(Though it's really best to stick to technical, or at least nonpolitical, stuff.)
Chipsets – I don't have a preference for a particular brand, but I'm not touching VIA again.
HDDs (when buying new, a 5-year warranty is mandatory for me)
Likes: WD Caviar Black and late 2004~2006 Caviars, Raptor 2nd/3rd gen; Quantum Fireball EL/EX/CR/CX; Seagate Barracuda ATA III/IV/V & 7200.7/8
Seagate Constellation (2.5″ nearline, super cute); revised Nighthawks (#RW/#RX with top damper) and Superhawk (even if not as bulletproof as the 7200.7)
Fujitsu's MEA3320BT (though you'd have to import from Japan) is also nice – 320GB 3600rpm with +5V motors, and built to last (unlike modern 5400s).
Earlier 7200rpm Maxtors (before the DiamondCrash Minus 9; see below), like the widely‑acclaimed 2000‑model DiamondMax Plus 40, were good too.
OK with: Other Barracuda 7200.9/10 models, current high-end Seagates (including the FireCuda, and ST10000VE001 now in my main PC)
Maxtor's DiamondMax 16 was (unlike its 7200rpm counterparts) surprisingly decent (at least the FDB models), no wonder but a competent U6 successor.
Dislikes: WD Protégé, the latter ball-bearing Caviars (2002~early 2004) and Raptor 1st gen (WD360GD-00FNA0); Seagate U Series, Cheetah 10K.6 (which was effectively a consumer-grade SCSI series) and Cheetah NS; Maxtors of 1994~1998 (so cheap and nasty); Caviar Green and newer Blues
Can't stand: Modern low-end Seagates (particularly Garbo, Brinks, Pharaoh, Hepburn and Grenada – their codenames are morbid too
)Burn them in fire: Maxtor DiamondMax Plus 9, 10 and 11/MaXLine Plus II, III and Pro (Maxtor deliberately scammed people by falsifying the start/stop rating so their drives could survive 24×7, but crashed VIOLENTLY after maybe 1000 cycles; eventually the furious OEMs forced Maxtor to fix the rating, but with exabytes of data already gone beyond all recovery – and RAID of no help against that systematic sabotage – Maxtor shall never be forgiven
)SSDs
Likes: Enterprise grade (I've chosen a 240GB Exascend SE3 for my main PC) – if you value speed and reliability, they're worth every dollar
OK with: Older Samsung PRO models (pre-980)
Dislikes: Any recent consumer models; notably Samsung 840 EVO (not so good) and 870 EVO and 980/990 PRO (very bad), plus anything with YMTC flash
Dreads: Kingston SSDNow V+200 series
(I'd seriously sooner use even a Hungarian-made Deathstar 75GXP/40GV/60GXP or a Grenada, than these monsters.)
I previously had a (non-SandFarce) Kingston A400 in my current system (an unused spare brought home from Mum's office, not one I chose myself), but it too developed severe slowdown (<30MB/s
– the Barracuda 7200.7 manages that even on its innermost zone!) after not-quite 3 years of use.Which leads me to the conclusion that neither the naysayers (like PCBONEZ) nor those predicting lifespans of “decades” (like mariushm) were right about SSDs; I've since concluded that they'll settle on a similar lifespan to that for HDDs, and this seems to be proving not too far from the truth.
Web browsers
Likes: Pale Moon (to a degree)
Dislikes: All the other “modern” ones, Internet Explorer/Exploder
Text encoding
Good: UTF-8
OK: Plain ASCII (where special characters aren't required)
Bad: UTF-16 and others
Semiconductors
Likes: No particular preference, but these all seem fine: Agere, Analog Devices, Atmel, Diodes Incorporated, Fairchild, Linfinity, LSI Logic, Motorola, MSC, ON Semiconductor, Renesas (formerly NEC), Texas Instruments
Dislikes: Infineon, Philips (did the European semiconductor companies just rest on their quality laurels from the '60s or '70s?
)Hates: STMicroelectronics (I'll never forgive them for their substandard chips bringing down millions of mechanically-healthy Barracuda ATA Vs and 7200.7s
)Electrical accessories (Australia)
Likes: Hager (their WBP4S is the only truly good retrofit quad-outlet, and yes its switches are double-pole even though the catalog and model number don't say), Clipsal 2000 Series; Clipsal's niche (or superseded, e.g. much of the Standard series) items can be crazy-overpriced though.
If you want the best switch action in Clipsal plates, then choose the 30USM over plain 30M (note that the '1' and '2' terminals swap places between the two).
I'll also keep using old Ring-Grip items where they still work (Ring-Grip's switches had a nice crisp action).
Meh: Clipsal Classic (they look good when new, but like HPM Excel many use ABS covers which yellow much sooner than the polycarbonate 2000 surrounds)
Ambivalent: Clipsal/PDL Iconic (the user-swappable rockers are clever but internal construction less-satisfying, especially that plastic-flex shutter closing arrangement), Connected Switchgear (they're better than most other small makes, even somewhat decent; but not all their products are yet good)
Dislikes: HPM, especially since the late 1990s (the only HPM product I still buy occasionally is their 5M cord-line switch)
To be fair, the newer Excel Life range does look better than their previous models.
Power‑boards (Australia/New Zealand)
Likes: Ningbo Kaifeng Electric (their native models are best, but the Arlec PB12PP and Crest PW4PBS10 are OK too); Kambrook 'Awesome Foursome' (Kambrook's 1980s/early 1990s model which was basically a quad Clipsal power‑point modified just as far as necessary to qualify as a power‑board – since Kambrook indeed also sold a power-point version before Clipsal went alone the C2015D4 – and is built accordingly).
OK with (in a pinch): Crest, Jackson models without surge suppression (since Jackson uses an MOV with no failsafe)
(Individually-switched Crest models appear to use full wiper contacts, although this doesn't apply to their unswitched or master-switched counterparts.)
Dislikes: Most other modern manufacturers (regardless of retail branding), with United Cable probably lowest among the approved makes
Current HPM power-boards earn a particularly dishonorable mention, for stooping to the USAmericans' level by saying they're “for residential use only” (even their overpriced “heavy duty” models, which of course contain the same flimsy socket contacts as the basic type
)Household fans
Likes: Vornado (although I don't really trust their heaters, observing that those have quite a few recalls)
Dislikes: Ordinary fans (mostly designed as cheaply as possible for their diameter, while still working just well enough to satisfy the average buyer) and especially Dyson's Air “Multiplier” (more like the Air Divider given how poor its laminar flow is at actually promoting heat exchange)
Other small appliances
Likes – heaters: DēLonghi (although the DL2401TF and now-discontinued HS25F are low points), Kambrook tumble‑proof radiators
Likes – rice cooker: Kambrook KRC300 (the smallest of their range, but also easily the best-built of all I've seen on the modern market)
Likes – toaster: Russell Hobbs RHT12 (with solid construction, 1670W into 2 slices, and stuck-lever protection for AU$60)
(Granted the old Sunbeam Radiant Control toasters were on their own level of ingenuity, but the RHT12 is probably the best affordable modern toaster.)
Generally OK: Breville, DēLonghi kitchen appliances, Kambrook, other Russell Hobbs models, Trent & Steele, Sunbeam (if nothing else is available)
Dislikes: Most store-brands, zombie-brands and other rebranded generic junk (e.g. the aptly-named Heller); Dimplex (which lately are more like Dumbplex); also those overpriced, pretentious makes (like French Noirot heaters). IXL heaters are/were serviceable but less-impressive than they look.
Various
Likes: Ad blocking, light dimming (if done properly)
Dislikes: Car culture, cursive writing, forced background music, jewellery (unless you make something genuinely clever without wasting precious metals or gems), group meetings
, nonfree standards, overproduced movies, carelessly mixed-and-matched colour temperatures in lighting, along with mindless imitation of the color temperature of old incandescent bulbs (I don't really want this “pleasing yellow tone” or whatever they call it, I want light that actually looks white). I guess that last one is analogous to cursive, in that it's the “old‑fashioned” way, people “like” it, but it isn't actually great.
Gigabyte, MSI
ASUS, ECS
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