Don’t Buy These Tech Products on Impulse, Even on Amazon Prime Day

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The best customer is the smart customer. While many of you will approach events like Prime Day, Black Friday or Amazon Cyber ​​Monday with a game plan, many more people see the deal and let the thrill take over. They might be confronted with an HDTV under $ 300 and pull the trigger because they want to upgrade, not realizing that with a little research, they could find something even better for the same price.

To help you navigate the next one and a half day Amazon trades, here are some of the top tech products that I recommend you don’t buy on impulse. This does not mean that you need to research an entire product category before making a purchase. This also means that you shouldn’t buy one of them simply because they are for sale. Selling can be a good deal, but it doesn’t mean much if the device doesn’t best suit your needs.

Do not buy speakers or headphones without examining them

There are a ton of speaker and headphone manufacturers out there. If you have a brand that you love and absolutely want to stick with it, this is one thing. If you’re just looking for a new pair of cans, or looking to install an acoustic lift in your living room, don’t waste your money on the first big sale you find on Amazon.

I have nothing against Amazon reviewers, but analyzing sound quality is difficult even when you are comparing multiple products face-to-face. This is what you really need to develop your ear for, with the exception of more obvious statements like, “These $ 300 headphones from a well-known brand really sound better than these $ 15 headphones I bought at the kiosk.”

I am not saying that you have to become an audiophile before buying something that makes sound. If this is your passion, go for it; I bet most people would just be happy to save up on a new pair of speakers or headphones that are better than they are. And therein lies the problem: they have no idea which is better because they haven’t even listened to what they want to buy. Even if they did, they would have nothing to compare with other than their older gear.

My advice? Do a little research and see what some of the many, many sound experts like. Make a wish list for some of the recommended headphones or speakers and wait for them to go on sale. Unless you’re really stranded, don’t buy the worst-sounding hardware just because it’s available. It is pointless.

Don’t buy anything made by Apple

Apple gear rarely goes on sale on Prime Day. But in case you find a deal – like the $ 50 off AirPods Pro – do n’t fall for that urge. Apple is literally announcing brand new products today. Give it a little time and you’ll probably find older iPhones, AirPods, HomePods or who knows what at even greater discounts as soon as the new hardware drops (whenever it does). Buying something “hot” on Apple’s announcement day – or any other time around it – seems like a dumb idea, unless you see confirmed (and significant) price drops.

Plus, we’re so close to Black Friday that you can probably hold out and risk finding a specific deal for the device you really want – Apple or otherwise – if you don’t find this amazing deal today . This is even more true if you buy smartphones, and double if you are ready to upgrade to a competing platform (Android). Hold on to the device you want; do not spend money on something just because it is on sale today. And don’t be the dummy buying an Apple product (or several) on the day of a major announcement .

Do not buy a game console if …

The second verse is the same as the first. We’re on the cusp of releasing brand new consoles from Microsoft and Sony. If you’re buying something right now, it’s because you’re probably annoyed that you weren’t able to pre-order on either the Xbox Series X or PlayStation 5. But that doesn’t make sense. Why buy the latest generation console when you’re only waiting a few short months to get something much faster, more powerful, and more modern?

Please note, I’m only talking about the offerings of Microsoft and Sony right now. If you can get a deal with the new Nintendo Switch, go for it. Nintendo is obviously working on a new version of the Switch, but we’re still too far from having any specific details on this. Patience will not reward you here; Get Switch, get Animal Crossing, and pay off your virtual mortgage.

Don’t buy brands you don’t know (or can’t Google)

During prime day, Amazon sells a lot of junk . It might sound harsh, but this is how I categorize all fakes that seem a little suspicious and inexpensive enough to raise a couple of flags. Look at you USB-to cable manufacturers [whatever]. Or you seemingly random fitness / sleep tracking companies. Or you, a random company that is doing a project in which the image of my laptop will fly off the wall.

Don’t buy an accidental fake from companies you’ve never heard of. At least give them a quick google to see if anyone legit has heard of them, viewed them, or had any experience with them. Don’t trust Amazon’s 120 random reviews of a game controller battery, USB Wi-Fi dongle, or anything else.

What may seem like a bargain may actually turn out to be a not-so-so product when you receive it. Worse, you could pay the same (or similar) amount, which works much, much better. Do a little research before pulling the trigger at an unknown company, especially if their Amazon product description seems rude, their reviews sound unclear, or the deal seems too good to be true.

This does not mean that there are no gems there! I recently bought a car rearview camera from some random company that looked like one of those stamping their brand on the same conventional devices other companies sell. And yet, the reviews all seemed legitimate, and there were loads of videos on YouTube of other car enthusiasts installing and using the camera. Understand, it worked perfectly for me.

Don’t buy a damn TV (or computer monitor)

If there is a place where doing a little research pays off, it is when you are considering buying something with a large screen, be it a TV, regular monitor, gaming monitor, UltraWide monitor, etc. For me it all comes down to image quality. Without reading the reviews – whether it’s the particular brand and model you’re looking at, a different screen size in the same family, or even previous generation products – you have absolutely no way of independently assessing the quality of what you’re about to buy.

If you end up ignoring me and pulling the trigger, you might not even realize that the picture on your monitor or TV is crap because you have nothing to compare to. Everything looks good in a vacuum, right? (Or at least what I tell myself all the time when I see people using one of the wacky preset modes on their TV, like Vivid or Sports.)

Time and again, I see people buying monitors or TVs because a small handful of specs sound like they should correlate with image quality: resolution, HDR support, high refresh rates, gigantic size.

Here’s the truth: a display may have the best performance in the world but still have problems accurately displaying grayscale and color. You might even be fooled by a display that looks incredibly bright, but just because an image is too saturated with colors doesn’t mean it looks right. You might prefer the flamboyant look, but you’ll be watching tons of movies, sporting events, and TV shows in ways that their creators never intended. You will rob yourself of the perfect experience because you don’t know any better.

There will be a lot of TVs and monitors on Amazon Prime Day as they will be on Black Friday and Cyber ​​Monday. Most of them are trash. Sure, the specs will suit your needs, but the raw image quality just won’t be very good. Or worse, you buy something that looks pretty good, only to find that it is missing key components: an adequate supply of HDMI ports (including ports that support the latest and greatest HDMI specifications); adjustable stand; USB; high-quality IPS panel (for monitors); HDR (especially with support for all formats needed for the content you usually watch); VESA mount.

Is the image quality everything? Of course not. If you’re a gamer looking for high frame rates, tear-free and high refresh rates, you might not care if your reds, greens, and blues look a little different. But why not try it all?

There are such huge differences in picture quality that I wouldn’t buy a monitor or TV that didn’t pass the test. This means that I may be missing a lot of products on sale and I just agree with that. Unless I find reviews that talk about the image quality of the monitor – ideally measured – I’m not going to risk buying anything worse to save a hundred or two dollars. A monitor or TV is an infrequent update, so why not wait until you get the very best display possible?

Don’t buy a wireless router invisible

I initiated the testing process for Wirecutter wireless routers and have spent years in a rhythm – probably irradiating myself in the Hulk style. Here’s what I learned: There is nothing but tests and tests that can give you an idea of ​​the real capabilities of the router. Full stop.

You can buy an expensive router. You can buy the one that has the highest “AC rating” printed on the box. You can buy a router that supports the latest and fastest Wi-Fi standards, supports multi-band wireless networks, and looks like the reaper from Mass Effect . And that might be fine for your home, but it might also not give you the best performance where you need it: as far away from the router as possible.

The only way to verify this is through testing. Often this testing will be done by you unceremoniously. You walk into the bathroom, work room, or back bedroom and wonder why you are having a hard time streaming YouTube videos. Surprise! The $ 400 router you purchased is not as powerful as you thought – perhaps not even as powerful as the $ 100 router or $ 200 mesh that can saturate the nooks and crannies of your Wi-Fi home.

The most reliable way to find out the actual capabilities of a router in a real environment is to find out how well it performs in other people’s tests. Ideally, this is the person who tested the router. Feedback from previous buyers may be of last resort value, but they fail to provide critical context for how the router you are considering differs from other routers (especially cheaper routers).

As with monitors, this means that many of the wireless routers you are considering may not get a lot of feedback – if any. And that’s okay. There are many excellent routers out there that have been tested by many experts, each of which tend to stick to their own test setups to evaluate competing devices. Read their work, and you will understand what is really great and what is just expensive and beautiful. Don’t buy a router because it’s for sale; buy because it’s great.

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