How much to spend on tech per year?

[portseven]

Just curious, how much do people spend on tech (through their Ltd) each year?

Assuming most of you are in IT, do you spend say X amount each year on tech. I am thinking laptops, desktops, software, etc.

So is a new laptop or PC each year OTT? I could make a good business case, as I need to up to date on things as a infrastructure architect, I need to be on top of whats what.

[Pondlife]

Probably spend about £500 a year I should think. I'm not in infrastructure so it's basically a new laptop & desktop every 3 years or so and the occaisional monitor/printer/HDD as stuff fails.

[SueEllen]

Don't spend a fixed amount. I buy things as required.

[Scrag Meister]

In November 2007, 6 months after starting contracting, I bought 2 laptops, 1 small and mobile and 1 large and a replacement desktop really.

Since then I have bought nothing tech, until recently when I replaced my printer which I had had for 8 years.

Am looking at a NAS, poss new desktop, dual monitor etc.., as the one I have is mine rather than Ltd.

I have bought books about tech, recently to learn c#, tried iphone dev but couldn't get into it.

Will prob get Visual Studio 2010 Professional (expensive @ £800-£1000), am using the Express version to learn at the mo.

I certainly don't have a regular tech budget, I get what I need when I need it.

[VectraMan]

I bought VS2010 Pro this year (£280), but that's all. I bought a desktop in 07, and a laptop in 08, both of which I still use and upgraded the hard disks in the desktop last year as well as buying both Windows 7. So it's probably averaged about £500 per year.

[Scrag Meister]

I bought VS2010 Pro this year (£280), but that's all. I bought a desktop in 07, and a laptop in 08, both of which I still use and upgraded the hard disks in the desktop last year as well as buying both Windows 7. So it's probably averaged about £500 per year.

Where did you get VS 2010 Pro for £280? The ones I have seen at this price are upgrades.

[rd409]

Why do you want to buy Visual Studio Professional anyways? I work with Eclipse and it does the job. Also use Resharper (Free or £150 depending on how you use it) and you pretty much get everything you need.
Why waste money on a MS product that sucks out performance from your machine. If at all I need to use, I then go on and use VS Express edition.
If you are still not convinced, and want to go for Visual Studio, register for the beta releases, and you can get a full version for free.

[VectraMan]

Where did you get VS 2010 Pro for £280? The ones I have seen at this price are upgrades.

It was an upgrade. That's the special offer upgrade from Standard (I bought VS2005 Standard about 5 years ago).

I think MS are shooting themselves in the foot making their developer tools so expensive (and you can't even buy Standard anymore). I needed to buy it as (unfortunately) I still need to do stuff with MFC, which is only in Pro. Otherwise I've been using the free Express version for C++ quite effectively.

As a professional Windows developer investing in the tools that the clients are almost certainly going to be using makes sense. Not having Visual Studio is like a window cleaner making do without a bucket to save money.

[Wanderer]

So is a new laptop or PC each year OTT? I could make a good business case, as I need to up to date on things as a infrastructure architect, I need to be on top of whats what.

If you have a liking for shiny gadgets and all the latest kit for business use then you are free to get your business to pay for it and claim it back against company profits.

Don't fall into the trap of spending company money on stuff because it's "not costing you anything" because it is ultimately your money you are spending at the end of the day.

[Jog On]

I just bought a whole new system in parts, cost about £800.

I pay for monthly web hosting, hosted exchange email, and a VPS server.

I also have a virtual assistant (about £100/month) and a couple of monthly subscriptions to some online marketing/social media services (onlywire). I have affiliate websites that I put through the LTD and get the VA to work on them while I'm contracting

Thinking about getting the MS partner MSDN type thing for about £300/year for all the latest software to evaluate and mess around with.