Ten Things Not To Buy In 2014

sfsuphysics said:
I'd like to find a non-luxury car that has GPS nav as "standard".
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For real.......

Just bought a 2014 Jeep Compass for the wife.
Liked the idea of a NAV system built in instead of those stupid things you stick in the window. To add that option $1800. GOOD FREEKING CHEESE!! Went with their base model CD player at no charge.
 
I have never payed extra for a credit card of any kind. Most banks want you to have one. I use my points for either cash back or gift cards. I am going to spend the money anyway, I might as well get some money back. I do not pay interest because I pay off the card every month, just like if I had bought the item with funds directly from my checking account.
 
Dr. Righteous said:
For real.......

Just bought a 2014 Jeep Compass for the wife.
Liked the idea of a NAV system built in instead of those stupid things you stick in the window. To add that option $1800. GOOD FREEKING CHEESE!! Went with their base model CD player at no charge.
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I dunno what system is in the Compass. But our 2014 Grand Cherokee has an 8.4 in screen...but nav isn't standard. However, I found out that it's just a software lock on the nav part of the system and told them I'd walk (after I had already negotiated the price before I found out that bit of news) if they didn't update the system to nav since it takes almost no effort. The sales manager grabbed me as I was walking out the door and said they'd do it. :D
 
cocheese256 said:
I have never payed extra for a credit card of any kind. Most banks want you to have one. I use my points for either cash back or gift cards. I am going to spend the money anyway, I might as well get some money back. I do not pay interest because I pay off the card every month, just like if I had bought the item with funds directly from my checking account.
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We do this with our COSTCO card. We get about $400 back every year.
 
Grahamkracka said:
I dunno what system is in the Compass. But our 2014 Grand Cherokee has an 8.4 in screen...but nav isn't standard. However, I found out that it's just a software lock on the nav part of the system and told them I'd walk (after I had already negotiated the price before I found out that bit of news) if they didn't update the system to nav since it takes almost no effort. The sales manager grabbed me as I was walking out the door and said they'd do it. :D
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Likely it has the same system optional as the Grand. We have owned Grand Cherokees before and always liked them but wanted something a bit easier on gas and easy to maneuver in the parking garages downtown. We did opt for leather seats the 4x4 on the Compass, after all it is a Jeep. :D
 
Dr. Righteous said:
WaltC said:
Overall, this was an exceedingly shallow article, I thought. She should have entitled it:

Ten things I won't be buying this year because I have no need for them


Just another example of what journalism has devolved into. Opinion writing. Not factual expositions of events, products, etc.

Mainstream journalism is nothing but leftist propaganda. Tech writers (very loosely applied) comes from this school. Why should we expect different?
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Good thing you even bothered to open the article before vomiting your political views on a forum! Had you, you would realize this wasn't a "tech writer" but one from the Spend and Save section of WSJ MoneyWatch.

Don't get me wrong... we all wanted to know your blind political views, because it is very important to this subject matter!
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haste. said:
Dr. Righteous said:
Good thing you even bothered to open the article before vomiting your political views on a forum! Had you, you would realize this wasn't a "tech writer" but one from the Spend and Save section of WSJ MoneyWatch.

Don't get me wrong... we all wanted to know your blind political views, because it is very important to this subject matter!
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Wrong buddy. I did read it and stand by what I said.
You get the same drivel from so called tech writers most places. In most cases "tech writers" at news outlets were reporting on why the sudden rise in cheese prices the week before. They are not technical people at all.
My point is we should not be surprise to find such drivel as newsworthy.
Journalist as a whole are a leftist elitist group and as such believe the masses are STUPID.
The truth is (in the tech fields) we are highly educated and skilled professionals that MAKE THE NON-ORGANIC THINGS WORK.
We eat up and believe anything they tell us?
The trend is a huge up tick in the sales of tablets; obviously everyone is throwing out their laptops and desktops and using tablets now. This is their reckoning of things because this is the extent of depth of their insight into the tech field.
Next week they are reporting on the Hottest looks for summer so stay tuned. :p
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Who even buys a car with GPS in it? :confused: I dunno about most people, but even after living someplace with a mega stupid road layout like Seattle and having to drive all over the place, I never needed a GPS to get somewhere. It's just more junk my car totally doesn't need to have in it because I can figure out where I need to go all by myself like any good CreepyAdultGoogle should.

TL;DR - GPS is for n00bz
 
Grahamkracka said:
I dunno what system is in the Compass. But our 2014 Grand Cherokee has an 8.4 in screen...but nav isn't standard. However, I found out that it's just a software lock on the nav part of the system and told them I'd walk (after I had already negotiated the price before I found out that bit of news) if they didn't update the system to nav since it takes almost no effort. The sales manager grabbed me as I was walking out the door and said they'd do it. :D
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Yikes, I wonder how strong that software lock is. I know with my Prius the actual GPS module is not in the car, the screen is there (backup camera), all the touch functionality is there, but no GPS software (or hardware) in it, although I think you can buy the GPS unit for about 1/6th of what they charge you new on it at the dealer.
 
sfsuphysics said:
Yikes, I wonder how strong that software lock is. I know with my Prius the actual GPS module is not in the car, the screen is there (backup camera), all the touch functionality is there, but no GPS software (or hardware) in it, although I think you can buy the GPS unit for about 1/6th of what they charge you new on it at the dealer.
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There are some guys I know that have gotten around it. But they encountered some warranty problems when they brought their cars in for software issues. The new Jeep's nav software was pretty buggy at first. This is the main reason I tried so hard to get it unlocked at the dealer (I knew they would cave).
 
CreepyUncleGoogle said:
Who even buys a car with GPS in it? :confused: I dunno about most people, but even after living someplace with a mega stupid road layout like Seattle and having to drive all over the place, I never needed a GPS to get somewhere. It's just more junk my car totally doesn't need to have in it because I can figure out where I need to go all by myself like any good CreepyAdultGoogle should.

TL;DR - GPS is for n00bz
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Of course you will not need gps in your home town...Lol, travel somewhere. You can enjoy the road maps and printed papers while I just ask onStar to get me from A to B
 
BroHamBone said:
Of course you will not need gps in your home town...Lol, travel somewhere. You can enjoy the road maps and printed papers while I just ask onStar to get me from A to B
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If you ever live in a major urban area, you'll rapidly figure out that going someplace you haven't been before happens pretty often. Also, I've moved lots since learning to drive and have had no problems figuring out where to go and how to get there without a GPS. It's not that I have something against the idea of owning one, but I think its too easy to get like brain-dead dependent on a navigation system and never learn how to do stuff on your own without it.
 
Grahamkracka said:
There are some guys I know that have gotten around it. But they encountered some warranty problems when they brought their cars in for software issues. The new Jeep's nav software was pretty buggy at first. This is the main reason I tried so hard to get it unlocked at the dealer (I knew they would cave).
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Man no wonder these car companies are doing so bad, they give you all the expensive hardware features in every car, and they lock it with software because if you don't unlock it the car will cost them much less money :roll:
 
BigJayDogg3 said:
Meh. I agree. The average consumer has no need for a full blown PC these days when 90% of their time is spent on the internet.
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Well if you think of it that way, even most of what we do can be done on a tablet at a lower cost. If you are not into high end games it might almost sound like a good idea...

...until you try doing anything productive, like writing a document in word, putting together a calculation in Excel, editing a picture, etc, etc. Even typing a decent length email (or forum post) can be a huge pain on a mobile device.

Tablets are great and convenient content consumption devices, but they absolutely suck at content creation. It saddens me that content consumption is all the ignorant hordes care about these days... :(

(Disclosure: I typed this on my phone, but I would have preferred to type it on my desktop!)
 
The reason people aren't buying PC's is because there's no reason to update what they already have. Intel hasn't produced anything significantly faster than my overclocked I7-2600K and that was introduced Q4/2010. To make matters worse, desktop PC's are coming with Windows 8 which is a turnoff to most of those who are used to Windows 7.

PC's used to get faster and cheaper each year so there were legitimate reasons to upgrade. What's the reason to now? I'm not buying the argument that tablets are replacing the PC but tablets are still getting better each year so there's a reason to buy new ones. Give PC users a processor that's double the speed of the current generation processors (not just more cores) and you'll see the PC market explode again.

Steve said:
I was totally going along with this list of ten things not to buy in 2014 until I got to number seven. :(
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Concerning #7, I know a lady who doesn't use her computer anymore but an iPad instead. I can totally see her not buying another PC if it goes kaput. I don't even like laptops. There's no way in hell I'm going to get rid of using desktops ever. Productivity reigns king there. I think people just want something small/portable that does everything albeit really shitty aka overpriced garbage phones. I barely use my phone, and I have zero interest in iOS and Android and their creepy intentions.
Seventyfive said:
I stopped at #1. I am boycotting the stupid slideshow "top ten" "worst ten" or any fucking website at all that uses the slide show presentation. How fucking hard is it to just put your shit in one list and let me scroll down?
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I agree slide shows are stupid, but it's not hard to bypass: http://www.marketwatch.com/story/10...int?guid=24B6D2AC-69CA-11E3-9369-00212803FAD6
 
SPARTAN VI said:
The article said nearly 50% of 2013 model year cars have it standard. I'll just leave this here... http://lmgtfy.com/?q=Navigation+standard
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That is too bad. I have yet to experience a integrated GPS nav in a car that didn't suck (aftermarket head units excluded)

For whatever reason all the factory solutions are just TERRIBLE.

I'd choose Waze on my tablet over the lot of them. I just wish I could get waze in an integrated touch screen in a car. THAT would be worth it...
 
Dr. Righteous said:
Mainstream journalism is nothing but leftist propaganda. Tech writers (very loosely applied) comes from this school. Why should we expect different?
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Reminds me of an old saying...


When everyone around you seems crazy, take a look at yourself.

If the mainstream seems out there and leftist, it probably says more about you thwan that "mainstream media"...
 
SPARTAN VI said:
The article said nearly 50% of 2013 model year cars have it standard. I'll just leave this here... http://lmgtfy.com/?q=Navigation+standard
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Well I appreciate the help, however looking at the top list I see many of those cars are $60K which I'd hardly classify as "non-luxury" and many are the same car just slightly different models, and those where something does come as "standard" it's not really a "standard" as it is a renamed version of an existing car. i.e. putting the "touring edition" after a car does not mean that it is a unique car, it's a single model of a car that has extras thrown in and declares them as "standard"
 
I need more than 16gb and whatever else a cheap tablet provides.

It won't cut it for porn.
 
Steve said:
I was totally going along with this list of ten things not to buy in 2014 until I got to number seven. :(
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yeeeesssss.....

Because a 7" screen can *TOTALLY* compare with a 21" one... :rolleyes: (I say this as an iPad owner!)

There are many people for whom an iPad could serve as their sole computing device (my wife's aunt does that,) but for the vast majority of people, screen size alone prevents tablets' use as a primary computing device.
 
They have some weird facts in that article ... economy upgrades @ $180, yes definitely that makes absolutely no sense ... but I get the economy upgrades for about 25% of the incremental first class upgrade cost so in that case they do make sense (to me) since I travel A LOT

as to the miles credit card, the fees are high for the card but there are so many add on perks now that it offsets many of them (priority boarding, lounge access, mile redemption refunds and discounts, etc) ... in addition to the fact that it adds about 25,000 miles to my account every year

There is definitely no one size fits all approach to some of those items on their list
 
Funny I bought my Dad a Blueray player so that he CAN stream netflix and amazon prime lol. This article is ridiculous.
 
BigJayDogg3 said:
Have it standard *at some level*. Meaning you're buying an extra $1500 option package in order to get navigation. Example: Honda Accord/Civic. You can buy a base Accord without navigation. That's not "standard" in my book. That's an option.
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I misquoted the article.

49% of 2013 model-year vehicles have a standard navigation system (in at least one of their styles)
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Emphasis mine.

Either way, my point remains the same. If I have to upgrade to a higher trim level to get a feature, that feature isn't "standard".
 
The Apple hate is strong in this thread. Come to think of it, it is strong on [H]ard|Forum in general...

The wonderful thing about Apple products is that no one is forcing you to buy them (and yet they still sell millions upon millions). If it is not your cup of tea, move along, but don't piss in our tea on your way through. Some of us like our Apple products and some of us even prefer them over Windows PCs and Android tablets/smartphones.

With respect to the article, I am liking the fact that it was published because it will result in decreased demand for more traditional desktops and/or laptops, which will bring the prices down through the magic of supply and demand in what remains one of the most free aspects of our market economy. Keep telling people that the PC is dying - I want to build my next one for less :D
 
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