You got me thinking more about this. What did you have in mind? Are you looking for a recommendation on something specific?
I'm not looking for specific recommendations, but rather any insight into those really great products people have. Stuff that has really been great in actual use and not just in a (worst case) paid review or (best case) unpaid "first impression" (which is when real people write reviews). Christmas is coming up and I'm already stressing about what to get my wife and extended family. There are also some big birthdays in the near future that require more than just a card...
I never have any idea of what to get anyone. I like giving people gifts that they really like, but finding *good* products is next to impossible. The same goes for myself. I'm just terrible at buying stuff. I take forever researching anything that costs more than a few bucks (to the great annoyance of my family). The more expensive, the more I want to get it right.
As an example, I've been in the market for a TV for about a year now and haven't yet pulled the trigger. And that's despite actually (finally) having decided more or less what I want to get. That "more or less" is part of the problem, obviously. Is that LG OLED going to be bright enough in our living room? Or should I go with the "safer" choice in a Samsung QLED?
I'll admit that I am extremely critical of products. It annoys me to no end when the stuff I buy has obvious design flaws. Usually, it's that too much effort was spent on *design* and not enough on making a durable product that actually works. I've never managed to find a hand mixer that I've been happy with. I've bought quite a few over the years, but they have all sucked. Too noisy, poorly weighted, not spinning fast enough, not easy enough to clean, too short a cord - there has just always been something really bad about them.
Online reviews are basically worthless in terms of evaluating the product for actual long-term use. I've had much better luck with products that friends or family have had that (by pure chance) have worked out and that I could then buy (or whatever new version of that the manufacturer decided to push instead of the original). As an example of that, we got my mom an espresso machine like 5-6 years ago and it was (and is) absolutely brilliant. Sure, it had good reviews, but so did a 100 others. Turns out it just hit all the notes. Incredibly robust, easy to clean, makes great espresso, good steam wand. I got their "deluxe" model of the same machine after reading that it was the same machine with two tiny changes that actually mattered a whole lot to me: Greater clearance for the cup(s) and a better steam wand. Been using it for 3 years now and haven't had a single problem with it. Just an absolutely brilliant (and relatively cheap) machine.
Contrast that with the old immersion blender that we had. It saw *a lot* of use and just died a couple of weeks ago. It was pretty expensive (cheaper than the espresso machine, but for what it is, it's expensive) and had some obvious design flaws, including an annoying cord design. I haven't had time to look at it, but I suspect that design flaw was actually what killed it and if it hadn't been assembled with glue, I would probably have been able to repair it. It was reasonably good looking, which matters to my wife, and it is extremely powerful, which matters to me - and it was reasonably easy to clean. Downside was that it used some rubberish crap for "better grip", which I absolutely loathe.
Anyway, the thing died and I needed to get a new one very quickly (I did say we used it a lot), so I basically had to just go out and buy one. After looking at all the models in 3 different (huge) stores, I decided on the latest version of the old model. It's exactly the same except worse, but still seemed better than the alternatives. A quick check of reviews was extremely unhelpful and pretty much every high-end model had great reviews, even though they were obviously very different when you looked at them. Anyway, the new one is harder to clean, has even more grippy rubber, slightly worse "trigger", and has removed a safety feature which, while perhaps slightly annoying in use, was actually really increased safety (immersion blenders with exposed blades are not suitable for small kids, but at least the old model required pressing in two different places to start it, kind of like what you see on some power tools).
tldr; I'd be interested in hearing about any really good product that people have had (and used) for a substantial amount of time. That kind of personal experience is just exceptionally hard to come by online.
Author