What sub $200 product improved your 2024

High quality casters for your office chair - they all come with generic, cheap plastic casters no matter how nice the actual chair. You can pick up, top quality rubber casters for $20 off amazon [1]. Makes rolling around 10X better.

[1] https://a.co/d/dqXmP4F

Also, my Jetbrains IDEs (mostly use Webstorm and RubyMine). As an individual, I pay $173/year for their all products pack after a 40%loyalty discount. It's an incredible productivity boost over VScode and I'm quite happy to pay for it.

A Levoit air purifier for my apartment.

It turns out my respiratory and sleep issues came down to indoor air pollution. Within two hours of receiving the purifier and turning it on full blast, my sinuses cleared, even when laying down for bed. That night I had intense dreams and have been dreaming much more ever since.

I got a cable tie gun (aka zip tie gun) and it it does it's job perfectly. Pulls the cable tie to the correct tension and then cuts of the excess perfectly flush. Very satisfying to use. The one I got is made by panduit, but there are many brands that work more or less the same way.

I upgraded my bed linens from standard cheapest cotton to satin.

It's such a huge difference I can't quite put it into words. It's completely different. I love it - some people might not though.

It feels cool and smooth. I sleep wearing only boxer briefs, and did previously as well.

One downside is you have to wash and dry them separately - but I already did that anyway because of the load.

Ignoring some of the obvious ones, something that made a big difference to me was an Aarke water carbonator.

Looks pretty, works really well, no more lugging heavy sparkling water bottles, and taking away the (many!) plastic bottles I used to go through makes me feel less like an eco-terrorist.

I get my CO2 via subscription in swappable/replaceable bottles. Excellent.

Yoyo desk bike - i bought it for a bit of fun thinking if it wasnt any good id get rid of it, but its really good fun. Ill do 20-30 "miles" on it in the morning - just tapping away and it helps me concentrate

Refurbished Wacom One 13 (Gen 1)

It allows me to use my MacBook in the same way that I use my other devices --- with a stylus, so writing/annotation/drawing are perfectly natural, and it's also easy to move from device-to-device:

- Samsung Galaxy Note 10+

- Kindle Scribe

- Samsung Galaxy Book 3 Pro 360

Looking at upgrading to either the new Touch edition or a Wacom Movink 13 (I just wish the latter was high-resolution, or the Cintiq's didn't use a different stylus technology).

A pack of 10 tea spoons. Cant tell you how self-satisfied I am every time I make a brew and DONT need to wash up a spoon.

A large stainless steal drink bottle (36 oz or 1065 ml). Specifically a Yeti after doing careful research.

Major improvements I've noticed:

- not having to frequently refill a small glass

- not having to bother anyone for water when I visit

- readily available for outings

Thanks to the above, I'm well hydrated more of the time. The bottle is a bit bulky (it's insulated) but I'm happy with that tradeoff.

I had a Samsung laser printer which died after ~10 years. I bought this instead of German Amazon.

https://www.lexmark.com/da_dk/printer/14204/Lexmark-B2236dw

It works without nasty binary only drivers, as it supports IPP Everywhere of similar protocol. I was surprised that it just worked on Ubuntu and MS Windows 11.

A couple things:

- Qingping Air Monitor Lite: https://a.co/d/1jUkawZ

- AirGradient DIY: https://www.airgradient.com/

They helped determine why everyone feels so sleepy and groggy at home in the winter: the CO2 levels are routinely over 2,000 ppm. If we have any guests for a couple hours, it usually goes above 3,000 ppm.

And before anyone comments about accuracy, I've measure both of the above against very expensive, high quality air quality monitors we have at work, and they all give the same readings over months.

More:

- AirPods Pro 2. They are a significant upgrade over my 1st generation in terms of both sound quality and noise cancellation.

- Milwaukee Fastback utility knife. Cheap and useful. I usually carry it at work so I'm not dulling my daily carry knife with a bunch of cardboard. Have a phillips screwdriver too. https://www.milwaukeetool.com/products/48-22-1505

- Streamlight ProTac 1L-1AA flashlight. Uses CR123 or AA batteries. Small, compact. Will stay charged for months, unlike the USB charging flashlights. I usually run with AAs and keep a spare in my backpack. Super reliable. These go on sale a lot so don't pay full price. You can supposedly use these to charge your electronic devices as well. https://a.co/d/ecQKQca

- Ninja Air Fryer and an "mister-style" oil sprayer. https://a.co/d/2Vo2x6j

- ASPERX car jump starter. Charges via USB-C. I ordered this randomly on a good sale and the day after it was delivered, I had my car battery randomly die at a gas station and I used it to jump start me. https://a.co/d/cYAokwT

- Quansheng K6 radios. $30. Already used these for camping (FRS/GMRS), power outages and storm communications. GMRS worked about a mile non-LOS in a suburb and several miles with direct-LOS from a nearby mountain top. Work good as short range ham, and for radio scanning too. https://a.co/d/2ihGVZd

I got a big portable monitor (22 inches, https://www.asus.com/us/displays-desktops/monitors/zenscreen...) that was just a bit over $200 on sale. They make a more expensive 24 in version too.

Love it. It can take USB C power from the laptop or plugged in to AC power for additional brightness. Comes with both a built in kickstand and a desk and cubicle mount.

I went traveling for much of 2024 and I wanted a universal charger and powerbank that just worked without issues. I also didn't want to carry around two different things so the best option I found was this combined universal charger and powerbank called the SnapWireless PowerPack Universal Pro, it is a brick but it has a 15k mAh battery with wired and wireless charging and also comes with attachable plug adapters. It saved my ass more than a few times when I was running out of juice for my devices.

The two most usefull things I got were

* Generic mini PC from amazon, that basically just runs docker containers. Very usefull to have as I use a windows pc mainly (cad and gaming), and while WSL2 works for dev, I want to have running services, and this thing works pretty well.

* Some Zwave stuff, which uses the above with a Zwave usb antenna, and HomeAssistant. Arose from a need to never forget to close the garage door, but I have been doing more complex stuff with optical and motion sensors.

* USB audio interface (focusrite), XLR Mic, and USB switch for keyboard mouse and audio interface. I can now wear super light headhphones (Seinheiser) instead of a bulky headset, and can seamlessly switch from controlling my work laptop to my main desktop, with correct audio output, never having issues with bluetooth or other connectivity.

* I also pay about $200 every 2 months to have my house cleaned. Well worth the cost for em.

A sharp knife. I already had a sharp knife relative to most people, but this is a lightsaber by comparison. I am almost excited to chop stuff with it, and it also looks really nice. It's probably the best souvenir I could get from Japan because I use it every day.

I got the kind of neck brace normally used by health care practitioners for immobilizing a person's head and wore it on several long haul flights during the year, lashed to the headrest on the seat back with an improvised system of belts, along with a blindfold. It enabled restful sleep during the flights with the only downside being that I looked weird. Normal travel pillows are useless to me because the tendency for my head is to hang forward when I'm on a plane.

A USB powered neck cooler/fan. Bought a 200usd one instead of a cheap one and I think it's worth it - it can cool and heat, charges very fast over usb c and has survived a few drops. It makes a huge difference in humid counties.

A USB charging cable that displays its wattage. Some devices are bad at showing when they're done charging, or even if they're charging properly at all.

Illegal drugs.

Not under $200, but this year I spent $220 on a nice non-stick wok:

https://www.scanpan.com/techniq-wok-90556?srsltid=AfmBOooVv9...

Definitely not for high heat cooking (well, theoretically you can, but it will reduce the pan's life), but it retains heat and doesn't scratch if you use wooden spatulas, it has been a very noticeable upgrade for our cooking, in a way that previous $40/50 woks can't match.

I finally bit the bullet, and bought one of those weighted blankets.

I wonder how I ever could sleep without one. Well, I couldn't. Sleeping like a newborn since I got used to it. Takes about a week or so.

A portable 20W solar panel that lets me recharge my power banks while hiking.

Home Wifi Mesh System - https://www.tp-link.com/uk/home-networking/deco/deco-x55/

Found my WiFi dropping off walking around my house and swapping to using data. Super frustrating but since installing these I've had perfect signal around my house.

A digital picture frame. The one I have gets a custom email address that family can use to send me pictures, or they can use an app to add pics. It's been great having pics of siblings, nieces and nephews, parents, etc all popping up on my frame. It does what FB used to do for me before the feed was filled with random things that aren't from my friends and family.

Annual subscription to Cursor. Easily one of the most powerful pieces of software out there and even if it's the only thing that survives this AI bubble, I'd be very happy.

high-torque 20v impact wrench from harbor freight, came with battery & charger, probably $175 after tax

i do the occasional maintenance on my high-mileage car including, recently, a front-end suspension rebuild. having a portable impact wrench with some juice made that job 1000x times easier!

Boox Color 7 e-ink reader. I read a lot of pdfs but wasn't a believer in e-ink. However, the screen has dramatically reduced my eye strain.

This model is usually ~$250 but it regularly goes on sale for under $200.

Noise cancelling headphones were a huge boost to my productivity.

Cheapest robot vacuum I could find ($150 refurbished Eufy). I will be upgrading to more expensive for sure, but even basic one is so good over vacuuming yourself.

I bought a motion activated plug so my workbench lights turn on automatically when I walk up and off when I leave.

$35 Manta Sleep Mask has drastically improved my sleep

$220 but a rusty used ebike. Great fun.

airpods 4, more convenient than bose qc35, now I bring them everywhere :)

A competitive online game. A ranked game lets you work on something other than work. This is for the goal oriented people that need something like this.

Life may not be perfect but, but hey, I been working on grinding to Plat slowly and I’m almost there. It’s one of the simpler hobbies to add for those looking for it.

If you really decide that starting today you want to be a competent sc2 player, that’s going to take serious effort lol.

So a lot of these games are truly compelling personal challenges - if you’re competitive.

Hakko 888.

Brother Ptouch D220.

About $200 all-in for both.

chatgpt ($20 per month)