Buy it for Life

Hi there, I came here to the BIFL Lemmy out of suspicion that the reddit posts are just unlabelled marketing, and I was wondering the possibility of sourcing goods that are more to a BIFL standard? In my area, second hand goods tend to be really quite poor in quality (reselling fast fashion) or otherwise not present, and I have not inherited anything that does last. So I would apprecite advice or reccomendations for finding goods at a BIFL standard. I was also wondering if maybe there would be anyone with good advice for finding sustainable, local textile production so that I may be able to tailor what I need without having to buy from the poor selection aforementioned, does anyone know of any of this?

TL:DR I am suspicious that a lot of what is claimed as 'BIFL' has been enshittified, and would like advice on being able to search for sustainable goods for a local area (not specified because I'm hoping for advice with searching, not exactly for specific reccs)

Well it's not an overly inspiring photo, but then what white good is?

Purchased some time before 2000 this fridge survived a move from the outback to the city on the back of a cattle truck, along with cattle, a Simpson top loader and many other household effects.

In March 2022 it decided to stop cooling. I was away so the missus bought an Inalto fridge - quite similar to that red one that drove Technology Connections mental.

When I got back I took the old fridge apart to see if it was the thermostat that was sick. The tip had rusted off, letting out the gas that operates the bellows in the thermostat, so ordered and fitted a new one. Success. Kept it in the shed just in case.

Now the Inalto struggles to get below 11°C, so have dragged the Kelvinator out of storage and it's back to full time duty again.

As for the Inalto, it's freezing up at the top corner of the unit and only drawing 30 watts. Will do some research, but suspect it's not fixable. At under three years old, that's an exceptionally short life.

where could someone find a pair of sturdy, comfortable goggles that an optometrist can put a prescription into?

Hello there!

Any recommendations for a sous vide thermoplongeur, like this one? It should be available in Europe, temperature from 30 - 60°C (90 - 140°F) and have a cooking time of up to 36h. Its main purpose will be yogurt making.

My big winter boots I have used for the last few years got a split in them today. I use them a lot as I walk about 1km a day to and from work. I have to walk up hills and on ice at times. Which boots should I buy that will be good quality, keep my feet warm and dry, and last repeated daily use?

I've been looking for a good Bluetooth speaker for a while now. My old one, a 1st gen Anker SoundCore that I bought in late in 2018 decided to quit working on me 2020 when the battery failed. I decided that I didn't want another one that would only last me a year or two before it failed. The ones that have actually decent sound just cost too much for me to be able to justify that. That one requirement turned out to be a big problem as almost nobody makes a decent Bluetooth speaker with a replaceable battery. Except, the power tool makers.

About 15 years ago (give or take) I had owned a Ryobi Bluetooth radio. The sound was crap and it wasn't exactly what you would call compact but it was loud and it took a good 5 years of actual, honest to god, abuse until it finally died. It fell into a pan of used motor oil. I cried. Not so much over the radio but rather over the 4ah 18v battery that had been powering it. Those things were damned expensive at the time.

So when I noticed that Ryobi had produced a new Bluetooth speaker, I figured that it would probably take a beating. Question was, how was the sound and more importantly for me, how loud could it get. Unfortunately, everybody seemed to be sleeping on it and hadn't done more than a cursory review on it.

Price wise, it's a bit eye watering with a $100USD MSRP with a 2ah battery included but it does seem to be on discount frequently. Which is good because I recommend getting a 3ah battery for it.

The speaker is a triangular rod a little taller than a 20oz coke bottle. Call it 8 inches long and 2 across. Feels well built, though not as solid as the Anker Soundcore. Ryobi claims that it has a IP67 rating and there are rubber bumpers on every surface the thing could possibly rest on. Feels like it weighs about a pound and a half.

On one end there are it's controls, a power button, play/pause, volume, and the Verse Link pairing button (which is not for pairing Bluetooth). On the other end is the battery door held closed by a toggle clasp and sealed with a rubber gasket. And finally on the side, opposite the speaker, is a USB-C port for charging only. I did check, and no, he charge port will not power the unit without a battery installed.

Sadly, no 3.5mm audio jack nor can the USB-C port handle audio in. This is a Bluetooth only speaker.

Bluetooth pairing is pretty simple, just press and hold the play/pause button while it is on and it will drop its current connection and enter pairing mode. I'm not sure what Bluetooth standards it is using, but the only device I have that I couldn't get to pair with it was my 9 year old Dell Latitude. It could see the speaker but I was never able to get the laptop to pair with it. My desktop did not have the same problem so it's probably just the ancient bluetooth chip on my laptop.

The sound quality is excellent within the limits of my damaged hearing. An audiophile coworker of mine (whose hearing is even worse due to spinning lug nuts off heavy trucks with air impacts all day) says the bass is a bit muddy but otherwise good. As for how loud, at max volume, playing Crab Rave on YouTube, my Apple Watch was showing 90dB 3 feet from the speaker. So more than loud enough for my needs and loud enough to continue damaging my hearing.

Ryobi claims that the 2ah battery it comes with will last "up to" 6 hours and that seems about right. The one time I actually used the battery it came with, it died about an hour before my 8 hour shift ended. I put the 3ah battery in it and it lasts longer than my attention span for testing it. In practice, the 3ah battery lasts me about a shift and a half, playing audio about 60% - 70% of the time.

The batteries this uses has a pair of party tricks, the first of which is actually pretty useful. While you can certainly charge the battery using an external charging dock or via the speaker's own USB-C port, the batteries themselves have a USB-C port on them which can be used for charging the battery. It can charge via any USB charger.

The second party trick is that the battery can also be used as a very small, very slow, 10W USB-C PD power bank to charge a phone or something. I get the feeling that the engineer in charge of designing the battery said "It's got the port, why not!" and nobody in accounting thought to stop them. And no, that ability does not pass through the speaker, and yes, I tried. Though I did find out that my iPhone 16 and iPad Air can themselves act as powerbanks, which I did not know.

About the Verse Link. It's not something I have a use for and haven't tested, but Ryobi crows about this feature more that anything else about this speaker so I figure I'll mention it. The Verse Link is a way to link up several Verse Link speakers up to a single audio source with a range of up to 125'. Again, not something I have a use for, but might be handy at a pool party or something.

All in all, I really like this speaker. Is it "buy it for life"? Probably not, but it does have the makings to be a piece of kit that will last a good long time. How long, I suspect, will depend more on whether Ryobi kills off the USB Lithium line like they did the Tek4 line. I don't think they will, but time will tell.

I'm looking for a BIFL (or at least last me for a while) music player that can play .wav files, has a lot of storage, is portable, and the parts are able to be replaced/upgraded. I've heard about using iPod classics but it seems like they're unable to play .wav files. Any reccomendations?

Had an old Wahl just die after probably a good 20+ years, kind of looks like the cable is frayed and splitting where it connects to the trimmer. Did a quick check online and the new products don't even look remotely similar.

Just using it for normal hair cuts at home, any recommendations?

Edit: Preferably on the budget side.

Looking for a buy it for life option for a lantern. Will mostly be used during power outages and only occasionally otherwise. Ideally it would hold a charge well and be bright enough to allow reading/puzzles/games/etc.

I took a look around and a lot of comments mentioned to get one that uses 'LiFePO4 Batteries', and that seemed like a reasonable requirement.

They're supposed to have a longer life span, be safer, light weight, and better charge/discharge efficiency which is in line with what I'd be looking for.

Some brands/models that I saw recommended:

• BLUETTI came up in more recent posts
• Ecoflow (specifically the RIVER 2) came up a lot
• Anker was suggested a few times, but the comments weren't that detailed

edit, added an image of what I'm referring to

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.world/post/22583951

I'm currently still using my CanoScan F910114 from ~2006 (pictured). The light recently burned out, but it still works for scanning documents if I add some contrast and brightness after the fact. Not great for photographs, though.

If I'm not able to replace the light, I might be in the market for a new scanner. Are there any that you all recommend for durability and potential repairability?

Obviously no electronics are truly going to be BIFL, but I figure I can at least aim high and see what I can find.

Edit: Thank you all for your replies! I'm probably going to go for a used Epson Perfection v600 or v700. I've learned a lot about scanners following your leads.

I basically listen to music constantly, and when I'm on holiday or riding my bike I generally use USB-C earbuds. I've had way too many wireless buds break and I'm sick of them, but these aren't fairing much better tbh.

Problem is that the cables always eventually stop working, often from my phone being in my pocket while I'm walking or cycling. I've been able to partly extend their life by keeping my phone in the thigh pocket on my cargo pants but it often just falls over and bends the cable more sharply than my hip pocket.

I'm looking for either a pair of highly durable earbuds either USB-C or 3.5mm with a USB-C DAC recommendation, or even better a DSP cable that I could use with IEMs with a 0.78mm connector.

I'm also open to any other suggestions at all.

Oh my goodness, it's so much better than petroleum jelly (and it won't degrade latex/rubber). Put it anywhere, you can even eat it, it's safe for nursing babies.

Other than nipples, it has thousands of uses. I use it under my nose where my CPAP machine rubs me raw. Oh, and it's a great moustache wax too!

Just try it. I costs a bit more than PJ, but it's like owning the best quality product of it's type. Nobody can buy anything better.

cross-posted from: https://beehaw.org/post/17069345

Because I've been eating rice more often I realized via my energy bill that cooking in a pot on an electric plate for 30 minutes consumes massive amounts of electricity. Therefore I'm currently browsing for rice cookers, but the info on energy efficiency leaves much to be desired.

What would be the most efficient method to cook brown rice? Which appliance would be recommendable and ideally be in line with the Buy It For Life philosophy?

I guess pretty much any bread knife is a bifl one, but in the twenty odd years i've had this, i keep thinking to myself that this knife is awesome basically any time i use it. That's why i want to recommend it. When I bought it it was quite cheap too, does not seem to be the case anymore. Is a Victorinox 5.2930.26

Hardware far outlasts software in the smartphone world, due to aggressive chronic designed obsolescence by market abusing monopolies. So I will never buy a new smartphone - don’t want to feed those scumbags. I am however willing to buy used smartphones on the 2nd-hand market if they can be liberated. Of course it’s still only marginally BifL even if you don’t have demanding needs.

Has anyone gone down this path? My temptation is to find a phone that is simultaneously supported by 2 or 3 different FOSS OS projects. So if it falls out of maintence on one platform it’s not the end. The Postmarket OS (pmOS) page has a full list and a short list. The short list apparently covers devices that are actively maintained and up to date, which are also listed here. There is also a filter tool to easily specify your criteria of what must function to obtain a custom shortlist:

https://wiki.postmarketos.org/wiki/Special:Drilldown/Devices?DeviceType=handset

Then phones on the shortlist can be cross-referenced with the LineageOS list or the Sailfish list, which seems to be exclusively Sony¹.

So many FOSS phone platforms seem to come and go I’ve not kept up on it. What others are worth considering? It looks like the Replicant device list hasn’t changed much.

(update) Graphene OS has a list of supported devices

(update 2) Calyx OS has an interesting list some of which overlaps with pmOS

So Graphene’s mission is a bit orthoganol to the mission of Postmarket OS. Perhaps it makes sense for some people to get a Graphene-compatible device then hope they can switch to pmOS when it gets dropped. But I guess that’s not much of a budget plan. Pixel 6+ are likely not going to be dirt cheap on the 2nd-hand market. Worth noting that these phones are supported by both pmOS and Calyx OS:

• Fairphone 4
• Google Pixel 3a
• SHIFT SHIFT6mq

¹ Caution about Sony: they are an ALEC member who supports hard-right politics. They were also caught using GNU software in their DRM shit which violated FOSS licensing in a component designed to oppress. Obviously buying a new Sony thing is unethical. But perhaps a 2nd-hand one is fine. It’s still dicey though because the 2nd-hand market still feeds the 1st-hand market and rewards the original consumer. Sometimes it’s clear you’re not buying from an original owner, like someone on the street with a box of 100+ phones.

(update) It would help if we could filter out all the phones with non-removable batteries. I can confirm that these have non-removeable batteries:

• BQ Aquarius X5

(I know its not really buy-it-for-life, but it's a 100% cotton, no-stretch jeans which usually last me a couple of years)

Does any one of you know how to find a pair of Levis jeans given the info on the care label? The place where i bought it has closed down, other shops around me are staffed by pupils, and their website returns nothing.

Per the label:

Made in Spain, CIF A 08298606 00501 0126 32x34 267004 0204 08159 LEVI STRAUSS EUROPE MIDDLE EAST & AFRICA 15-23 AVENUE ARNAUD FRAITEUR BRUSSELS, BELGIUM

I believe the part in bold should specify the make (501) and the specific style.

As i don't really care about the brand: Can anyone recommend a decent pair of 100% cotton, no-stretch, straight-leg (but somewhat bulky thighs) jeans which can be worn with (biker) boots?

Thanks a lot for your help!

The things with a grid of holes and a little spinning blade that removes pills from furniture and fabric. I keep buying $10 shitty Walmart ones and they die after a few months.

Any brands etc that aren’t enshittified yet?

I'm looking to purchase a bike (probably second hand) and I want to make sure that it'll be easily repairable in the future for at least standard maintenance stuff.

Thing is, I don't know anything about bikes- I've heard people say off hand that modern bikes might perform better but are less maintanable, is this a thing? What qualities/features in a bike tell me that it'll be easier to maintain in the long run?

Hey all,

So I'm in the search for good quality skate style t-shirts, preferably not black and white. In the past I was a big fun of the Animal brand but in the recent years they've turned mainstream.

Any recommendations are much appreciated!

Ive usually bought champion ($35 ususally) and theyre decent, but theres gotta be other stuff out there. Im looking at as colour right now, because i got a hoodie at a festival from them and its super nice, but theyre $50 each unless you buy in bulk

what brands are out there that wont be a scratchy mess on the inside in one year?

Does anyone know of a mouse that can be used wireless, with a replaceable battery and that can be connected to the PC via USB-C to recharge the battery? Obtainable in Europe.

The reasoning is that I do not want to get into the situation where I do not have a charged replacement battery at hand and am therefore unable to use the mouse.

Currently I am using a mouse without a replaceable battery which got so old that the battery only holds for 1-2 hours without being connected to the cable.

I know I could simply go with a wired mouse, however, I like the cleanliness of minimal cables on my desk. Thanks for suggestions.