end of the day my brain would be toast, I wouldn't be capable of any really important thought, and I'd have a splitting headache and feel exhausted. Now I just open the window whenever the meter turns yellow (which actually means I just leave the window open almost all the time). Here's the one I use: https://www.amazon.de/-/en/gp/product/B00TH3OW4Q


> automatically spin up if someone cooks, farts, opens a window or hits a vape pen.

I guess it will be on all the time for me.


My air purifier is built in with them, and I think it's especially handy if your bedroom is close to the kitchen (range hood only does so much imo).


What sensors do you use? I have a bunch of air filters but just leave them running all the time.


I use airgradient sensors.

On the other hand, instead of DIY you could just buy air purifier units with integrated air quality sensors. A friend of mine uses these, they appear to work very well https://www.philips.co.uk/c-p/AC2936_33/2000i-series-air-pur...


I got a Philips air purifier with such a sensor, it's a different one though (it's oval and just white at the sides).

I would not recommend it purely because they decided to use an extremely poor touch interface for control which quiet often doesn't register when I try to manually adjust something like shutting the unit down temporarily or resetting an error code


Honestly, that still sounds like a minor inconvenience compared to DIY. Those things seem pretty set-and-forget beyond filter replacements.


Also don’t stress yourself out about air purifier quality. The only thing that matters is the disposable filter and the difference between cheap and expensive is how fast they can move air through it. They all reach the same destination.

Buying a purifier that can fit standard sized “box” filters will save you $$ in the long run.


There are aesthetic concerns, it’s harder to have a bunch of air purifiers spread around your home if they’re ugly as sin.

Having one very powerful air purifier hidden away in another room is not as good as having a bunch of smaller ones spread around.


Not exactly, price increases with some certifications and branding. In the high end of purifiers, they can handle much smaller particulates and gasses (e.g. carbon matter measured by dozens of lbs with replacement filters costing hundreds). The most effective filters for general use will have higher CFM. CFM also decreases with smaller particulate filtering. Unless you're spending ~$1k+, most activated be carbon seems to wear out faster than it's worth considering.

Overall, yes, a cheap box filter (placed specifically in the bedroom, if limited to one room) is often the most effective.


> Unless you're spending ~$1k+

Speaking of expensive air purifiers, you can often find excellent deals on used IQair units. I got 4 GC Multigas units from a local museum for 100 euros each.

I have an alert set up on the local craigslist equivalent and constantly get emails.


Aren’t the filters super expensive though? I see the ones for the health pro listed at 115.- each.


They do last much longer than the cheaper filters.


How often do they require charging?


I’ve changed mine once after 4 years of moderate use in a quite well insulated 1700 sqft apartment with wood floors, no carpets but a decent amount of visitors and occasional tiny dog.

Those filters were used though, no idea for how long (they only had like 70 hours on them according to the onboard tracking, but that would be easy to manipulate even by accident)

This essentially tracks with the numbers presented here https://www.iqair.com/newsroom/why-you-need-to-replace-your-...

IQair recommends a yearly replacement for my HEPA filter, but my environment had a fairly low amount of particulates to begin with (new building with filtered air intakes) and workload split between multiple units.


Air purifiers create ozone which is dangerous.


This only applies, in general, to purifiers with ionizers that release positive ions.


You are confusing purifiers with ionizers.


Mine has an ozone button, are you saying even if that's turned off it's still making ozone?


How does that work? Does the electric motor of the fan put out meaningful amounts of ozone?


UV-C light generates ozone


When I used to mine cryptocurrency, I ran the miners as my space heater too. Now with gaming PCs and GPUs pulling up to 1.5 kW as well, I just use my computer, running GPU tasks, plying games, etc, when I need some warmth. It works well and at least the miner and computer were doing useful work rather than simply shedding heat.


> I just use my computer [...] when I need some warmth

The difference is that the computer's fans don't blow directly at you and make you warm while leaving the room effectively unchanged as in my use-case.

When heating up a room, regular natural gas central heating is usually a lot more efficient than electricity. A gas power plant creating electricity for you to turn back into heat is rather lossy. Heat pumps are different: they roughly break even if you have a 100% gas power mix, because they move heat at 300% efficiency instead of creating new heat.


That's true but I still get useful work out of the electricity to heat conversion. For example I turned off my heater the other day and upscaled a bunch of media on my computer, my room was quite toasty.


Oh sure, when you're using waste heat that you would otherwise be venting or actively cooling then this is definitely better. The way you phrased it, it sounded to me like you'd find extra gpu tasks to turn on whenever the room gets cold that would otherwise not be done at all. In that case, on most grids it's unfortunately still better to burn gas directly.


> Space heater, 20 bucks.

Which probably produced just as much heat as a $200 space heater. Technology Connections did a great video on that. https://youtu.be/V-jmSjy2ArM

I used to occasionally run a space heater under my desk on low because my legs and feet would get cold. It felt nice and cozy, but eventually I just got used to putting on socks and pants.


Your math is off by a lot. 1.5 kW for 3 minutes is 0.075 kWh.


> Your math is off by a lot. 1.5 kW for 3 minutes is 0.075 kWh

Oh, you're right, I rounded the three quarter up to a one, but failed to remove the zero before it. Either way, it's a lot better than even just filling up the cold radiator with hot water, let alone it heating the rest of the room up!


> Air purifier

Bless you. Not only do my neighbors burn wood for heating but I also have to use an AC for heating. Totally forgot air purifiers existed.


I posted this separately, but look into a heated mattress pad too. Its life changing for cold climates. Direct heat into your covers makes it so much cozier.


Heh, I'm the opposite. I want a mattress cooler.

I stay up later than my wife and like to go to lay in a cool bed. She likes it warm. So we compromised and got a mattress warmer for her, and I have the heat set to drop by several degrees at like 11 PM.

But then she gets up at like 7 AM (6 AM on workdays), and she'd be freezing, so I have the heat set to turn back up at 6 AM, which means if I wake up, I find myself roasting and can't get back to sleep.


What's the temperature in your bedroom? You say "drop by several degrees" (but not from what to what) so it sounds like you heat there during the day and let it drop at 11PM?


I haven't checked the bedroom temp itself, but I do change the thermostat for the whole house from 71 degrees down to 68.


Got something like that too! Not sure why I didn't mention it honestly. So in the morning I get out of bed and turn on the air heating so I get dressed in warmth; in the evening I turn on the heated blanket while brushing my teeth and warm up the bed and covers. Also allows me to leave the room colder while not being cold in bed for the first twenty minutes.

I don't know the power draw while it warms up. The packaging says 100W but I measured it to actually use only ~30W, average during 1.5 hours. Maybe it does use 100W the first 5 minutes or so. Let's say it uses the full 100W for up to 15 minutes while I do my evening hygiene ritual as an upper bound, that would be 0.025 kWh (1 cent last year, 2 cents at current prices).

Definitely recommendable.


Kagi search engine subscription is easily my top choice (https://kagi.com).

I'm really glad something can finally, truly replace Google search and be just as good or better (neither Bing nor DuckDuckGo were good enough when I tried them).

If we're talking physical products, I'd probably go with the Apple Magsafe wallet. It's a little thing but I love not having a separate wallet to keep track of every day.


It really bothers me that Kagi sample search is a canned response.

If you would carefully look at "Best headphones" example, the reddit result card shows '2 days ago', whereas the link it points to is 7 months old.

Similarly the Sennheiser headphones results card shows $379 on Amazon, when its actually $400 today.

No offenses to how well it works, but if I had to be sold to get a subscription, I would rather like to see a real-time example. A canned example FWIW could be a completely scripted search result.


Kagi founder here. I am of the opinion that things are not and do not have to be perfect. We do not want to market Kagi as a perfect product, without flaws. What you see is what you get. We have a lot of work to do. Google, a trillion dollar company with nearly 200K most talented employees, still gets many things wrong in their results. We are a ten people bootstrapped team, and the web is a vast problem, just to align expectations.

I am personally not bothered by small errors here and there, it is important to get the big picture right - alignment of incentives inside the search experience. Overall, I believe we also have superior results to Google, please try it for a few days and share your thoughts.

Kagi is in some ways broken and flawed and it is what makes it feel more humane to use.

If there are things that particulary bother you feel free to share them on kagifeedback.org. We are not ignorant of these, just limited by our current resources.


I was a beta user and paid for a while, but my search results were too intermixed with my wife's and my child's. It's absolutely worth it to me, but paying $30 a month for 3 users was a little too much for me to stomach.

To be clear, I pay $20/mo for ProtonMail Visionary so I'm not averse to paying! I just can't see the value at $30/mo when the other family members don't use it nearly as much as I do.

Maybe this is an untenable problem due to your costs and you need those low use paying users. I'm not sure.

To clarify: by intermixed I mean our tuning was different so it became somewhat interesting, as we all wanted to tune the settings differently. It's not a huge thing, but between that and feeling bad for having three people using one sub...


Good news, reduced price family plans are coming soon (we are aiming January). You'll get three users for $10/mo, four for $12/mo as a base membership. A lot of discussion about it going on right now in our discord server.


I'll be signing up the day those are available!


Most of your arguments regarding resources are in general valid points, but when you are showcasing 3 results as selling points how hard is it to keep them updated. If you're not personally bothered by this showcase -- which is your product advertisment -- you perhaps should be. Going against a trillion dollar company needs a very convincing pitch IMO to average user.

> We are a ten people bootstrapped team.

We are a 2-engineer startup. We give business analytics/market trends on mined webdata (through our B2B dashboards) with a 48 hour live data guarantee. Every time, user queries crunch through about 9 million data points for every day over last 36 months - in real time. Sorry, but it isn't a very good reason to have stale results.


You're demanding an awful lot out of a $10/mo product here. And I think you're missing the forest for the trees. It's still an as-good-or-better search engine than Google with no ads and a focus on privacy.

The fact that it lists ballpark prices rather than exact prices is really not that important in the grand scheme of things.


I never once mentioned the price point.

My critique was about the accuracy of the results, and staleness of their showcase. If I would be a paying customer - be it $1 or $10/mo - I would expect it to be better than something I get for free. I already mentioned in another comment that Google shouldn't be a baseline to improve on, when so many competing innovative search companies such as DDG, Ecosia, You.com exist. Even DDG, Ecosia aren't visually that spammy either. For Kagi to win, the product strategy should win over by a visible margin.

You like it. To each his own.


They're not pitching to the average user. Average users won't pay for search.

Also kind of a dick move to compare to your startup to Kagi to justify it sucking. Analytics is very different to search. Your products sound completely different.


Then you're missing the contradiction. Average user won't pay for search, and paying tech-savvy user may not be convinced. I have nothing against their product - my critique is to improve their product showcase.

I never knew pointing out excuses was a 'dick move' when we are doing the same theoretically (mining web data). In my defense, you could take your opinion elsewhere.


There are startups that index only products and prices, so you could use their API. Maybe it’s a cost issue though.


It doesn't seem like it works all that well either...

Their example is the headphone search. That Reddit post is a few months old, and has _one_ comment on it. The thread asks specifically about closed-back headphones under $150.

Something like this would be much better as a result: https://www.reddit.com/r/headphones/comments/nq0pt/headphone...


For sure it can be improved, but at least it points you in the right direction (/r/HeadphoneAdvice)

Remember we are comparing this to Google where the entire first page for this query is either ads or results full of ads and affiliate links.


No offense again to the product. Please take this as positive criticism

Please don't compare yourself to Google. Most people on HN are well aware that Google search has become a terrible baseline. DDG, appending Reddit to query etc., are workarounds discussed a lot of times on the forum.

I have no beef against Kagi. I wish you guys succeed, but please have a better product argument. At this point, I actually find equally good suggestion on 'headphones' from both DDG & Ecosia. If Kagi needs to win over, it should be doing better vis-a-vis the upcoming search engines, not Google which has been SEO gamed over & over.


Non taken. I mentioned Google as for most people, 'better than Google' is already worth paying for (and for most people Google is also still the "king").

We may differ perhaps on what 'winning' means. For us having thousands of people pay for Kagi despite such strong and free competition is already winning. We do not have ambition for global domination, but are creating a search experience for people that want an alternative that has their best interest in mind. And when we have a product glitch, it is not like we are delibarately not achieving even higher quality - we are constrained by our resources.

Also have in mind that we launched our public beta just 7 months ago, give us a bit of time (Google has been around for 25 years, DDG for 15 years, Ecosia for 14 years) and we may reach your standards of quality. Fact that generally speaking Kagi already brought more innovation to search experience in such short period time than these legacy search engines did in decades (by legacy I mostly mean using legacy business model - ads) means that we are serious about it. Just need a bit of time.


> the reddit result card shows '2 days ago', whereas the link it points to is 7 months old.

This happens on Google too, all of the time. I think this is a reddit issue, with how they have their meta configured...


Would you say Kagi has escaped the Google SEO deterioration? Google has essentially gotten so bad for me that DuckDuckGo, without noticeable improvement, is now on par with Google.


Also a subscriber to Kagi.

In my experience it's at least marginally better, but one of the really nice features that Kagi has (and probably the main reason I subscribe) is you can extremely easily block domains. So whenever I hit a SEO garbage site, I just go back, block it, and I never worry about it again. In the areas you regularly search, this quickly gets you to a result page that is substantially higher quality than google.


> "you can extremely easily block domains"

I just use ublacklist [1] for that.

I like Kagi by the way, but my problem with it is:

1. major: I value privacy. I would not connect my identity to a search engine (we've learned from recent news events that promises/privacy policies mean nothing.)

2. minor: The subscription cost is a little too high for my usage volume.

[1] https://iorate.github.io/ublacklist/docs


> I would not connect my identity to a search engine (we've learned from recent news events that promises/privacy policies mean nothing.)

You do not need to. You can register with an anonymous email (like SImpleLogin) and use anonymous payments (like PrivacyHQ) if remaining anonymous is imperative to you.

Kagi is 100% privacy respecting though, with the data you choose to trust us with (we are in the business of search, not the business of monetizing data).


Not GP but do you mean Privacy.com? As far as I'm aware it requires truthful personal information to use just like any other financial service.

As such, it can still be used to link a person to their Kagi account which means it's not private or anonymous in any meaningful sense. Additionally the service is only available to US citizens. I would strongly urge Kagi to consider adding cryptocurrency payments - ideally Monero.

This is coming from a paying Kagi customer. I like to put my money where my mouth is but I'm not a fan of the current payment options. I understand that Kagi is a small company in early stages, but I would expect cryptocurrency payments to be available 12 months from now.


You are correct, I thought there was a company called PrivacyHQ that offered anonymous payment cards, but I see now I was wrong. Privacy.com does not fullfill that gap.


> "You do not need to. You can register with an anonymous email (like SImpleLogin) and use anonymous payments"

Well, that would be an improvement, but all searches will still be linked to 1 account, whereas i can search on other search engines without this privacy issue.

On top of that, privacy laws in the US are... quite bad (even compared to Europe.)

> "we are in the business of search, not the business of monetizing data"

I appreciate your effort, i might reconsider at some point. Thank you for your reply!


> Well, that would be an improvement, but all searches will still be linked to 1 account, whereas i can search on other search engines without this privacy issue.

We do not log searches or associate them with an account (check our privacy policy). This is because this would only be a liability for us, with no benefit. We are in the business of selling search results, not user data.


It would be good if you can accept Bitcoin payments and do something like Mullvad VPN (use numbers for login).


From my (shallow) understaning, Bitcoin does not offer full anonymity ?

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2022-09-21/crypto-tr...


> use anonymous payments

Why not Monero, the clearly top choice for anonymous payments?


When we looked into it, it was hard to find a simple API that a USA company can use to allow monthly subscription payments with Monero, similar to how Stripe enables fiat subscriptions.


Pinterest gone from image results is worth the entry price alone.


Fyi, it’s pretty simple to add a custom filter to any decent adblocker like uBlock to prevent annoying domains from showing up in search results. I haven’t seen a Pinterest result or Stackoverflow clone in years…


Seconded!


I think we really will need more details here! Could you elaborate a bit? What would I learn if I spent 25 min researching kagi?


Sorry, I'm far from an expert here. They started recently and just went out of closed beta I believe. I've been using it for a few months now.

They have a lot of nice features pulled from Google and DDG:

https://help.kagi.com/kagi/getting-started/index.html

I haven't done any objective tests, so can't really say much about search quality except that it definitely works at least as well as Google for my searches (usually tech or legal stuff), and it doesn't have ads. Whatever I'm looking for is usually the top result if my query is good and it's not something that's ambiguous.


> DuckDuckGo were good enough when I tried them

I'm curious as to where it lacked. DDG works more than well enough for me, but I'm wondering what other people search for where it is not.


I think it's hard to describe how one search engine is less good than another. It just... is. Quite often there are very few or even no relevant results for my query, and as soon as I put a "!g" in front of it I quickly find what I'm looking for.

Don't get me wrong, DDG works fine for me for 90% of my search queries (which are usually quite straightforward). But I have noticed a difference in quality vs Google, at the margins. I'm considering trying out Kagi.


Yeah, the dreaded !g in DDG is an all too familial feeling.

I have been using Kagi for four months now, and can happily report that I resort to it less and less, and even when I do it is mostly due to muscle memory from years of DDG.


totally agree that for ~5-10% of searches DDG is not as good as google.

When DDG fails, I just re-run the search with "!g" and it goes straight to google and I'm good.


The problem is knowing when it is failing. How can you know what you may be missing? How can you know how much time you are losing by not getting the best results? Etc.


Yeah, I used DDG for about a year. It just became such a pervasive weight I went back to google. Despite the crappy seo it is still less of a pain / faster than ddg - but I know google is not surfacing high quality results from sites I found through it years ago. At this point, the web is far less useful than it was, mainly because you can't find the good sites anymore. I am going to give kagi a spin, since I really wanted to make something non-google work, and google looks like it will never improve. This feels exactly like my back and forth with linux as my daily driver. It took 15 years, but it eventually became the least bad option.


I love DDG but there’s still an awful lot of weird results. Just the other day I searched for a clothing brand and the first result wasn’t their homepage but someones saved wish list (something like “?wishlistid=someuid”). It was bizarre. I don’t know enough about SEO to know if it’s down to the owners of the site or some weird DDG indexing but I’ve found a lot of weird indexing like this where you’d expect the homepage and get a very specific page instead.


Google still beats DDG on local search and providing latest results on news updates and other changing events. On more technical and stable topics, DDG is miles better and doesn't drown in clickbait or ads like Google does. These tend to be 99% of the searches i do throughout a day, so using DDG first is a no-brainer. The best way to describe it is it works exactly like google did 5-10 years ago, without neither the improvements nor the regressions that has happened since.

For truly rare and unique searches, Google undeniable has a bigger index, so cases where searching for a unusual error code 0x004104010 give you nothing on DDG, Google could find one poor soul in an obscure Korean forum, that solved the same issue and then translate the result, just enough for you to recover your broken data.


I last tried DDG a couple of years ago, so it may have improved. But I gave it a good hard try for several months, and I just kept finding instances where I couldn't find something that I knew should be out there. Then I switched back to Google and it was like a breath of fresh air, I was finding things easily again.

But I'd say with Kagi it's almost the opposite - it finds things at least as well and there aren't ads to get in the way. It feels like old-school Google.

I actually found that I was getting annoyed on my mobile devices because they were still searching on Google and I need to scroll past ads etc., before I recently switched them over.


I often search for an error message from software, get nothing useful from DDG, then add the "!g" and find exactly my problem.


Non-English queries have usually poor result.


Has anyone tried YOU.com? It's my new favorite search engine. Wiping Google from my searches is great.


I keep going back and forth between you and brave. I love the concept of brave's goggles but I wish it was more like point/click and it could automagically pick the best goggle based on keywords etc.


Anyone here use Kagi and Neeva for a similar amount of time? If so, thoughts on comparison?


- all matching socks. No more time spent pairing.

- clothes drying racks that hook onto radiators. Reduces drying time and clothes crumpling

- wired mechanical keyboard. Wired is simpler than wireless. Quality ones have n-key support

- bicycle fenders

- digital wrist watch so that I check my phone less.


The all matching socks strategy breaks down over time. Eventually you need to buy more socks, and the new ones aren't as worn as the old ones, so you end up having to match them anyway. My solution to this is to buy a large batch of identical socks. Then when you need new ones, buy another large batch that are slightly different - e.g. grey hiking socks instead of black, or wool hiking socks that have a slightly different pattern but are still the same style. This reduces the matching problem from matching all pairs to matching into a couple different sets, which is much easier.

I've thought too much about this.


Step 1) Buy 10-12 pairs of identical socks.

Step 2) Wear socks, when any of them wear out, throw them away. Even a single sock, no need to throw away in pairs

Step 3) When you're low in socks (my limit is 3 full pairs), throw them all away and GOTO 1

I do have a few specialised socks for hiking and winter, but they're the unicorns in the bunch, I just need 1-2 pairs of them.


Same. My wife thinks its a weird quirk but always laughs when I jokingly celebrate "Sock Bankruptcy!!!"


Yepp, this is my method as well. A couple pairs of "dress" socks and some waterproof ones for hiking/outdoors a few days a year.


I just buy bulk, discard ones that get holes, and when I'm too low throw them away all at once, if I can't buy the same


I assume sock manufacturers are doing well post-pandemic. I still wore socks during lockdown, but not shoes. Most of my socks are ready to be retired.


> you end up having to match them anyway

You are clearly pickier about this than I am, hah.


On the topic of luxury splurges that change lives. And this doesn't work in all situations. But, Aloe Socks. https://www.earththerapeutics.com/products/aloe-socks-single...

They have lotion in the fabric. You probably want to wear them more than once, if possible, maybe stretch them to a couple days if you didnt make them gross right away. Once you wash them they turn into regular fuzzy socks.

But on those days that they are fresh, there is nothing like them. I have a stash tucked away for special days, and once they are done, they get added to the normal fuzzy sock rotation. Turns out you can wear black fuzzy socks pretty often.


Socks are so cheap I just throw them all out and get a new pack or two. It is like $6.99 once a year.



haha. I had not seen that. Thank you.


I bought 3 packs of black wool socks about 10 years ago. I wear them almost exclusively throughout the year (cold feet) except for sports etc.

Just recently I've replaced them all with 3 new packs of black wool socks.

My life have never been simpler. See you in 2033 for the update!


This is how I operate with normal socks - I never buy a single pack of socks - I just do a "line change" and replace them all when the old rotation is too far gone to meet my needs.

I have a few specialty items for exercise or dirty yard work, but those are easy to separate from the daily drivers.


I call it the 'sock purge.' It was a game changer.


"sock reboot". I do the same for underwear and t-shirts, too.


My exact term too!


sockpocalypse


My sons still wear socks I bought for myself 22 years ago. They also wear my 40 year old wedding and funeral dress shoes. My feet grew, so I can't wear either.


I simply stopped pairing socks 30 years ago. I have experienced no ill effects wearing unmatched socks.


I don't mind them visually non-matching, but different materials/thickness, etc. is annoying


I've actually had quite a few people positively comment on my unmatched socks, including on dates. I now wear unmatched socks on purpose.


This. Been doing this for almost two decades.

99.9 percent of the time nobody will notice. You almost have to draw attention to it deliberately before anyone notices. Any nobody ever cares - the sort of person who would you probably wouldn't want to be around anyway.


> - all matching socks. No more time spent pairing.

Relatedly, replacing all of my cotton socks with wool socks.


I spent like 200 bucks on several pairs the same color smartwool socks and got rid of most of my cotton socks. One of the best decisions I have made.


Ditto - worth every penny!


+1. Synthetics aint got nothing on pure wool.

I work outdoors a lot and have 100% merino wool thermals to wear as a base layer in the winter (or when skiing), beats the pants off of what most of the rest of the crew is wearing.


>all matching socks.

I have 12 pairs of the same lightweight Darn Tough socks that are perfect for year round use (I don't live in snow). I've had them for ~10 years now and when a given sock gets a hole in the bottom, I put them in a pile and wait until I have 4 then send them back for two new pairs of socks. They were initially expensive, but after each being replaced a couple times, they are dirt cheap (even when factoring in one-way shipping). Thankfully, they have kept the exact same style all these years. Fingers crossed that they stay in business and that 80 year old me will have saved a lot of money by not buying socks.


I tried this. I ended up with 11 pairs of threadbare socks and 1 new fluffy pair.


I already had fenders, but not this:

https://www.printables.com/model/146449-bicycle-splash-guard

Works great. I have a segment of unpaved road on my commute. Greatly improves trousers and shoes cleanliness.


A piece of plastic cut to that shape from a flexible chopping board or plastic milk jug works well too.


If you need to dry stuff really quick, get a little cheap desk fan of the kind sold in warm summers and point that to the wet stuff. I use it to dry out my children's boots.


Shove crinkled-up newspaper into the boots, it will absorb moisture and hasten drying (was taught this by an Icelandic hiking guide).


If you put stuff next to your case fan it dries even faster


> - all matching socks. No more time spent pairing.

after my son started wearing unmatching socks (and refuses to wear matching socks), I started doing the same and I'm now hooked. Granted these are unmatching socks of the same style (i.e., I have 5 pairs of Nordic socks) and I like just throwing them all in the box after laundry and pulling out 2 at random. Probably not going back to matching socks unless it's required :)


I used to have socks with 'Monday', 'Tuesday', etc. I used to wear them randomly. A lot of people used to notice it and comment why I'm with Friday socks even though it's only Tuesday:)


>- all matching socks. No more time spent pairing.

Around 5 or 7 years ago I found 100% cotton socks on a massive discount, don't remember how many, but I took more than 40 pairs, full backpack I had with me that day. I use them pretty much most of the year, except in summer. Never bought socks since and due to all that "mismatching", I only had to throw a few of them, they were shredded and composted.


Oh cool, did you shred/compost yourself or is there a service for that? We compost everything we can but I have been throwing out clothes that I can't use for rags.


I saw this practice on instructables. You can simply use old non-plastic socks as a protective bag for plants. Fill a sock with soil or compost, stick a branch/stem cutting, small tree, you know just anything that has fragile roots into the sock, stick it in soil. The sock will keep moisture a big longer and protect roots from worms eating them for a few months. It simply buys plants some time to grow. Eventually the sock will decompose. I planted 4 berries, a few yews and pines this way. I can't tell if this actually helps the plants, my sample size is too small, but doesn't seem to harm them.

Some corporations like H&M accept donations of old clothes for recycling, in return they give you a voucher.


> all matching socks. No more time spent pairing.

I KIND OF do this; I have a couple different brands with slightly different styles, but they're all black ankle socks so I don't care if one has a gold toe and one doesn't. Drives my wife mad, but it doesn't bother me and I'm either at home or wearing shoes, so...


I made all the clothes hangers in my house match. A simple change, but it felt so much better and more organized.


I replaced all our hangers over years with wooden ones and not getting wire hangers tangled up or small plastic hangers messing up the shoulders on my t-shirts is well worth the expense. My girlfriend doesn't care, the barbarian, she will throw in a plastic or wire hanger from the drycleaners and I go full-on Joan Crawford https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XOILKHmZBwc


We standardised all hangers to wooden Ikea ones. You can get a fancy plastic top that makes them a bit wider for your better clothes.


yah, i bought 100 flat black hangers a few years ago (~$15 at ikea back then) so i could hang all of my casual clothing (rather than folding, which is more time-consuming). the flat ones allowed me to hang like 50% more stuff in the same space. my fancier clothes go on wooden hangers (also ikea) so they have more room to breathe.


A programmable keyboard is even better. Doesn't even need to be fully programmable via scripts, a simple macro functionality is usually enough.

I mapped arrow keys and Home/End to Fn+WASD/QE and code navigation is so much faster now, especially when I have a hand on the mouse.


Let me introduce you to this crazy little program called vim...


The point is that my keyboard works everywhere, not just in some obscure programs that don't have tooling support for the domain I earn my money in.


They complement one another: using keyboard-driven programs, and having a good keyboard.

Especially if you're willing to put effort into your tools: vim's sophistication requires effort to learn, but has advantages. I think the same can be said for fancy small keyboards.


And a keyboard where your thumbs are able to use 2-3 keys each is better, still. :-)


The Keychron K2 keyboard supports both wired and wireless so when it's at my desk it's wired but I can take it on the go and pair it with my laptop to use it wireless. It's a good medium :)


I have the K2 V2 and it's actually really bad when being used for both wired and wireless.

The issue I've mostly had (and found that others have as well), is if you run the battery to 0 using it on wireless mode, it won't even work on wired mode until it's fully recharged. Like you can't use it "offline".


Hah, I went for automatic wrist watch, so my phone would interrupt me less.


I have two sets of all matching socks. Winter and summer.


A bidet. We got one with heated water and seats and going to the bathroom feels super luxurious now. Not to mention all the toilet paper we save and increased hygiene.


Reddit loves bidets. Has for years. Based on all the glowing comments, I bought one and installed it. Even after some practice and experimentation, I wasn't clean nor felt clean. Plus, the bidet added numerous crannies for urine spray to accumulate. I went back to wiping and discarded the bidet.


I got an expensive one (~usd 1000) with a remote, heated water and seat, dryer, moving nozzle, etc.

There's just no comparison with just wiping. I let it spray, wipe, spray quickly again and wipe clean. Takes thirty seconds.

The real protip, which feels weirdly inappropriate for HN, is shaving down there.


> The real protip, which feels weirdly inappropriate for HN, is shaving down there.

I've heard very much the opposite.

Or at least, shaving down there makes it amazing for a day or two, but then the hairs start growing back and it's stubbly at first, which makes it INSANELY itchy.


My experience is that this happens the first few times and it gets less bad on regrowth each time.

I did an experiment when I started shaving my legs where I only shaved one for a while and then later shaved both, only the one that hadn’t been shaved multiple times was painful when the hair regrew.


> I've heard very much the opposite.

What's the famous story about the guy who Nair'd this region as a joke/prank and he didn't realize the side effect of: the hair down there acts as a buffer for the scent so flatulence comes out much much worse?


The trick is to not shave it clean like your beard. Just trim it using a small trimmer and leave about 1-2 mm length. No more itch.


using an electric trimmer on the shortest setting will avoid itching and general skin irritation


Can waxing fix this?


If you’ve ever tried to wipe peanut butter off of shag carpet… ya know what OP is talking about


I got an expensive one (~usd 1000)

I've seen clamp-on versions in big stacks at Walmart for $25.

I've always wondered how they would stack up, but been too chicken to try.


Temperature control of the water and seat are the killer app, pressure control and nozzle width are really nice too. Blow dry, not so necessary, takes a while.


Buy a 60 pack of soft towels [0] and you will be clean and dry. Did this based on a friend's rec and I'm never going back.

[0]: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07TJ7646Z


Sorry, am I understanding correctly? As in a substitute for toilet paper? Do you have a bin of poopy towels that you have to wash each week?


Well, yes, I guess. :)

But if the bidet has done its job, then the towels aren't poopy. A lot cleaner than dealing with cloth baby diapers!

Buy plenty of towels and you can spread out the washing a lot more. We do a load every 3-4 weeks probably.


The bidet leaves you clean and wet. Just like after a shower, you run the towel through your nooks and crannies.


Trash bins for toilet paper are in basically most non-Western countries (to avoid clogging).


One thing is I find that it's really water pressure dependent. At least with the class of no-frills, not-expensive toilet attachment ones I buy.

I moved recently and at the new house water pressure overall is noticably lower and it's far more difficult and slightly frustrating. If I hadn't learned/trained/experinced on higher water pressure I probably would agree with your assessment.


yeah if you accidentally put the dial a bit too high it will hurt on one that will clean properly.


There’s a wide range of how effective they are. Some people are happy with cheap toilet seat attachments but there’s a reason people spend significantly more on expensive toilets.


> Even after some practice and experimentation, I wasn't clean nor felt clean. Plus, the bidet added numerous crannies for urine spray to accumulate. I went back to wiping and discarded the bidet.

Serious question: why not both?


Absolutely. Splurge on a TOTO, $400+ may seem ridiculous but I can't go back to normal toilets now, its that good.


> I can't go back to normal toilets now, its that good.

Getting nature's call outside the house must be hell...


This is one of the reasons I haven't looked into a bidet more. I'm no stranger to waiting until I can be comfortable taking care of business, but to be dependent on an appliance to do something as fundamental as using the bathroom, seems a bit too far.

Now, if I lived in Japan, somewhere famous for the widespread adoption of high-tech bidets, sure, it makes sense to adapt. But in basically all of America and Western Europe, it's still a luxury that if I adopted it now, I would be much more uncomfortable anytime I need to go to the bathroom away from home.


One of my favorite underpromoted benefits of working from home is that I get to use my own washroom.


Same. I want to put them on all of mine. Having a warmed seat is so nice in the winter!


Problem here is getting electrical to your toilet location? I was thinking about that too, but I didn't feel like making the leap to hiring an electrician to install / create a new outlet there.


I use something called a Tushy. It's purely mechanical. Downside is it's not heated, but that's proven fine for me. Took me about 15 minutes to install and I'm no plumber. No leaks, though I did have to check for them during install and tighten things a bit to get it right.


Oh, interesting, but too bad -- the heated water makes such a nice difference (hah).


You can buy a faucet that has a bidet connected to the mixer.


Search for 'Brondell swash nonelectric', available at costco and jeffazon. I have this and the electric version, and I find the non-electric is good enough and a fraction of the price.


140 year old victorian home. I managed to run a new 12 gauge circuit to my second floor bathroom myself to get an outlet in the right place. Took me a few hours to puzzle through how to get the line up there without breaking open a wall, but I managed it in the end.

Its going to be a _little_ tricky to get lines to the other bathrooms, but I'll figure it out when the time comes.


I still like to use paper to dry after the bidet.


Yes. Not to overshare but I find that failure to actively dry changes the biome back there; in short it can get itchy. Just pulling up and heading off is not enough (use a small towel). That said though, it is great.


I do too, but only because the warm air dryer gives my tushy a rash!


Second this. I bought one and when we travel I wonder how anyone can live without it. Using a toilet without a bidet just seems uncivilized now.


I am using a small hygienic shower with the button for more than a 15 years. It is really easy to install, a skilled plumber will do it in an hour, putting a T-connector where the toilet takes its water. Did it in every place I rented since. 10/10, highly recommend.


Once you bidet you never go back to paper. I even carry a portable one when I travel.


What portable bidet do you use? I've found the ones I tried super weak.


On days I don't work from home, I try to always use the bathroom at the office instead of at home because the bidet makes it so much nicer. It's a small thing but it makes me feel like royalty.


I've always wondered what people do with their wet butt after using the bidet... dry with a towel, smaller amount of toilet paper... what's the norm?


My model has a built in dryer. When I have time I let it dry for a minute before wiping while I mess around on my phone.

Otherwise just a bit of extra paper on a first wipe is enough.


I use charmin ultra strong to dry off, and it always comes clean so its reassuring


In Italy, where bidets are really common, there's a designated towel for your butt.


Does each person in the home get a monogrammed towel? I would be very uncomfortable sharing a butt towel, even with my spouse.


A little paper.


Don't know about the norm, but 3 sheets of toilet paper works for me.


> smaller amount of toilet paper.

this


Blow dryer.


My guy you're supposed to use the bidet after wiping lmfaooo


You can spend a lot more than $200 on a fancy bidet toilet and IMO it was worth it.


When I bought my house, the first two purchases were a super fancy bidet (Toto Ultramax II with an S550E+), and a fancy dishwasher.

Best purchases ever.


Yeah, we got a Toto as well (Neorest 700H) :-).


which one did you get?


What's your budget?

If you want heated anything or a blower, you'll first need to consider how you'll get power to your toilet's location. If, however, a cold water bidet is fine then just grab a cheap LUXE.

A TOTO WASHLET is still the gold standard though. That's what I own, and it has been great. Only thing I wish was slightly better was the blow-dryer. The pre-rinse/pre-mist is legit good in terms of keeping the toilet cleaner for longer.

PS - Quick note about mechanical bidets like the LUXE, it has no sensors/safety features. So if a child goes in, turns it on, and runs away it WILL flood your home. TOTO and similar quality bidets automatically turn off the water when weight isn't detected on the seat.


Ah, I hadn't even thought about power. I'll probably need to go on the cheaper end.


It’s not a big deal. I have a flush plug, braided cable extension that neatly runs from near the outlet under the sink and out of the way.

It’s not perfect, but for >$20 it’s a quick fix that didn’t require an electrician. Heated water is 100000% worth it!


A huge (A0, 33-1/8 x 46-13/16 in-sized) 12-month calendar with the months laid out in long strips.

I wasn't doing enough. Too much YouTube and reddit, so I stopped and decided to do things.

I used different colored markers for different aspects of my life-- health, work, fitness, recreational travel, home maintenance, etc) and decided I had to do something every week.

The different colors even accounted for down time. Too much color? Draw a nice relaxing blue line for a couple of days and do nothing.

I went from being a hermit to a EMT-qualified volunteer at my local volunteer fire department on his way to Firefighter I training, a spotlight operator at a local community theater, an enthusiastic yogi, and by having the year laid out I can look at weekends with holidays and plan my year's travel months in advance. I make notes on when to plant what and have a pretty front yard.

Digital calendars are nice, but they can't beat having a huge-assed poster right next to the front door with everything laid out in black and white and red and blue and green and yellow and........

If you feel like you're not getting the most out of life, get a huge-assed calendar, start googling local volunteer opportunities, write it down, and then do it.

$30, including markers.


Hi, could you link to the one you got, or one similar to it? Amazon is lousy with hits for 'A0 calendar'.


genius


Airpod Pro 2

They are basically bionic ears. Headphones, headset, earplugs, hearing protection, hearing aids, extendable ears, and more. Wish they could act as universal translators, but I suppose that's still yet to come.


Second this. I upgraded from the first-gen Pros after seeing many strong reviews about how much better the noise cancellation is. I can tell the noise cancelling is much better because previously I couldn't cook with our (very loud) exhaust fan on and listen to podcasts. Now it's no problem.

For me, I view the purchase as an investment in my hearing health. Instead of having to turn up the volume to account for traffic background noise or the like, I can keep the volume low and use ANC. While $200 is a lot to drop on a piece of electronics with a limited (<3 year) useful life, the calculus changes dramatically when viewed through the lens of a medical assistive device.

It's also nice that there are more volume/seek controls built into the stems, versus the v1.


I just gave a pair to my mom who uses hearing aids. She was able to enter her audiogram in them and use them as both backup hearing aids when her regular ones are on the charger or in for repair and as headphones that match her hearing needs. So heck yeah they can be viewed as a medical assistive device.


Be careful, my ear doctor said these things cause wax build up and create problems in the long term, not just hearing.


That doesn't make any sense. They just sit in the outside of your ear. Nowhere near where earwax is produced.

There are other brands of in-ear headphones that you jam into your ear canal more like earplugs. Possibly those could have an effect. But AirPods Pro are nothing like that.


AirPods Pro are in ear, they compound the issue of earwax on your outer ear into a worse problem. That's according to me ear doctor, feel free to argue further with me but that's what he said.


Interesting. I would believe there is more ear wax when I use them a lot. Does that not reverse to ordinary levels when they are not used? What problems does this (or other non-hearing issues) create?

I agree that we need to be mindful of rapid and dramatic changes to how we interface with the world, since our bodies may not react well in the long run.


I think it's more a case of constant ear bud usage packing in the wax and concentrating it. It got so bad for me, even the water tool they have at my doctor's office didn't work to remove it.


I have terrible wax issues from before I used in ear headphones, mostly from swimming. I have found an earwax cleaning kit called Earwax MD and it works great for me. The peroxide based kits didn’t remove my wax and I needed to do periodic ENT appointments to scrape it out when it got impacted. This Earwax MD formula really eats away the wax and dries it out so that it can be rinsed out or fall out on its own.

And before anyone raises a stink about this being bad for my ears, I become functionally deaf when my earwax gets impacted which happens about once ever 2 years.


Whoa, not good! I assume they found another way to get it out? Did they have any tips (aside from not using earbud-style headphones) to prevent the issue from recurring?


They sent me home with a solution to eat away at the wax, then tried again with the machine 2 weeks later.

Doctor said he sees this all the time, and ear buds are to blame.


Do they actually provide hearing protection? Hearing protection requires a pretty tight seal, which I wasn't aware of any headphones providing aside from in-ear monitors.


That is an advertised feature, so I assume that the lawyers have looked into those health claims as somewhat defensible.

First, they do seal, so even if it's not as tight as a foam earplug, it is something.

Second, there's the ANC which is producing out of phase sound and lowering the sound pressure level reaching your ear. I have seen commercial hearing protection with ANC, though I'm not sure if it's allowed to be advertised as such. The theory is sensible at least.

Thirdly, the ANC is allowing you to listen to your audio content at lower volumes, especially in a very loud environment like an airplane.

Fourthly, there's an advertised hearing protection feature in passthrough mode where external noises loud enough to cause hearing damage will be automatically reduced.

Fifthly, There are sound pressure measurements being sent to the iphone for audio content loudness in real time, and also over time notifications you receive if you have been listening too loudly.

So all in all, yes in practice, but we're not exactly talking OSHA here.


I really wanted you to get to sixthly, seventhly, eighthly, ninethly, tenthly...


I have often wondered if the ANC creates more noise in overcoming the outside noise. I did some googling, but the results made me feel like I was asking a dumb question.

I'm genuinely curious: are there any audiophiles on here that could answer?

FWIW - with the ANC off, sounds that make me 'cringe' (sawzall, table saw, hammer drill, etc.) are very much muffled and seem to be just as muffled as when using foam ear plugs. As others have said, there is a big difference between noise levels for a guy remodeling his bathroom with power tools and a someone that saws concrete for a living.


Not a dumb question at all! At a basic level, ANC creates "anti-noise", a waveform 180º out of phase with the noise, and they cancel each other out. So the resulting waveform is much lower amplitude than the original.

I don't know anything about this channel but I watched a bit of this video and it seems to be a good explanation of how it works:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6GC4P5r7Zaw


I mean hearing protection isn't a binary thing. I doubt they would pass hearing protection certifications for things that they're normally used for, like heavy construction or whatnot, but it'd be hard to imagine sticking something in your ear wouldn't offer hearing protection, not even considering the ANC.


I’ve used them as hearing protection at music concerts. If you put them in transparency mode it keeps everything sounding the same but just quieter.


While true, I think the marketing should address those. I have seen and heard of people using them as ear protection for heavy and loud equipment, like lawn mowers and motorcycles and stuff, and I’m not sure they apply there.


You don’t need nearly as much hearing protection for lawn mowers and motorcycles compared to someone operating a jackhammer or similarly loud equipment for hours a day.


I don't think that's entirely true. Motorcycle noise on highways can be in excess of 100 dB and is broad spectrum noise. Most highway motorcycle rides are in the tens of minutes to hours range, but the damage can occur in just the single digits to teens of minutes.

Beyond a certain point, it doesn't really matter much that something is worse for your hearing than something that will permanently damage your hearing. Plus, people are interacting with lawn equipment, motorcycles, and other such things far more frequently than jackhammers.


Jackhammer’s can be 130 decibels it’s easily a thousand times as loud as motorcycles so we really are talking different realms of sound protection being needed.

Also Motorcycle helmets should reduce things. Further it varies but motorcycles really shouldn’t be 100db, California’s legal limit is 80db for motorcycles manufactured after 1985.


It's not the motorcycle itself making noise. It's wind noise.


Source?

At highway speeds motorcycle wind noise is nowhere close to 100db. Are you talking about high speed motorcycle racing or something?


At highway speed here in France, (110-130 km/hr), the wind noise is sufficient to cause tinnitus for me, if I'm not wearing ear protection under my helmet. The bike style is a factor - my touring bike has a movable windshield that can push the airflow above my head, but the wind noise from the daily bike, with a tiny windshield, is like sticking your head out the window of a moving car.


According to this article, the source is from an OSHA study. I can’t find the study at the moment.

https://www.hear-it.org/motorcycles-hazardous-to-your-hearin...


Anecdotally yes.

I've used them in situations where the "ambient" music is ear-splittingly loud (Apple Watch saying GTFO or you're gonna go deaf). Aipods Pro 2 in and I can still hear what people are talking, but the loud noises are brought down considerably.

AW decibel check goes from 90 -> high 60/low 70 with ANC on.

Not as good as actual proper earplugs, especially the ones that look like pine trees, but I carry my Airpods with me everywhere - earplugs I don't. The Airpods go to the Airpods pocket in my jeans, I do have earplugs in my bag, but it's not with me at all times. My pants are =)


I wear AirPod Pros on flights and when walking over a busy freeway for lunch. The noise cancellation feature works really well. I can continue listening to music or podcasts at an indoor volume. The AirPod Pro does form a seal.

My only complaint is that something in the noise cancellation mic tends to wear out over time. After about 18–24 months of use, I start to hear an unpleasant high-pitch sound whenever I touch the mic opening on an earpiece. This could be related to dropping them, which is inevitable. I'm on my third set now.


That was a manufacturing defect with the first gen. I had a pair replaced for free.


I used my original AirPods Pro as hearing protection on a table saw. It's not a terribly loud saw and I use thin kerf blades, but it's quite comfortable. At age 36 I can still heard 16-17kHz tones (typically you hear up to 15k by 40), so it seems to be working well enough.

For my giant router I use muffs. The AirPods act funny around stuff that loud, and it stops feeling comfortable.


For a fun time, try wearing the airpods underneath ear defenders. I swear I can hear my brain.


As far as I can find Apple does not advertise an official Noise Reduction Rating (NRR) for them though there are some review sites claiming they have a NRR of about 22-23, comparable to basic foam earplugs. I personally wouldn't rely on them for anything where you actually _need_ hearing protection - shooting, loud machinery, etc.


Most foam earplugs have ratings in the 30s, which is a fairly significant increase.

https://www.3m.com/3M/en_US/hearing-protection-us/products/f...

My concern with the Airpods are simultaneously playing music through a small speaker, with its own negative affect on hearing (long term), while also trying to attenuate (poorly) loud noises.


Not those but I have used these before and they are very good at blocking sound passively. https://www.directsoundproaudio.com/product-page/ex29-plus-e...


Yeah I would not use them as hearing protection against industrial level noise.

In my experience, Jackhammers and rivet guns will absolutely blast through the foam and the ANC will not be fast enough (the noise also too sharp and high frequency).

Everything else works great but people reading this thread: wear proper hearing-protection!


any noise cancelling makes the london underground noises bearable to travel.


"Probably the oddest thing in the Universe." [0]

0: https://hitchhikers.fandom.com/wiki/Babel_Fish


Don't the Google headphones do universal translation in their range of headphones? I am sure apple can replicate if it is any good.


Does that mean translating, in real time, the speech of someone talking?



> the other person in your conversation will speak into your phone

Well that sort of ruins it…


I've used this service when I was in Asia. You don't need headphones, you can just use your phone via the Google Translate app. Place your phone down within speaking distance of both or all participants, then speak. It will translate and reply back and then allow the other person to speak, repeating the process. It worked extremely well even several years ago so I assume it's gotten better since then.


I was in Asia a few months ago and can confirm, it worked like a charm. I was able to have a long and enjoyable conversation with my cab driver during the full 40-minute ride. By the end, I almost forgot we were speaking to each other through translations. It's hard to say what mistakes it made, but there were never any moments of real misunderstanding. It was the first time I'd used it at length and I was pretty blown away.


Nice, where did you go?


Isn’t there an ongoing investigation regarding an influx of tinnitus related to the ANC feature?


I'm not aware of any evidence of that, though for me I rarely notice my tinnitus unless I am in a quiet space. It is almost never quiet for most people in most cities, so I can understand someone noticing it for the first time while using ANC.


Not that I could find any news about. Someone did sue Apple back in May about hearing damage caused by an amber alert, but I can't see any progress on that since then -- and "someone has sued" is pretty weak evidence of anything, in the US legal system.

[1] https://www.engadget.com/apple-airpods-pro-lawsuit-amber-ale...


I haven’t heard that, but I’m curious to learn more since I use ANC a lot and would like to protect my hearing! Do you think the noice cancellation causes the tinnitus, or do people suddenly realize the ringing when the silence makes it more noticeable?


anecdotal, but I cannot use ANC while riding the NYC subway

the amount of air pressure I can feel in my ears when a train is coming into the station is definitely much larger than just letting the silicone tip do the little noice attentuation it can

the weird part is that it's not a sound I can hear, I normally have an ok range of hearing but this is just _pressure_


ANC gives me a whopping headache from the pressure, even since the early Bose days.


I can confirm anecdotally. Got ANC headphones for the first time. Developed tinnitus out of nowhere. Stopped using ANC. Tinnitus gone.

ANC might be a "huh cigarettes cause cancer, who knew" type thing.


I finally bought a pair of 1st gen AirPods at the end of 2021, and while they have some issues (tap gestures stopped working and/or became very unreliable at some point, occasionally in-ear detection gets messed up) the convenience of them is hard to overstate. No untangling wires or having to be tethered to the device. At the gym I can throw my phone on the ground nearby and continue to get my music while I do exercises, and at home I can pop in a single earbud and have the stereo audio converted to mono in a single ear to listen to podcasts while playing a video game. And it wasn't until using that that I realized how much of an annoyance having my ears tethered to my pocket was, and having to constantly keep the mental overhead of not snagging the wire on my fingers or a doorhandle or something while using wired headphones.

I do wish they'd come down in price more, and ideally in the future be more sweat-resistant and most importantly have replaceable batteries. I don't really love the idea that they're essentially a ~$200 every 2 years subscription at the moment, all while creating a craptonne of ewaste.


Going on 5 years with my OG airpods, still work fine.


I'm hoping I can get a good few years out of mine. Just from research it seems people were averaging about 2 years, and some even less from sweat/earwax accumulating in ports and wrecking them. And I do use mine for working out, and I produce a lot of earwax, so I worry mine are gonna be on the shorter side of lifespans.


Just use a toothpick or anything non-metallic and not too sharp to scrub out the earwax.

I thought I was going deaf when I couldn't hear my airpods even when the volume was cranked up to max. They were just covered in a film of wax :D


Agreed! Having had Airpods 2 (non-pro) since launch, I only now appreciate the ANC feature. My listening volume went from 80% to 30%, even 10% at home.

Seriously, if you have headphones in every day mainly to mask environment noises, these are a must-have. Best buy in a looooong time.


> Wish they could act as universal translators, but I suppose that's still yet to come.

Likely would come from Google's or Microsoft's (OpenAI) services rather than Apple's, given how terrible Siri is.


i have to use different sized tips and they push out over the course of time.. i like them and accept that it's my ears, but after the airpods pro i'll go with something with a hook or over the ear.


I’m a wrestler and really struggle with getting a secure fit. This isn’t specific to Airpods, but it does seem worse than other buds. I tried foam tips from Comply. They worked reasonably well, but their longevity was short and the small size means there isn’t much physical room for them to compress/expand for a good fit. Some attachment issues as well (though I’ve heard they had been sorted out).

More Airpod Pro form factors would be welcome, but the functionality is pretty good.


I suppose you mean that you have cauliflower ear? That seems like most IEMs would not work for you.


Very mildly, but yes. Not apparent to others at all.

My experience is that most IEMs actually work quite well (Shure, Etymotic). The Airpod pro rubber seems more ‘slippery’ if that makes sense.


I switched to Comply foam tips and they stay in a lot better. Not perfect, but the best fit I've had with in-ear headphones ever.

The only ones that stay in better are the OG Airpods with no noise cancelling. The shape fits my ear perfectly.

Anything that goes in the ear canal? Always pops out eventually.


I find the Pros migrate out no matter what size I use. I was hopeful that the new XS size on the v2 Pros would help, but it doesn't appear to.

As a result, I use my old Airpods (not sure what gen, but pre-Pro) for zoom calls. I don't need ANC under these circumstances, and I prefer to not be reaching for my ear every couple minutes to push the pod back in.


I have small ear canals and tried every possible aftermarket ear piece for my airpods pro to no avail. Now I use bone conducting earphones. They don't sound nearly as good and they don't block outside noise (which is both a negative and a positive depending on the situation), but they work well for all kinds of activity.


I got some memory foam tips for mine and they've been amazing.


There are 3rd party tips you could try.


FYI for those of you more concerned with hearing protection: I use a product called "Plugfones" which actually create a tight seal in your ear canal. I got the blue-tooth version and use it on my motorcycle rides to listen to music (on low volume) while filtering out the wind noise. They're about $70 for the blue-tooth "Liberate 2.0" model. I've owned it for over a year and it's worked out great. Durable and no issues with battery life so far.


There was no problem with my Airpods pro gen 1, but I bought new gen 2 version just because I wanted to support Apple for making such a great product. I never leave the house without them. Got it on sale for thanksgiving holidays


Apart from a lot of convenience, Airpods have a serious problem, so I am not sure they are worth supporting: http://www.ibtimes.com/apple-airpods-repair-recycling-imposs....


All battery powered in-ear headphones have the same "problem".

It's nearly impossible to make something that small _and_ get a 10/10 iFixit score. You can't put any sane screws in anything that small, stuff needs to be glued down.


There are many alternatives with replaceable batteries. None have 10/10, but most are much better than 0/10.


Also surprisingly comfortable to wear while laying on a pillow, at least compared to anything I've tried so far. White noise + noise cancellation makes for pleasant naps.


Does anyone know how well these work with an Android phone?


You lose enough of the features that I would not use them with Android regularly. Most importantly, the only high fidelity bluetooth codec they support is AAC, which most Android devices do not support, causing you to fall back to SBC. You will also not be able to adjust any of the settings.


My past few Samsung phones have supported AAC.


Yes, there is a licensing cost that only a few manufacturers will pay.


I can't comment on Air Pods since I don't use them, but there are other high quality ear buds with ANC that work on any device. I'm particular to Bose ANC 700 which are over-ear and more comfortable for me, but definitely don't fit snugly under a hood. Jabra elites are excellent and similar form factor to Air Pods.


They function as headphones. The main issue, for worse or sometimes for better, is that you need an iPhone to update the firmware. Apple's Quick pairing also won't work, but Android doesn't really have an equivalent anyway.


And you got a great deal on them too at less than 200$!


I work from home - with a 5 minute screensaver with complicated password required by corporate - USB MouseJiggler - https://www.amazon.com/Undetectable-Computer-Simulate-Moveme... Best - Purchase - Ever - !


my wife took my $5 timex watch and just put her mouse on the face of it. kinda blew my mind because her request was very out of left field. but it works!


Ooooohhh, that's clever.

I've never had a need for such a device, but I worked for a company that wrote Skype for Business plug-ins, many of which revolved around "presence". You were considered active on your computer[0] when your mouse moved. We had a tool that we used for billing our time which included a graph of your Skype for Business presence state for the day you were entering time for[1].

I noticed, one week, that I was active 24-hours a day for three days in a row. I discovered that I left my mouse plugged in, it had fallen onto the carpet, and the minor vibrations that would occur in the house mixed with difficulty tracking would cause the mouse to move on its own "little enough" for me to not notice but frequently enough that it kept the computer from sleeping and kept my Skype for Business state bright green.

[0] Similar to Teams, today, you could be logged in from multiple devices; unlike Teams, a toast message might not reach your phone (or appear and be dismissed immediately) if you were active on a computer.

[1] This was entirely to assist in accurately filling out time sheets; it was never used to make sure "butts were in chairs".


Product idea - active mousepad.

The mousepad itself has an eink or similar display to change it over time and have the mouse detect some motion. The "active" part is turned off (to just be a regular display) when there is pressure on the wrist rest.

The mousepad is a USB hub (to get power for itself) that you can also plug the mouse and keyboard into so that its one less cord back to the computer.


I'm speechless on how simple this solution is


Years ago when optical nice were a new thing, I pranked my co-worker in the IT department by taping a feather to the optical sensor and then taping the mouse right behind the power supply fan on his tower PC. Then I plugged in a second mouse and put it on his desk. The constant jitter of the mouse drove him bonkers. He replaced the desk mouse several times, went back to a ball mouse and even reimaged his PC (we used Ghost back then to image the company PCs in-situ). Every time he replaced his desk mouse I thought he'd see the rogue mouse, but he always did it "blind", tracing his cable back, pulling it out and fumbling with the replacement usb plug for 5 minutes, cursing USB ports. If he once pulled out the tower or crawled back there to look he'd have seen my ruse.


I must check whether placing a mouse on laptop's screen would work. As the screen blanks out would it register as a move and the system would not lock itself?


I was worried that would be detectable so I programmed the onboard memory of my Logitech mouse to jiggle itself.


You can also put your mouse on a rough surface like I do. Optical mice are natural-born jigglers (my "stuff HN says" candidate).


Beautiful! Any tips on where to start learning to hack mice? I have a few where I'd love to tune the debounce algorithm (switch wear).


It's way easier than it sounds. Logitech provides a tool that lets you program their gaming mouses. They use Lua. I don't know Lua but there were plenty of guides for different gaming macros like recoil compensation and the Logitech documentation was decent enough.


Oh. I was thinking you were rewriting the firmware against the manufacturer's wishes.

I am not interested in installing bloatware drivers. Embedded IDEs OTOH...


Got one of these recently, they run qmk so easy to modify if that’s your thing: https://ploopy.co/


Is the program uploaded to the mouse, so does it still work if you plug it into a different computer that lacks the software?


Yes.


> macros like recoil compensation

Isn't this cheating?


It 100% is.

The problem is that preventing it is difficult to impossible.

You can't calculate recoil server-side because the latency would make it nigh unplayable. But once it's done client-side, it's cheatable.


This is making me feel old. Totally agree it is difficult, but not impossible.

Logitech is the problem here for even allowing this in the first place. No CRC checks for mouse firmware or anything? It screams poor implementation. I will not be surprised if anti-cheat software starts banning people or companies like Logitech.

Kind of sad to see the number of threads and communities online encouraging this. The point of games is to have fun, when you cheat all that goes out the door.


There are multiple mice vendors that allow this. And you can’t ban them because the cheater focused ones will just set their device ID to match some common device.


> No CRC checks for mouse firmware or anything?

It's client-side. Spoofing the CRC checks would be almost trivial.


If it can be done on exe's at runtime, it can be done on hardware attached to the computer. Signing things securely isn't a hard problem to solve, it's keeping people from attacking that signature that is hard. Something tells me the kids writing lua scripts as aimbots aren't quite smart enough to crack a proper signature implementation.


> Something tells me the kids writing lua scripts as aimbots aren't quite smart enough to crack a proper signature implementation.

They don't have to.

All they need is a signature of a valid firmware, and then inject code that returns that signature.

The "kids" won't be the ones writing the cheats. That'll be someone who knows how to write code that injects code into another running process, and then they sell the cheat software.

Blizzard tried for YEARS to detect a bot program for World of Warcraft called Glider. Every time they found a way to detect it, the bot engineers found a way to evade the detection. It was constant cat and mouse until Blizz sued the developer and had them shut down.

More back on topic, most of the cheaters are just script kiddies. There are only a couple that actually develop cheats, and they tend to be quite clever.


The last thing I want is to have to buy a "certified/trusted" mouse to play a game.


Nobody said they wanted this, but I'd rather that than play with a bunch of cheaters.


Which won't work without a subscription


Yes. I don't do it. But those examples were helpful since I don't know Lua.


Putting my glasses on my laptop trackpad does the trick, too. I guess the metal confuses the trackpad sensor.


https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/powertoys/

If on Windows, I use their "Power Toys" (free, btw), which has a keep awake function. My company user policies do not allow me to manage my energy policy, which is what kept shutting off my screen (and therefore necessitating the complicated password). Power Toys solves this problem.


I open a PowerPoint and put it in screenshow mode.

this usually keeps the laptop from going to lock screen

bonus: press B to blackout the screenshow to avoid monitor burn-in


It does, but it doesn't stop Teams from changing my status to 'away'


Opening a YouTube live stream also works to keep my screen from sleeping.


All these people are putting out all sorts of complex solutions, I love the simplicity of this one.


On Linux, KDE has a built-in presentation mode on the power/battery indicator


Use an Excel macro[0]. No sketchy USB hardware to buy that's really a keystroke logger in disguise. ;-)

[0] https://social.msdn.microsoft.com/Forums/office/en-US/c19a56...


Until you realize most corps turn off macros or only have macros on for a small subset of users.


Open Notepad/editor of your choice Place a 9V battery on the spacebar Go about what you want to do


My cat sleeps on a mat by my workstation. I put the mouse on the mat. Its a win for him and me.


Proof that avoiding corporate surveillance is a cat and mouse game!


Same except I used to avoid my employer detecting me going AFK


-- your employer can know this? - why they want to - you are paid by the minute? - never heard of a company monitoring this --


Many employer do it over the teams activity status.


Pretty sure that isn't legal in most countries where HN'ers work from

Which is not to say that it is not done, but personally I have enough options that I would like to see them try to fire me over something like that. If I'm staring off into the distance to think about something or reading source code without pgdn'ing for five minutes, yes it's not uncommon that my screen turns off while reading something (until I get around to setting the timeout higher at least) but that doesn't mean I'm not working.


It's 100% a US only thing.

It was almost a meme on TikTok during the pandemic, (American) people figured out the weirdest ways to keep their Teams bubble green.


Open new email, a weight on the space bar.


cough! - well, yes, that too - cough!



Does this eventually "wear out" our monitors/displays because now they never turn off. I have expensive monitors and I work from home and keep my laptop always docked. Never turning off the displays makes me wonder if I am rushing them to going bad too soon.


Early in the pandemic, I built a mouse jiggler for my roommate for a similar reason: https://www.anmolsarma.in/post/mouse-jiggler/


I used "Don't Sleep" with a good success http://www.softwareok.com/?seite=Microsoft/DontSleep


An easier solution is to simply not work for a shitty company that requires this Orwellian monitoring to prove you're doing work...


This is a weird one—Fiskars 4-Claw Weeder

https://www.homedepot.com/p/Fiskars-34-in-Aluminum-Handle-an...

Our dogs are frequently out in the yard, so other than spring pre-emergent I try to avoid herbicides. I bought it after a hand weeder broke pulling up crabgrass.

This thing has oddly been one of the most satisfying purchases I've made in years. You put it in the ground, step on it and the thing easily pulls out weeds and only in the spot you put it. Then you get to shoot them off the claw. I have a bucket I try and shoot them into. It's oddly therapeutic.


I refuse to use herbicides for a variety of reasons (pets, kids, and our property backs up to a creek and I try my best not to contaminate) but I despise pulling weeds the old fashioned way. Can't believe I've never seen this before. Definitely getting one - thank you!


This works great for me! I use it to rip out dallisgrass weeds, which can not be pulled out by hand and they are very hard to kill with chemicals (at least without also killing your grass as well). After using this, those weeds never come back as this device completely removes the entire root. Highly recommend. Totally agree about it being therapeutic!


These are great, and I use mine, but I discovered that much cheaper and more robust options exist which work as well. I actually found an all-metal option at around $40 CAD that my sister-in-law has was quite a bit nicer to use. So anyone interested in this, definitely look around!


This thing is so satisfying. I've done something to mine though, I feel like the claws have moved down a little or something else has moved up. It keep getting jammed and I have to give it a boot.


Our backyard definitely needs this, and I also hesitate to use herbicides because of pets (and insects and whatnot). Had no idea this existed. I'll definitely get one, thanks!


If I pulled all the weeds out of my yard all I would have is dirt.


These are so satisfying!


A solid long desk. I didn't focus much on the standing desk stuff too much but instead zero'd in on desk length and depth. I feel like 55inch width is bare minimum at this point. If you pick the longer desks that have well designed shelves, or even some of the L-shaped stuff, you can tuck away laptops/desktops in such a way that your main surface work area is huge blank canvas. The space and lack of clutter is almost therapeutic.

This is not the one I have since I have mostly wooden stuff in my crib, but this one looks nice and long and cheap:

https://www.amazon.com/CubiCubi-Computer-Writing-Storage-She...

Forget standing, get long instead.

Oh, and this. I don't know why it took so long for me to think of this, reusable K-cups:

https://www.amazon.com/Reusable-Universal-stainless-Refillab...

And finally, window privacy films:

https://www.amazon.com/Privacy-Frosted-Decorative-Covering-B...

It lets in natural light, no curtains to fiddle with (but you can have curtains too).


Big fan of big desks. I just moved down to a 57 inch desk. Fifteen years ago I needed a temporary desk solution and bought the cheapest bare wood door at Home Depot and laid it across two filing cabinets. That turned out to work great for the next fifteen years and I still kind of miss it (but it was time to upgrade the home office decor.)


    > bought the cheapest bare wood door at Home Depot and laid it across two filing cabinets.
I'm surprised how many people don't build their own desks (especially those of us who work at home). I spent about $1,200 on a pretty minimalist (but very large) desk in my early 20s. I could build my ideal desk for half that price.

Even the "cheapest bare wood door at Home Depot", switch that out with "cheap (but straight) wood" or layers of thick MDF or other durable surface, add paint, grout, tile adhesive and window molding (or something wood for an edge) and cheap ceramic tiles. Cut the MDF to ensure no tile cuts are needed, sand/spray paint the edges to match the tile and you have a pretty decent looking/functional/durable desk of any desired size.

I did a dining table that way in my 20s. It was a curb rescue that the top was destroyed (someone used it as a work bench) but it had a really nice set of thick oak legs that would clean up. I re-used the top after a lot of sanding but the tiling/painting job was maybe an hour's worth of work done mostly by brief instructions given to me from an older gentleman at Home Depot (I owned a dull hand saw and plug-in power drill given to me by my grand father). It took a weekend to complete between the various "waiting for things to dry". I sealed mine, as well. It cost less than $75 about 20 years ago.

Honestly, if I were to do it all over again, I'd skip the $1,200 desk. I'd watch Craigslist for a large hardwood dining room table with the right characteristics[0], preferably with leafs. It's a huge work area. If pressed against a wall, you could set a number of deep cabinets wall-side, put the monitor in the center of the table and even access cabinets behind (but above) the monitor pretty easily.

[0] You'd want legs that wouldn't be in the way of your knees while working at it. Ideally, leafs that are attached in some way which could be re-engineered into a printer/computer stand.


Ikea has solid wood tables tops. Just need to find a pair of legs and you've got a solid desk for a few hundred dollars.


On the big desk front, I just found a solid wood dining table on Craigslist. 36x72" without plywood or veneers for $60. The depth is great for ergonomics and the length with me have some reference books and electronics without it seeming cluttered. Best desk I've had


55inch = 140cm


A one-hour shopping session with a personal stylist, at about $175. I desperately wanted to break out of my t-shirt/blue jeans habit, but parsing clothes sizes, trying things on, and getting opinions is equal parts sorcery and torture for me. (I'd tried Stitch Fix and felt like it wanted to reinforce my habits rather than break me out of them.)

After sending her details about my problems and the kinds of styles I admired, the stylist experience was very old-school retail — a department store — but she was unexpectedly pragmatic, giving great advice about picking durable clothes and materials that specifically fit well on me, with lots of wink-and-nudge budget advice (like "This would look great on you for $50 less" followed by flashing me a Nordstrom Rack or Poshmark listing of it).

Also, finding out that the department store has a complimentary tailoring service for hemming and adjusting the waistline on pants you buy from there permanently changed my clothes shopping process.


I don't want to belittle your experience as stylists can be helpful for achieving a certain look, but often department stores (especially Nordstrom) have sales associates trained as stylists.

They will spend a lot of time helping you with your style for free, albeit you'll probably want to buy from that particular store. Nordstrom clothes are a bit on the pricier end, but ~most~ are often good quality.


We went to a Nordstrom, actually, and worked with their designated stylist who did quite a bit of the picking. The value for the hired stylist was not working for Nordstrom, which meant being able to say "that looks good, here's something that will look as good and cost half as much, and also here's why that looks good on you and where you can find it elsewhere".

EDIT: I really also want to stress that the stylist was just... nice. Completely non-judgmental about me waffling over things, offering lots of advice beyond just the clothing — how different postures affect fits, being able to explain to me why layering was sometimes uncomfortable and how to alleviate it, how to better adjust my fit when my body's size changes, even a gym recommendation. The in-shop stylist was also very nice, but the hired stylist got me through the door to the shop, and for me at least, that was worth the $175.


Interesting, I have a preferred stylist at Nordstrom in Seattle and there’s never been even a suggestion she would charge $175 (or anything) for services. Definitely possible to not take along your “hired help” and be successful!

I spend 60-90 minutes with her a handful of times a year and it’s been awesome - something I wish I’d started doing a decade ago in fact.

I also never felt entirely happy with Stitch Fix, or shopping the racks myself in stores. It was harder for me to find items which work well together and which fit well.

Nordstrom also tailors almost everything I buy in at least a minor way — length of arms, waist size, length of leg. Really does make a difference.


I get it, and I've been back to that Nordstrom without the hired stylist and gotten advice from the in-shop stylist. I expanded my answer a bit, but I never would've gone into the Nordstrom to shop if it hadn't been for the hired stylist. I didn't know what I didn't know.

Maybe $175 wasn't a good objective value for that, but for me, it worked.


> I didn't know what I didn't know.

I think that’s a good point, some things are extremely obvious for some people and they don’t need any consulting on that subject. Good for them, but it may not be obvious for other people. That’s normal and that’s fine.

It is completely normal to hire a trainer for learning a new sport, why shouldn’t you do that for other skills. If you’re bad at picking clothes, you can easily spend way more than $175 on stuff that isn’t comfortable and you will never wear.

And if you look at people on the street, at least one third seems to be bad at shopping clothes ;)


You got a lot of personal value precisely because of

> I didn't know what I didn't know.

so it was money well spent.


Serious question: Do you tip them? Is there an expectation to?


No, I’ve never tipped them. Once asked if that was expected and she said no.

I believe Men’s and Women’s is 8-10% commission rate, but believe Kid’s is higher. Shopping in Men’s a single jacket from Armani runs about $1500-1800, formal trousers in the $350-500 range, decent jeans or shirts seem to be in the $150-250 range, tees they carry from e.g. Robert Barakett around $70.

It adds up and I feel like it’s hard to get out of there with a few new outfits for under $2000. It’s worth using their loyalty program [1] and worth considering their store card, although “Icon” status means spending >$15k per year on their store card.

If you end up liking Zegna then you’re up into the stratosphere at $3500-5500/ea for many of their items.

I guess it’s possible tips are appreciated if you’re going to visit, take an hour of their time and emerge with one $70 tee at the end? That’s not been my shopping experience, I don’t wear Zegna, but I usually buy a few pairs of Paige jeans and some Bugatchi shirts, perhaps a new merino wool pullover, probably some shoes. By the time I’m ready to spend 90 minutes in Nordstrom shopping and getting the tailor to measure for alterations, I’m usually looking for enough new stuff that the stylist will make $200-500 in commission.

[1] https://www.nordstrom.com/browse/nordy-club/manage-card/icon...

Edit: Oh, and worth knowing is Nordstrom does sales at the start of the AW season [2] for incoming items. It’s a quirk, and it’s worth timing some of your shopping to coincide because it’ll save you 15-30% off a lot of items!

[2] https://www.nordstrom.com/browse/anniversary-sale/details


Usually they work for commission, at least where I shop. They either go to the cash register with you or put stickers with their personal number on the price tag.

Which means they will give you the clothes with the highest commission, and are going to tell you that those look best on you.


I used to work at fairly expensive furniture/houseware retailer. They had a big squad of interior designers who all worked for free. They drove so much additional revenue that we didn't need to charge customers at all.


> (especially Nordstrom)

I might be missing the point but aren't you talking upwards of $200+ per outfit (shirt, pants) when shopping at stores like this?


Ymmv with that though - I found some were just trying to get you to buy anything even if the size was completely wrong altogether.


Would an associate on commission give you good advice on budget though?


I have no experience here, but I'd guess they would. It would be better to guarantee a sale than alienate a customer who would consider returning of the experience went well.


A lot of current season clothing will have MAP (minimum advertised pricing) agreements in play meaning you’re probably paying list almost anywhere which is an authorized retailer.

Now, what you can do is figure out what brands suit you and fit well, what sizes are good, then shop past seasons in Nordstrom Rack or elsewhere. Popular sizes and colorways may sell out quickly so it’s a more frustrating experience, but you can see items marked down 55-75% too!


I did the same thing several years ago, only in my case I was able to follow the guides at /r/malefashionadvice for free, highly recommended if you don't want to or can't afford a personal stylist right now.

Look at the guides on their sidebar (on old reddit at least) and they have everything you need, such as a basic guide, what to buy for $X, and so on. Take particular notice at their What Are You Wearing Today (WAYWT) threads, while they are sometimes ludicrous, they often show the current fashion zeitgeist.

https://old.reddit.com/r/malefashionadvice/


Is there not a simple "look book" that exists and gives you examples of where you can find / buy the kinds of clothes that you see and like? (hopefully for less than premium prices)

I find it odd / annoying that all the clothing is made in low cost countries, but we need funnelers of information or access or recommendations who tack on a surcharge at every step until you're paying $50 for a simple t-shirt.

I equally find it very strange that, for companies making and selling clothing, I can only imagine it costs very little much more to make good-looking clothing and copy the latest styles. Why does cheap clothing always seem to be so unstylish?

Example: someone manufacturing a tie (if people wear those any more even), the material and labor scarcely costs more if it's ugly versus nice. Why are ugly ties still made?

Puzzled.


Just looked up stitch fix to see what that was since I never heard of it. First results include news stories of the CEO stepping down and laying off 20% of its workforce in the last 24 hours. Ouch.


its not personalized. Funny story. My wife tried it out one time, and we went to meet up with a friend who we haven't seen in 5 years who just came back from working in Japan. The friend and my wife have vastly different body types, hair colors, height and style. Guess who ended up matching exactly in clothing for the night?


It’s not personalized at all when I tried it about a year or so back.

I signed on and in my intake explicitly said I wanted new shorts and I live in Texas so don’t need jackets.

They sent me a jacket and some shoes and shirts and no shorts.

If you’re looking to build out a whole new closet it might be okay if you just want whatever the current style is but if you want something specific it didn’t look like a good product.


Same experience.

I put two notes in my profile, 1) that I have very fair skin so whites and off-whites are not a good look on me. 2) no polos, ever.

My first box arrived with a white polo and a cream beanie.

Could not cancel faster.


Which is hilarious since they were well known for having an insanely huge data science team supposedly working on really tough problems in personalization. They had a constant stream of (interesting) blog posts but I was always curious how much of that work really touched the product. AI/ML was supposed to be their big market edge.

Not too surprised that didn't work out given my experience with every other company that had built out massive teams of largely inexperienced DS people.


It was much better before they laid off the bulk of their stylists in 2020


Never considered that. But now I am curious, how did you pick the stylist? Not even sure how I would find one lol


I went to Nordstrom looking for a nice blazer to up my wardrobe with a hard limit of $400. I had a couple guys who kept bringing me pricey items that didn't match what I asked for and half heartedly saying "looks good bro trust me". It was annoying, I know they're on commission but at least make an effort to sell.

Finally another of the sales guys started chatting with me. I explained what I wanted and he went and grabbed exactly that. The item was less than my limit and on sale. With the savings in mind I asked if he could suggest a couple more items, told him the colors I like and general style. He brought a few more told me what he honestly thought (if it looked good or not) and I knew this was now my personal stylist.

Now whenever I walk in if he's not working I just come back another day. This guy is good at his job, and has learned what I like. He makes recommendations, I give my feedback when I don't like something, and he rolls with it.

So all I can say is create a litmus test, and don't be afraid to tell them they have totally missed the mark and you're gonna look around on your own. Soon enough someone else will walk up and you try again.


My wife is a stylist and does an online-only version of this (and other related services) over at https://estilistas.co.uk/ (hope no one minds the plug!)

I'm always surprised how often her clients come back multiple times per year. She's had quite a few from the US and Canada too. She caters for men & women


How did you find your stylist?


> I'd tried Stitch Fix and felt like it wanted to reinforce my habits rather than break me out of them.

Wow, same! Who/what service did you use? This was my biggest gripe with Stitch Fix, my friends are all surprised I complain about it. I wanted an opinionated new style and all I got was the same stuff I usually wear, just more expensive.


The "stylist" part of Stitch Fix disappointed me the most. I had a different stylist each time even when I didn't request a change and none of them seemed to take feedback into account in the selections. It made me doubt that the "stylist" was anything but a vague algorithm with a boilerplate letter generator.


What was the service ?


I used FernDate,[1] which is pitched as a dating profile consult but lets you select services a-la-carte. You can find local stylists and negotiate with them if all you need is a consult — the prices they list on their websites are often expecting to do a full wardrobe assessment, outfit curation, and co-shopping for a femme client, but (in my limited experience) will mark prices down a bit if you're masculine.

1: https://ferndate.com/services/

(As an aside, if you're in Portland or the PNW, I also highly recommend Duchess Clothier as a custom tailor: https://www.duchessclothier.com/)


I'll also suggest John Helmer Haberdashery in Portland.

https://www.johnhelmer.com/

I'm very happy with the service and the suit I got there.


Thanks for that. I'm in the PNW and I've been looking around for a good tailor. I was ordering some of my stuff pseudo-custom from sonofatilor but it's a bit hamstrung by how bad I am at taking my own measurements. Other than that the shirts are really nice, but the wool is a bit fragile (no afilliation). I also have a bit of an odd shirt size so this is helpful


+1, I'd also love to learn more about your experience, especially about how you found your stylist.


+1 would also love to know how you found your stylist


Lots of Googling, then a little calling around. I started with one in my neighborhood who also runs a hair salon, who was also the only one I found who specifically advertised a masculine-specific wardrobe assessment service.

When I described my problem, she gave me a shortlist of several other stylists who were outside of what I thought I was looking for, like FernDate, Duchess, and some local vintage-specific pickers who just aren't online.


Could have just gone on a date with a woman lol.


Ordering frozen croissants online. Before going to bed you leave one in the oven. Wake up, turn oven on, hit the shower. When you come out, it's ready to eat = cafe experience at home, coffee and a croissant while checking the news.


Same, but with an air-fryer it's just 10 minutes from frozen to done, so I usually pick them from the fridge, put them in the airfryer, boil some tea-water, and then have tea and croisants for breakfast in 10 minutes.


What a coincidence, just had one of those. Don't want to be a shill, but no need to order online. 4 for $5 at Trader Joe's.


Just tried these for the first time from TJ's and you are absolutely right!


TJ’s are better than most cafes in the US for nearly $1 each, too good.


The only problem is this: a random croissant once a week as a treat is negligible to your overall calorie intake, but a daily croissant means you eat croissant for breakfast every day. Huge difference. In the book "French Women Don't Get Fat", one of the things that the author points out is that our invisible daily habits are the biggest factor in our calorie intake. If your commute walks you past a donut stand that you cannot resist, change your commute.

Of course if you have a well-worked-out diet and matching exercise plan that accommodates a daily croissant, this is great (with the air fryer).


This one is a big win. I (occasionally) buy Costco croissants and reheat them in the air fryer. It takes like 3 minutes on the 320 degree setting for a perfect experience.


Costco will generally sell you the unbaked bakery items.


Do you use the "air fry" setting or a reheat setting?


I use a button with the icon of a bread on it. I guess it is air fry since my air fryer seems to only have one mode with fan and heat both on. That defaults to 320f, 8 minutes, which is far too long in my experience. Temperature is about right, you want it as hot as you can go without burning.


Best croissants I've ever had in the States were from frozen (albeit from a local bakery, not from the grocery store).


Curious why and how this is something that needs to be done online. Frozen food sounds like a bad thing to order online.


Fair question. I live in Japan. Frozen deliveries work reliably, and I don't think we'd have frozen croissants at the supermarket.

I order from a store that seems to mostly serve cafes based on their order sizes (their other products are things like a 13kg box of butter).


Where I live, if you order frozen food online, they're delivered by a courier specialized in delivering frozen goods (like UPS but only accepts frozen parcels and delivering them using refrigerated trucks).


Now: put one in a waffle iron and sprinkle with brown sugar before dropping the lid, for a killer Croffle