Has anyone tried budget options [v5]

Been thinking about this for a while and curious what the community thinks. This came up at a meetup recently and the room was split, so curious what the broader community thinks.

For context, I am working with a pretty modest budget so high-end suggestions probably will not land. Quick context: I am relatively new to this and trying to find my footing.

There is a lot of conflicting advice online and most of it is from 2019.