Underrated budget options (2026 edition) [v1]

Maybe an unpopular opinion but here we go. There is a lot of conflicting advice online and most of it is from 2019.

There is a lot of conflicting advice online and most of it is from 2019. I want to write something more comprehensive about this later but starting with a quick post to gather thoughts. Been thinking about this for a while and curious what the community thinks.

For context, I am working with a pretty modest budget so high-end suggestions probably will not land.