I know so many people who get frustrated with hobby tools and then quit the hobby, when if they would've bought something decent to start off with, might've kep

I know so many people who get frustrated with hobby tools and then quit the hobby, when if they would've bought something decent to start off with, might've kept interest. The price differential is a lot less if you buy used, but quality tooling. This tooling is fully depreciated, and you can turn around and sell it for what you paid for it as long as it's still in working order. To bring it around to programming, imagine trying to debug code in GEdit+Terminal vs having the latest and greatest Jetbrains IDE to help out (ignoring the fact that the community editions are actually pretty functional - let's time travel back 20 years when you had to pay for VS or Borland). One is way more frustrating than the other; one is way more likely to lose motivation. Or soldering - avoid the cheapest harbor freight iron, and EBay a used Weller for $50+shipping. If you never solder again pass it on and you're out the shipping costs. Weller irons have been and always will be around $50~$60 used.