Shitty Hardware Brands - Brands that you will regret buying

[Troonos]

Buy a laptop with a thunderbolt port.

Nah, I value portability. I don't want to sit on my couch and game with a fat GPU dangling from the side of my laptop.

 

[TFT-A9]

I've heard of people having issues with ASUS stuff but never had any problems myself. I have heard of a number of issues with anything Sapphire makes and have myself had a Sapphire graphics card arrive DOA. Have not experienced any major issues with MSI in the past, my current graphics card is MSI and it's doing pretty well. My RAM sticks are the only thing in my current rig I'm not enthused about - GEIL EvoSpear, but they're functional.

Specific to peripherals: I've heard that Razer products are actually garbage. CyberPower UPSes are apparently shit and APC or TrippLite are strictly better. HyperX headsets are shoddy in my experience, I had a HyperX headset and the left ear just stopped working for no reason after a few months. Logitech stuff that isn't keyboards or mice is consistently garbage in my experience.

Back in the day: Anything Compaq, Packard Bell or HP (non-printer) put out was probably garbage. Dell used to be solid, not anymore. Gateway 2000 used to be great, not anymore. Seagate used to be pretty good, apparently they're shit now. Connor hard drives were shit. Western Digital went from being a bit of a black sheep to being one of the better options these days.

 

[Agent Abe Caprine]

Raidmax. Do not get their power supplies.

 

[Pissmaster]

It's not necessarily computer hardware, but everything Sony I've ever owned that wasn't Playstation-related was total garbage. The worst headphones I've ever used were some blue Sony sport ones that were like $10. They were worse than even total dogshit pack-in headphones from no-name Chinese junk.

I've also had enough problems with ASUS stuff to where I'd only buy their products on clearance.

 

[murdered meat bag]

Is it all Dell laptops, or just the Inspiron line? Are the G5 and G7 any good?

they run loud and theres a change that the keyboard will scratch your screen when you close the lid. you'll need their warranty before they even bother to fix it.

 

[Troonos]

they run loud and theres a change that the keyboard will scratch your screen when you close the lid. you'll need their warranty before they even bother to fix it.

So other than the G5/G7 and the Lenovo Legion line, are there any other laptops with something in the 1660Ti to 2080 range and a 10th-gen i7 and 16 GB for around $1000, preferably with great build quality?

 

[Pee Cola]

Seems like I'm the world's luckiest ASUS consoomer. I've used a shitload of ASUS products over the years including network cards, laptops, motherboards, graphics cards and smartphones, and I've never really had any problems with them.

Acer, on the other hand...

 

[Trans Fat 41g]

PNY MicroSD cards, not even once.

These pieces of shit can barely handle any heat and within the short span of the two I've used I had to constantly re insert the second until it refused to be read anymore. I haven't run into these issues with any other memory card brands except for no name prepackaged cards.

 

[Smaug's Smokey Hole]

PC Chips is legendarily bad.

https://redhill.net.au/b/b-bad.html

 

[Dysnomia]

Pretty common for laptops to have their own proprietary connectors. Thinkpads do that to.
I guess that's changing now with USB-C though.


Inspiron is Dell's cheap trash line.
Their actual workstation laptops ("Precision") are fine.
Have no experience with their gamer line but you should generally stay away from gaming laptops.

I got an Inspiron N7010 free from a friend since my PC died. So far so good. Better than being stuck with a tablet like I was for over a year. That's good as a spare. But not a main device. Not a mobile fan. But that was a gift too so free is free. Don't know what I would have done without it.

I had a Compaq Presario for years and never had any issues even though I always heard they were horrible. It was cheap because it was a floor model and that Sears was no longer selling electronics so they were trying to get rid of everything.

This is the first laptop I have had. I had three desktops before that. A charity former medical office computer from 2000-2003, The Compaq Presario from 2003 to 2009 and the HP from 2009 to 2019. That one died on me. The other two were fine. I just gave them away to relatives. The charity computer was from like 1993 but was still running A-OK over a decade later. I can't remember what it was though. Horizontal tower with a reset button on the right side of the front. It had no sound card so a neighbor's brother put one in for us. He had a bit of a drinking problem and just sat there downing wine like water.

 

[Dr. Sexbot]

I'm not talking about having proprietary connectors for charging the battery. That's nothing new. I'm talking about being unable to use your laptop properly if you have 3rd party equipment that fits that proprietary port. You can use a 3rd party AC adapter with a Thinkpad and it will still charge properly. If you use a third party Dell AC adapter with an Inspiron, then the laptop will be powered on, but it won't charge. because they specifically made it so that you have to buy first hand AC adapters from them in order for it to charge it. That's not the same different brands having their own proprietary ports.

You know, I used to agree with your perspective completely (and still agree with this line of thinking, in general). However, in the specific case of power supplies and laptop batteries, I have seen how bad it can get. Just because a Chinesium power supply for your machine exists for $15 on Aliexpress does not mean that it is a good idea to pump 10 A through the cheapest possible hardware. Power supplies and laptop batteries, when poorly designed or QC'd, can be fucking dangerous as hell. We've all seen the electrical shorts and ensuing fires. And you want that sitting on your lap, powering your >>$15 computer. Nah bro. I actually just built a machine, and ended up splurging and getting a nice platinum-rated power supply just to protect my investment a little more.

That said, vendor lock-in for anything with low-risk is scummy (e.g. Logitech, just pay the fucking $1 licensing fee so your "2.4 GHz keyboard" can be a real damn Bluetooth one...the hardware is identical). The high-risk stuff such as the P/S is probably more CYA on behalf of Dell, preventing them from getting sucked into a liability suit when the shit literally explodes in your lap.

 

[Dr. Sexbot]

I've heard of people having issues with ASUS stuff but never had any problems myself. I have heard of a number of issues with anything Sapphire makes and have myself had a Sapphire graphics card arrive DOA.

Having just completed a build (and having been out of the hardware game for a long time), it seems that brand loyalty for BRAND$ is just as real as ever, but QC across the higher-tier brands has dropped. Some brands will tend to fail, and some will tend to be of good quality, but it seems like more companies are willing to let the assembly lines run just a bit faster and longer at the risk of a largely DOA lot. (I think we see this now with a lot of non-computing stuff as people rush to fill the supply chain gaps, but I digress)

CyberPower UPSes are apparently shit and APC or TrippLite are strictly better.

That used to be the case, but APC got acquired and quality tanked. TrippLite is the only one left that has any kind of reputation left that I'm aware of. The CyberPower ones are indeed cheap shit but the price difference should make that clear. I just want something to give me time to hibernate if the power shits itself...AVR is great to have for stability and longevity but I got a P/S that includes it as well.

Gateway 2000 used to be great, not anymore. Seagate used to be pretty good, apparently they're shit now. Connor hard drives were shit. Western Digital went from being a bit of a black sheep to being one of the better options these days.

LOL, I haven't heard Connor in ages. The Gateway brand (hasn't been 2000 since..well) had disappeared years ago only to resurface as a marque at Walmart recently IIRC. WD got in some hot water lately by sneaking SMR into some of their disks. I knew they were doomed a few years ago when marketing crept in and started introducing all these fucking stupid segmentations -- it used to be Black, Blue and Green, easy to follow -- now there's also WD Red, Gold, Purple, fucking Chartreuse et al. Once they started pulling that shit I knew it would be downhill from there. HGST still supposedly has the best reliability, per the last BackBlaze report I read, but it's been a couple years.

PNY MicroSD cards, not even once.

These pieces of shit can barely handle any heat and within the short span of the two I've used I had to constantly re insert the second until it refused to be read anymore. I haven't run into these issues with any other memory card brands except for no name prepackaged cards.

Not just no-name cards, there is actually a huge problem with counterfeit SD cards (these include second-shift productions with relaxed QC on the same production lines). I believe Amazon is completely infested with them, so I only buy them in physical stores like Best Buy or Fry's and ask them to do a price match if it's worth the trouble. The big retailers have more control over the supply chain and are a lot less likely to end up with seconds.

Edit: sorry for the DP

 

[Smaug's Smokey Hole]

HGST still supposedly has the best reliability, per the last BackBlaze report I read, but it's been a couple years.

It sure has... Western Digital bought them eight years ago.

Toshiba is a good manufacturer that is surprisingly cheap, in my experience it's not uncommon to find 7200rpm Toshiba drives cheaper than 5400rpm WD/Seagate drives, or drives at the same price except the Toshiba is 1TB larger.

 

[potato fan]

Microsoft
I needed a basic, no frills wired keyboard that would last longer than noname supermarket brand, so I thought MS should offer something good, after all I had their curved keyboard from mid-90's that lasted me like 15 years. So I bought this garbage, and some months later some keys stop working. Turns out there's some static buildup and the switches do not work. And the solution, I kid you not, is to bang into the keybard a few times. Fucking piece of garbage

but I thought it's just a one time bad luck, and when I needed a portable Bt mouse, I bouthg this:

and obviously it works like shit. for some reason sometimes it stops working and this little diode it has is pulsing white light, and hte manual does not mention what do in such situation.
I had been considering getting a surface laptop, but after those two fuckups I will buy anything else than MS hardware

 

[⠠⠠⠅⠑⠋⠋⠁⠇⠎ ⠠⠠⠊⠎ ⠠⠠⠁ ⠠⠠⠋⠁⠛]

You know, I used to agree with your perspective completely (and still agree with this line of thinking, in general). However, in the specific case of power supplies and laptop batteries, I have seen how bad it can get. Just because a Chinesium power supply for your machine exists for $15 on Aliexpress does not mean that it is a good idea to pump 10 A through the cheapest possible hardware. Power supplies and laptop batteries, when poorly designed or QC'd, can be fucking dangerous as hell. We've all seen the electrical shorts and ensuing fires. And you want that sitting on your lap, powering your >>$15 computer. Nah bro. I actually just built a machine, and ended up splurging and getting a nice platinum-rated power supply just to protect my investment a little more.

That said, vendor lock-in for anything with low-risk is scummy (e.g. Logitech, just pay the fucking $1 licensing fee so your "2.4 GHz keyboard" can be a real damn Bluetooth one...the hardware is identical). The high-risk stuff such as the P/S is probably more CYA on behalf of Dell, preventing them from getting sucked into a liability suit when the shit literally explodes in your lap.

I've seen swollen batteries breaking expensive Toshiba and Dell 'ultrabooks' apart.

The problem is not random Chinese power supplies. The problem is laptops which are designed with absolutely no margin for error. Internal laptop batteries should be illegal.

 

[Toolbox]

Microsoft

I had been considering getting a surface laptop, but after those two fuckups I will buy anything else than MS hardware

In my experience, if you're looking for cheap keyboards or mice that will actually last some time, just get some bog standard junk from Logitech. Even if it's not the best it will last.

As far as terrible peripherals go, I'd gotten one of these passed to me after the person that had it no longer wanted it (they barely even used the thing)

Not sure if it was the "deathadder" pictured here exactly, but it was a practically new wired Razer mouse that looked a lot like it. It died within 3 months or less. Never again, especially with the prices these things run for.

 

[augment]

Yeah anything with "gaming" on the title will most likely be overpriced piece of shit, that's why I stay away from razer.

 

[Just Some Other Guy]

Yeah anything with "gaming" on the title will most likely be overpriced piece of shit, that's why I stay away from razer.

I use a razer Naga, but that's only because I got it on a clearance deal. Keyboards though? I use a cheap Havit mechanical that works great. I see mechanical keyboards now run up to $200....just wow.

 

[AmpleApricots]

You can get a good logitech mouse for around 8 euros in these parts. It has a wheel (doubling as third button) and two buttons. It comes in white or black. What more can you possibly want? They last for many, many years - longer if you don't have two left hands and can open them up occasionally to clean the wheel. If the feet for gliding ever come off you can order new ones off aliexpress for less than a dollar.

 

[ducktales4gameboy]

Razer. They've been getting worse and worse in the last decade and it's frustrating. The hardware's still decently solid but if you want any of the features you're getting stuck with a huge bloated modular control panel, and straight up FUCK any company that wants a web login to manage a driver. I learned this the hard way after snagging a solid metal and otherwise very sound mechanical razer keyboard from a rummage sale.

Also Oculus. They were great during the Rift DK2 era but powerslammed into the shitter when the Facebook infection became terminal. Now a FB login is required and the easy-to-damage headset cables run as much as the headsets do on eBay due to FB completely killing support for older products as soon as newer ones are released. Fuck them so much.

One more, not a tech company: Intex. Don't buy any intex product, ever. It's been my powerlevelly personal hell in the last month attempting to repair a pump on an Intex hot tub for a family member and every single discussion I've seen online about repairing them has had multiple engineers spewing vitriol at about how shitty their construction is and how replacement parts are impossible to source, both of which are statements I can confirm.