Impulse Buys

Worst impulse buy ever? I bought a $25 CD player from Best Buy once (this was back in 2001, when that was cheap!), without the slightest knowledge of the brand or the player itself. The paint started chipping off almost immediately, the screen quit working after about a month, and the whole unit died not long after. I learned my lesson, and wound up replacing it with a little Panasonic one that only cost a few bucks more than the little generic thing. That lasted for at least three years before I replaced it with a Sony CD/MP3 Walkman and eventually an iPod nano.

the nano itself was a bit of an impulse buy...I bought it on launch day before any reviews were avaliable. I can't say I regret it at all, though! ^^

My best impulse grab was a used stereo system from the early 1980's. I wound up getting a $25 Technics SA-626 receiver and a pair of old Acoustic Research AR-93 speakers for $36, pretty much unheard and without any real knowledge of the particular models or brands. The speakers needed another $30 worth of repair to work well, but the end result is amazing. The receiver can put out 60 watts per channel for hours (I've never clipped it, and that's using pretty inefficient speakers) with no distortion or noise, and the speakers can go very low and have good balance and sound quality. <3

Jam it back in, in the dark.