I have everything on a upgrade list depending on how much we use it and how fast the technology is changing.
Phones: 3 years. Thinking of moving this to 4 or 5 years with the industry’s stagnation. Starting to see some companies offering updates for longer times.
Why 5-6 years, that’s about when I start seeing the cascade of little things. Weird transitory bugs when rebooting. Speed issues and compatibility issues with bloated new software etc. After that amount of time, I start to spend way too much time maintaining them.
I could tinker with them and keep them going. Its what I used to do when my kids were small. Install a Linux distro on an old computer, load a bunch of educational games and set the browser homepage to PBSkids.
However I have 5 computers to maintain now and my teenagers need compatible fast systems for college and school. My wife works from home at times and needs something that reliably works.
The only time I replace electronics anymore is when something breaks or when I’m gifted someone else’s hand-me-downs
I have everything on a upgrade list depending on how much we use it and how fast the technology is changing.
Phones: 3 years. Thinking of moving this to 4 or 5 years with the industry’s stagnation. Starting to see some companies offering updates for longer times.
Laptops/desktops: 5-6 years.
Wifi/modem/router: 10 years.
My notebook is 9 years old. My desktop is 6 years old. I haven’t found a reasonable argument to replace them until they stop working. Why 5-6 years?
Why 5-6 years, that’s about when I start seeing the cascade of little things. Weird transitory bugs when rebooting. Speed issues and compatibility issues with bloated new software etc. After that amount of time, I start to spend way too much time maintaining them.
I could tinker with them and keep them going. Its what I used to do when my kids were small. Install a Linux distro on an old computer, load a bunch of educational games and set the browser homepage to PBSkids.
However I have 5 computers to maintain now and my teenagers need compatible fast systems for college and school. My wife works from home at times and needs something that reliably works.