What does 1000€ buy you in your favourite hobby?

My two main hobbies are amassing wealth and being bad at finance so it probably gets me about 500€.

Two and a half hard drives.

I get 1 nice drone or 2 small ones.

Lost a 500€ infrared drone 2 days ago in a sugar beet field because "I don’t need the GPS when flying near the street" and then I was too high to make out if it was a deer or a rabbit and the powerline in between disrupted the radio signal, so the drone went into failsave and stopped all movement, getting carried by the wind into the field and it fell in a way that the battery disconnected… thank you for reading.. I’m sad now…

Two chicks at the same time.

3 cheap synths but only half a more expensive one.

Reasonable amount of average magic cards or just a few good ones.

Half a graphics card.

Some nice wood for woodworking, but not that much if decent quality.

A flight ticket.

3 festival tickets.

0.5kg of ketamine.

A lot of 3D printing filament.

2 Warhammer figures.

3 years of swimming pool subscription.

A mid range set of motorbike gear (dirt or road) or a very cheap registrable motorbike.

Alternatively a number of interesting secondhand cameras/lenses, the number ranging from one to many depending on what exactly. I'll admit I have actually spent near that much on two backs for my 1960s era Hasselblad so you don't even necessarily get a whole camera...

You guys have stable hobbies..?
If you count "starting new hobbies" as a hobby, then I could get like 4-5 hobbies out of it, around 200-250$ is a reasonable buy-in for a new one.

Either a whole load of books, fiction, tabletop RPG sci-fi. I would also need to buy more bookshelves to put these on.

A decent upgrade to my computer, maybe a new graphics card.

A sword or two, some better protective kit for sparring.

Not much. My main interest is digital privacy. Perhaps 10 years of service with Proton.

Homebrewing. Either everything you need to get started and going for like €100. Spend the rest on tools and equipment and ingredients as you go and learn what you need and why you need it.

Or, as it seems to me is the middle aged man thing to do¹, buy everything for a complete microbrewery and insist it is absolutely necessary with the best of laboratory grade equipment for your first batch of IPA that will taste like anybody else's first batch of IPA and the only solution is to keep spending another €1000 when you got it on better equipment and gadgets and dodads and quirkmaflixers in magical materials and still nobody will be impressed but that's just because you didn't have the correct temperature to the third decimal and dear we absolutely need to take a small loan on the house no listen this is an investment when I get this going hey baby wait listen...

¹ I'm a middle aged man so I'm allowed to use these words.

I could get a copy of the original "White Box" Dungeons & Dragons set, although not an actual first print run copy, because those go for $20k. But I'd probably buy the last few Planescape products I'm missing, which are also unreasonably expensive for rpg books but not in the same league as the original dnd sets, and much more enjoyable to read.

A few large sets, amounting around 12000 bricks, or a random assortment of up to 20000 bricks if acquired in bulk ( or like a bathtub of bricks if acquired second-hand )

A low-mid range PC. Maybe? Prices for components are fucking wack and I'm broke anyway, so I am not sure how far 1000 dollars would go rn.

A lot of yarn. A few motorcycle jackets and pants. ALL of the video games. A lot of yoga accessories that I've ogled but never bought.

I don't think I need to spend that much money on my current hobbies. But I obviously could

• A real lot of pencils, a lot of Bic and a lot of paper to write with (and to make paper planes, too). Like a good chunk of a lifetime worth of supply :p
• A lot (but already a little less) of top quality watercolor paint (that I don't need to enjoy my hobby watercoloring), too many top of the line watercolor brushes (that I don't need for my hobby either) and a lot of excellent watercolor paper (that I may enjoy using but still don't really need for my hobby ;)
• The entire line of Caran d'Ache 'Luminance' colored pencils and the entire line of Faber Castell 'Polychromos' colored pencils, in multiple examples. But why would I need that many colors when I use maybe 10 or 12 regularly?
• I do a lot of scratch building also using... cardboard. SO, a 1000€ would buy a few decades, centuries?, worth of cardboard and fresh hobby blades too. But since I mostly used recycled cardboard from old packages and parcels... I won't need to buy those.

Back when I was making scale models (plastic planes and tanks) I could have easily spend that In a couple hour in any hobby shop worth shopping at, buying a few fancy model kits, too much paint and some of the fancier tools, plus reference books. Or on a single camera lens, but that is another hobby I quit practicing. Or on some rare books... which I also quit collecting. It looks like I won't be able to spend much money :p

Infinite library cards!

A decent road bike. Not top specced, and with none of the additional gear you'll probably want, but you can definitely get started with €1k. I bought my current bike for approximately €700 and have upgraded + bought additional gear for probably a bit over €1k, but that has gotten me some really great stuff and I basically want for nothing in the sport.

With tabletop role-playing games (I don't play D&D), a thousand bucks and you're pretty much set up for life. You can get a huge range of beautiful dice in all sizes, a nice deck of cards, a variety of tokens and you can skip miniatures to invest in bits that are more flexible. Speaking of flexibility, a big ebook reader allows you to enjoy tons of published games and only get physical box sets or books if you really desire them as artifacts. Another big advantage is that you can spend your money slowly and just enjoy what you have first.

A nice OLED TV. I love watching movies.

Edit: Holy cow OLED is still very expensive. I've changed my mind: projector.

A holiday

Depends on the hobby because I have too many...

Photography - not much unless I buy used, which is what I usually do. So some funky old lenses and adapters to get on the body, which usually nets some fun results.

Data hoarding - a couple of hard drives. Which I should really do, I'm coming close to 5% free (which sounds like less than it is when you've got about 115tb, which is why I'm not rushing out).

Computer Vision / AI - more processing power! But I make work buy me that stuff so its fine.

General compute - about 5 more tiny/mini/micros at the usual price (plus the usual upgrades) to either ads to the cluster or make a new one! Or one or two of the newer little beasts that I will probably be waiting another year or two to pick up.

Bicycling - a good bike for getting around! My bike is about 15 years old now, it was new old stock because no one liked the color apparently - which made it about 1/2 the price of what it should have been. I've been replacing gear on it over the years, but I'm tempted to buy something new, honestly less for going fast and maybe more upright, like a hybrid. Which I can get an OK model at that price.

2 years of yoga classes.

Or

All of the garden beds, fencing, and good soil I got for the garden.

Composer here, I could grab quite a lot! There are multiple shops in a 2.5 hour drive-radius from me that sell used instruments and audio equipment for dirt cheap. I bagged a $700 audio interface for $100 - just a single hunge! I could probably start an Elephant 6-grade recording setup with a thousand.

… my favorite hobby “this week”

A basic road bike I guess? 😅

either 100 IEM or headphones, 1 home and portable setup or 1 thing in audiophile hobby. same with collecting pocket knives. not applicable with leather/Goodyear welt boots. probably starts at 5 pair of boots at the low budget end.

similar with coffee. it could just get you an espresso machine, or he'll just even a metal tamp. fucking crazy people those espresso drinking heathens. sips expensive bean juice

The hobbies are photography and videography, and it depends a bit on how frugal I am being.

If I limit myself to buying new stuff? Not a whole lot. Maybe a camera body or a few lenses.
But if I shop around and get stuff second hand, then I could buy so many lenses and cameras that I've been meaning to try out.

Usually I do the latter

If you already have a good computer, that much money could outfit an entire home music recording studio with decent gear, especially if you buy good used gear, which is easily available:

A couple of good super-budget guitars from Harley Benton (a Strat clone and a Les Paul clone), for about $300 (new).

A good Yamaha acoustic guitar, $100.

A bass, $75.

An interface, to get the music into the computer, $50.

A basic MIDI controller, $30.

A good electronic keyboard with weighted keys, $100.

Microphone, $75.

Headphones, $50.

Electronic drum machine, $50, or use the pads on the MIDI controller, or voices on the keyboard.

DAW - Reaper is free, and works great.

That's approximately what I spent on my studio, and everything works great, and sounds terrific..

A thousand euros in airsoft will get you a high-quality gun or two, depending on what you're looking for and where you're getting it from. Generally, replica pistols and "standard" rifles tend to be cheaper than anything heavy or exotic.

And you'll probably have plenty of cash left over, for things like safety gear, special clothing, and gun-related accessories like slings and holsters.

The most expensive gun in my collection, a replica of the pistol from Kingsman, was €430. I spent about another 100 on spare magazines, shotgun shells, and a custom holster. My next-priciest gun cost less than half that, even after acquiring similar accessories

I haven't put any money into modifying any of my guns, since that's an entire other can of worms I don't feel like opening. Most guns will be perfectly playable out of the box, rarely needing more than heavier BBs or a hopup adjustment to be improved.

Depends on how much you mind restoration/cleaning work for fountain pens. I've already got all the entry tier stuff covered, so buying new pens at MSRP would probably mean somewhere between 1-3 pens, depending on how fancy I'm looking to get. I already have an ultrasonic cleaner and plenty of repair supplies, so I'd be hitting up auctions, personally. Depending on what's in the lots and how many people notice the contents, 1000€ would probably get me somewhere between 200-400 pens. Probably another 200 or so if I get to count what I could buy with the proceeds of selling off the ones I'm not interested in.

Gunpla and other mecha model builder, here. 1k Euro could get you anywhere from 4-75 model kits (likely more if you really wanted to stretch it), a sweet airbrush setup plus all the tools you could need, or a few nice display cases to show the finished models off in.

An absolute shitton of indie games

Almost endless quantities (for me anyway) of 3d printing filament and small electronic parts.

Another hobby. Two, if I'm lucky.

About one-fourth of a top-tier professional video card, or a whole -almost top-tier- consumer card. Or a relatively decent factory-made classical guitar. That being said I'd probably go for a extrawide capo to fit my ten-string instead. And then buy coke with the remaining 950$. Regular, not diet

Maybe a third of a used or import lathe or mill.

Machining is super expensive as a hobby to get started.

Which is why I'm slowly upgrading my cheap CNC router to be more rigid and capable, bit by bit. Machined stainles for the first time last week. though i'll never get close to a 'real' machine, in hobby machining, everything is a finishing pass…

On raves...? 😵‍💫

Half of a full army, maybe some brushes.

A surprising amount as prices have dropped considerably in the past few years. (3d printing)

A suit of plate armour, and maybe a shield or a weapon.

Few or many diseases depending on how I spend it.

digital art: i guess... a new drawing tablet? maybe a laptop that's also a tablet with pen pressure and stuff. would be neat

gaming: upgrade my pc (add a dedicated gpu, new power supply, water cooling, etc) + better peripherals

If I really wanted to go HAM, about one third of a Norbauer Seneca. For me in reality, my laser engraver, 3D printer, soldering station, and other tools I typically use to do keyboard projects probably all come together to be about EUR1000.

Would that it 'twere my only hobby.

100s of components and boards

A new main sail

I can get a lot of weigths and a sick power rack

One card in a vintage deck.

An enclosed core XY 3D printer with a material changing system with a built in filament dryer.

The Bambu Lab P1S is a crazy good deal. If you get it with the older AMS that doesn’t do filament drying, it’s only €800.

There are some issues with Bambu Lab and their proprietary nature. But I’ve very much loved my P1S, and while I’ve tinkered with and upgraded it quite a bit, I’ve never NEEDED to the same way I did with older 3D printers (other than standard maintenance).

You can get Prusa’s Core One for a bit over the stated budget, but only if you do the assembly yourself. Which is fun! But you also don’t get the multiple material system included in that price.

All the Japanese language resources for a lifetime you need and then some more for lessons if you want.

• Wanikani and Bunpro might be about 300€ together for a lifetime.
• A few grammar books with extra exercises, like Genki, would be less than 200€ I think.
• Writing supplies, a computer, Internet access etc is assumed.
• 500€ Could likely get private tutoring for quite a few lessons I think. You may also want to look at courses by the nearby university or language school, or get additional support resources.

Japanese learning resources are really amazing nowadays. Tons of good free content too, like articles on grammar or YouTube Videos by people explaining stuff. If you cut Wanikani and Bunpro and go with Anki (FOSS) instead for SRS, you can go really cheap.

That is, the price you pay for learning the Japanese language is also that it takes a fuck ton of time to get anywhere. But then again, you understand Japanese after that, how cool is that??

A decent entry-level hardtail.

A really nice bow, and probably enough arrows for a few years.