Upgrading whatever just because...poll

[WhoX]

Over the years I have become more practical when purchasing tech. A decade ago I would have grabbed the newest computer gadgets just because. Now, the newest whatever device needs to climb over a firewall to woo the impulse buyer in me. Lately I resisted tossing my beloved Galaxy Tab S LTE for a Surface Pro 3, which has caused some twitching nerves in my fingers to question my sanity.


So I'd like to know, why do you upgrade?

 

[ian]

I just changed the poll to a single choice poll.
I sometimes buy on impulse, but lately a lot of the time it is out of necessity. I have had my laptop for 4 and a half years.
I keep my phones for 2+ years
The computer I am using now is 3 years old, but I am still using a second one which is maybe 5 years old.
Cars, I will use them until they are written off or break and cant be repaired.
I would rather have some savings for a rainy day rather than constantly upgrading.

 

[beers]

I just changed the poll to a single choice poll

Dang, I had multiple reasons

 

[ian]

Dang, I had multiple reasons

For some reason it was giving me an error message and was not letting me vote, so I changed it.

 

[strollin]

I just upgrade when ever I get the urge so I guess that's "impulse". However, I have become less impulsive as I get older, especially with big ticket items. If something is less than $100 I am far more apt to buy it on impulse.

My current desktop is around 3 1/2 years old and I have no plans in the immediate future to upgrade it. I have a laptop and a tablet that are both less than 3 years old so won't be upgrading them soon either.

We are in the process of winding down to prepare for retirement, will be putting our house up for sale soon in order to downsize to a smaller house, just got rid of lots and lots of "stuff" and don't really want to accumulate more.

 

[porterjw]

I typically go for previous models rather than the newest (and most expensive) current stuff. Or, if I do buy current stuff (when I built my current Desktop, for example), I'll go mid-range as far as CPU/GPU.

Phones I always stay a generation behind solely because what I do for work skews the odds of damaging a phone away from my favor, and if (when) I have to pick one up off of ebay, they're cheaper. Plus, the extreme discount at time of contract renewal. When it comes time for my next phone in February, it will be a Galaxy S5.

Tablets I'm still too new to figure out, though I bought a Tab3 last April and a Tab4 this January, so I think that trend is heading towards 'latest and greatest / newest model'.

Laptops are the opposite end of the spectrum for me. Had a circa-2003ish Dell I bought for about $80 on ebay. Tossed in a new HDD and ran stripped down XP on it and it flew. Current one is a 2010-ish $160 HP ebay purchase with a $60 SSD running 7.

 

[voyagerfan99]

I just recently upgraded my mobo+CPU+RAM out of necessity. I was running Socket AM3 and while it ran everything file with my GTX 670, it was bottlenecking the card a little, and I knew I'd want to upgrade my card in the near future to a GTX 970 or 980. Watch Dogs would lag while I was driving a vehicle and it also uses a lot of RAM. After upgrading to 16GB and an i7 I don't have lag issues in-game anymore.

 

[spirit]

I very rarely upgrade for the sake of it because I don't have the money to throw at stuff just for 'sake of it'. That's why I've still got a Sandy Bridge system - still works great some 3-4 years on and I don't really see the newer platforms offering a performance gain that is really worth the money. When it comes to things like phones I barely spend any money on them and for my fairly basic uses they usually last well over a year. At some point I'd like a higher-end Windows Phone with a nicer camera but it's not essential at the moment so it can wait.

I only upgrade when there's a reason for it. My latest upgrade was upgrading the RAM in my laptop from 8GB to 16GB, I did that because I was hitting 6-7GB RAM usage a lot. Before that I upgraded from a 128GB SSD to a 250GB in my desktop because I was running out of room and I could donate my 128GB SSD to another build. The next hardware purchase for me will probably be a large NAS because I am running out of disk space, especially having lost 5TB and a whole NAS in the course of a few weeks. I look at what's practical to buy too. I was thinking about buying a nice new camera body but then I realised what's the point of that when I can't store the files or carry the camera? So a bigger camera bag and more storage space is probably what I'll buy before that new camera. Further down the line I am also thinking about putting my system in a nicer case and a modular PSU - potentially a white NZXT H440 or a Fractal Define R5 and a Corsair RM650 PSU.

 

[Geoff]

I don't need to upgrade in the sense that I can't do what I want, but after a couple years I get tired of not being able to max out games or my photo/video workflow takes too long for the processing, so I decide to upgrade.