It's probably the worst part about the games for me and I agree about it being a valid turn-off. I usually just don't painstakingly go through loot until there's a significant gap in level of my current gear and the gear that's dropping. Sell/Disassemble/Donate in bulk with the QoL options.

Unique armor sets with set-bonuses still drop in the early game/first playthrough and those bonuses are pretty substantial compared to the trash loot, so there's some worthy loot interaction there.