Bought a cheap cable toner from a flea market and it cost me a full day's pay

Found a 'like new' toner for 30 bucks at a swap meet, figured I'd save some cash. It gave me a false reading on a buried line in a new build, so I cut into the wrong spot and had to re-run 50 feet of coax. What's the cheapest tool you've bought that ended up being a huge waste of time?

4 comments

4 Comments

shane_scott1mo ago

Remember, you paid for a day's work fixing its mistake.

henryt181mo ago

Sounds about right for the modern cost of doing business. You basically need to budget for a human cleanup crew after the AI finishes. At least the mistake was fixable, I guess.

grant.olivia1mo ago

Honestly what gets me is how they never factor in the time lost. Like yeah you fixed the AI's error, but now you're a day behind on the actual project. That domino effect is the real cost.

richard_young809d ago

Exactly this. Had a situation just last week where an AI tool spit out a data report with a bunch of messed-up totals. Took me a full afternoon to trace the errors and redo the calculations. By the time I was done, I was late on my actual analysis deadline and had to rush it, which felt crappy. The worst part is nobody sees that hidden time cost. They just see the report got done eventually.