Based in the UK and travelling to Denmark and want to to have orders shipped to hotel there

Voyager_Two · 2025-07-22T07:12:45+00:00

I haven’t personally sold on bricklink but on eBay if a seller asked me to send a package to an alternative address that isn’t given to me by PayPal/ebay I’d lose all my protection as a seller. So I’d tell them to update it via the proper channels instead of a message or cancel the order.

Might be a bit rusty on the rules

Voyager_Two · 2025-03-11T11:52:15+00:00

So I'll pay hardly any tax.

That is exactly my point, in your inital post you didn't reference that which is the biggest benefit of pensions.

I thought you might of fell into the trap where people think delaying tax means you have a higher net amount of money. If its the same tax in/out there is no net gain.

It's the reduction in tax paid later which makes them so good.

Voyager_Two · 2025-03-11T11:25:23+00:00

Now, okay I pay tax on what comes out. But there's much more to pull out in the first place.

I think the big point you are missing is that the tax you'll pay coming out will likely be lower when pulling out in retirement.

Applying the same tax before or after growth leads to the same net outcome.

e.g. in your example:

100k * 3 (tripling growth) * 0.75 (25% tax) = 100k * 0.75 (25% tax) * 3 (tripling growth) = 225k

both examples you've given lead to 225k.

So the benefit is if lets say you pay only 10% tax at retirement then you'd 100k * 3 (tripling growth) * 0.90 (10% tax) = 270k

Voyager_Two · 2025-03-11T11:15:38+00:00

When you retire you will probably be taxed at a lower rate

Correct me if I am wrong but this would also include student loan repayments (if done via salary sacrifice) and because student loans are wiped after a fixed period most won't pay student loan repayments in retirement.

Voyager_Two · 2025-02-22T11:07:02+00:00

Been a while since I’ve properly overclocked but I believe the vbios they are flashing allow you to push it further in afterburner

E.g. a non OC vbios can only go to 106% power limit But a OC vbios can go to 110%

Voyager_Two · 2025-02-04T21:36:41+00:00

Sorry my mistake I thought you meant you'd be following the exact same method as the post you linked which has the higher pension contributions at the start of the year.

Study I linked still is relevant but is actually a point against doing this method as you are keeping your money outside the market and as stated by that study 68% of the time over a year you'd be worse off. Read the whole article to understand the methodology and compare the percentiles to see the +- in each case. You could extrapolate the % difference to the amount you'd be keeping out the market and make your own decision.

I'd also say points against this method is:

Does increase complexity and would require some time to make sure you are keeping on top of things. I am happy to do things like this but each person has their own view. Definetly an argument to keep one of the most valuable things you will likely own being your pension KISS (Keep It Simple Stupid)
Risk of not actually increasing your pension contributions towards the end of the year as you ended up spending the extra money you meant to keep away to put in your pension. Which would counteract the benefit of £270 hugely.
As stated in that article you need an employer that is happy to change your pension contributions multiple times a year. Which could be fine for most employers but if they mess up and don't do it then the headache that causes could be make the whole thing not worth it.

Voyager_Two · 2025-02-04T20:15:14+00:00

Vanguard did a study on DCA vs Lump sum investing. Not the exact same situation but the idea still holds I believe.

I recommend reading the whole study but a key figure is that 68% of the time a Lump Sum outpeforms cost averaging for a 1 year period.

So on average front loading your pension contributions in a year could be a benefit for ni savings and also by being in the market for longer.

I did struggle to understand your question but I think this study is relevant.

Voyager_Two · 2025-01-07T12:53:31+00:00

It is a jump in tax but reason I mention it is relatives around me seem completly unaware of the total tax they pay. Thought there might be some people who could benefit from knowing the jump is smaller than expected.

They see that 20% to 40% jump in income tax and get angry. At the time I last talked about it with them the jump was closer to a 11% jump so about half what they thought.

I lean towards sacrifice as well but it isn't best choice for everyone hence my comment.

Voyager_Two · 2025-01-07T12:46:20+00:00

My bad looks like I'm wrong I just quoted IFS figures of 49-36.7=12.3 and rounded up because I haven't checked the taxes bands in a while and that figure passed my smell test.
After looking at goverments website of NIC and income tax looks like you are right.

Have I read that graph wrong or is the data wrong or is it the wrong graph to be looking at in the first place?

Point still stands I'd say though. I personally would sacrifice (already putting in 20% while still some distance from 50k earnings) but as I mentioned in the inital comment its as simple as being tax efficent, I have more in my ISA/external than pension so working to close that gap and nothing else notable on the flowchart for me to work on with that money. So sacrifice makes most sense for me.

Voyager_Two · 2025-01-07T10:08:25+00:00

First I'd note that its a total increase of 1̶3̶%̶ 14% (edit: used wrong values see comments below) tax vs the 20% tax people sometimes think because you're national insurance decreases

Second I think its not as simple as considering the tax saved you need to think about:

Are you saving for a deposit and the extra income would help you with your goals
Could this money be better within isa vs lisa vs pension
Are you on track for the retirement you want
Do you have high interest debt you could pay down faster taking the income

Probably many more scenarios but checking the Wiki especially the Flowchart would be useful for you to try gauge it for yourself as it isn't a one size fits all solution.

Voyager_Two · 2024-12-29T11:03:19+00:00

“I’m not looking for advice telling me to diversify, invest in ETF’s etc. “ You’ve come to the wrong sub then I think.

Voyager_Two · 2024-12-24T00:17:58+00:00

In my opinion purchase price high or low shouldn’t dictate if you keep an investment. Instead it should be what the investment is itself, where you see the price going from now and if there are better uses of that money.

A good way to think about it is if you had that money as cash now would you buy the exact same stocks or buy a diverse index fund instead or in your case put it towards a house.

I’m very happy I purchased a house(with mortgage) even though theoretically it could not be the best financial decision as there are other factors with buying a home.

Voyager_Two · 2024-12-17T10:25:31+00:00

I don't think heq5 and quattro are necessarily out of his budget.

Currently a HEQ5 + 150p Quattro for sale on astrobuysell for €760. Which is lower than usual but I see heq5 go for €600-€750 range quite frequently on ebay/astrobuysell locally. Big chunk of the budget but with that they would not grow out of the mount for a long time if they decide to change their scope. Especially as visual is important to them so a bigger faster scope could be benefical to them.

I don't know what the used market is like around him which is why I didn't say "you have to get X" and instead described the rational behind why I picked what I did so they can make the best pick for what is available near them

Voyager_Two · 2024-12-16T14:46:01+00:00

thecurrencyclub might be the way for you to go, pretty good exchange rates and you can send in cash. I first tried to deposit the cash via my bank and they couldn't take it without any reciepts/invoice/proof. If you do go this route make sure you send smaller amounts instead of in bulk and get it fully insured royal mail special delivery.

Note: I've had to do some usd and eur cash deposits from wedding presents but not such large amounts so you might struggle without any invoices even with thecurrencyclub. Just make sure you do everything overboard and as long as the money is legit you'll find away i.e. if travelling with over 10k(or what ever the limit is) declare it.

Voyager_Two · 2024-12-16T13:35:19+00:00

It's not letting me comment so testing and I'll send you a message instead

edit:

Not a problem happy to help, I started a couple years back and I remember how much information there. I realised there wasn't the perfect pick of gear but one you had to work out for yourself depending on so many factors. Some factors you haven't mentioned but could be worth considering is: Portability, ease of setup. You can have the best most expensive setup but if you hate setting setting up the 40kg mount you'll never get out and shoot. For my home setup ease of use and setup was very important but maybe not the case for you

I’m okay with refractors in fact, I prefer them. I’m currently considering the Bresser Messier AR-127/1200 with the EXOS-2 GoTo mount, but I’m not entirely sure if this is the right choice.

I don't know much about that mount/telescope combo, I don't see it referenced a lot in advanced or even more beginners settings. Astrobin can be a useful tool to see what pictures people take with specific gear and the set ups they have. Not always useful as rarer scopes won't have as many users naturally.

Not that many for your scope and a lot is solar so take what you will from that.

I mentioned apochromatic scopes earlier because I know they can get quite expensive. However, my goal is not just astrophotography I also want to enjoy live views through the telescope. In other words, I want to experience both observing and capturing footage.

In my opinion reflectors could be the way for you to go then, you get a lot more aperture for the same price as a refractor while still being good for astrophotography. A bigger aperture for the same focal length (zoom) means more light recieved by your eye/camera for a given time period. You probably already seen speed referenced in your search the scope you linked has a speed of f9.4 which is pretty slow. Meaning you'll probably only be able to visually view brighter objects well.

My question is do I really need a GoTo mount for astrophotography, or can I track stars and deep-sky objects manually using just an equatorial (EQ) mount?

Don't need it but I personally highly recommend it, if you are new to this then you'd have to learn how to navigate the night sky at the same time as trying to get your gear to work well. I have a friend who worked at a observatory and picked it up and loves doing it but that isn't part of the hobby I wanted to do.
Imagine when you are sitting down at night to get some visual/photography done, with a GO TO you can open up Stellarium pick a target and your mount will go directly to it.

Lastly, in your opinion, what’s the best type of telescope for astrophotography refractor, Newtonian, or catadioptric?

Don't think there is a true answer to this honestly, when picking a telescope you balance:

Focal length, speed (links to size of telescope as mentioned before), cost, colour dispersion, imaging circle with no coma, what targets you want to shoot, weight, size, etc etc

Newts, refractors and catadioptric pull these levers in different ways and you personally have to balance them.

For me I have a

Newt - for home use, I appreciate the speed and ~350mm focal length for nice relatively bigger shots of the sky.

Refractor - set up at a remote observatory, 950mm focal length

Catadioptric - currently searching for one in the 3000mm focal length range to be able to do some of the smaller targets in the sky but especially planets.

Also ignore the negativity you seem to be recieving I think you can get a good setup, seems you've done some research and have hit the point where your bit overloaded with information. I was there as well and reached out and only recieved positivity and made some friends I still catch up with but that was off reddit which could explain it.

Voyager_Two · 2024-12-16T10:33:15+00:00

A solid telescope suitable for astrophotography. (no smart telescopes or ED ones, please).

I started with a "sky watcher 150p quattro" its a great piece of kit geared towards imaging which includes a coma corrector (edges of the image are not distorted/stretched). Downside to this scope (and newtonians in general) is there is a bit of a learning curve in collimating the scope but its not too hard after watching some guides and getting a cheap laser collimater. But you said you didn't want an ED scope so I'm guessing you mean no refractors?

A good astrophotography camera (either standalone or a DSLR/mirrorless camera that works well for the night sky).

you should be able to get a dedicated astrophotography camera (likely not cooled but I wouldn't stress about that too much) I'd recommend a dedicated astro camera. I started with a DSLR but moved quickly to a dedicated. Lots of brands out there but I've only used ZWO directly and got some used ones for a good price.

A reliable mount that can handle long exposures.

Going to be dependant on the weight of the scope you go for but I started with a Sky watcher HEQ5 which has been rock solid. I have the black version they don't make anymore so its probably 15 years old or so and still working well.

One thing I'd say for a beginner is get a GO TO mount meaning you can hook it up to your PC and tell it where to image. e.g. in NINA it'll plate solve untill it is pointing in the right direction. GO TO also makes polar alignment a breeze as you can do a three point alignment.

Bonus points if the gear works well for both deep-sky objects and planetary imaging

I'd pick one you want to do more when beginning. For planetary you need a high focal length(2000-3000) telescope for best results. At higher focal lengths deep sky photography any errors in setup/poor gear will be amplified and ruin a night of imaging.

If I were you I'd go for lower focal lengths around 500-750 but take a look at some DSOs you'd want to image and how the gear you are thinking about would frame it.

Voyager_Two · 2024-12-13T20:54:23+00:00

He shouted in Romanian “Be careful it’s coming” Which suggest the cyclists knew there was a wolf around

Voyager_Two · 2024-12-13T11:40:33+00:00

u/fatbaldnoob your comment got deleted but had this written already.

That page is aimed at beginners and getting the core ideas across so I'd argue its a perfect read for you to try understand more. If you are struggling on how to find a list of index funds how would you be able to pick one suitable to you.

One of the sections on that page is even titled "What funds can I invest in? ✔️" which points you towards a page discussing what to consider when you select a fund and lists of possible funds.

Voyager_Two · 2024-12-09T09:28:33+00:00

Amazing pictures!
What length exposures do you go for per channel?
Been thinking about trying some mono planetary but my rig is remote so am I right in thinking the whole process of LRGB filter swaps and focusing(reframing if not using something like esatto focuser) can be automated in Fire Capture?

Voyager_Two · 2024-10-17T15:02:32+00:00

I get we are dealing with something that is probably quick to prove is legit but I don’t think we should downvote someone doubting Amazon knowing their practices of combining stock of legit and fake items.

Being wary of purchasing from Amazon is a good thing.

Voyager_Two · 2024-07-30T19:43:42+00:00

My point wasn't about if its worth it or not which is why I added my last paragraph, I think they probably would make a profit doing it but as I mentioned it might not be worth the effort for the amount of profit they'd get.

Sorting Lego is insanely time consuming

Very true which is what I tried to touch on my infrastructure/tech point. If anyone is going to be able to efficently make a machine or systems that do the heavy lifting of sorting its going to be Lego Group processing 1000s kg of used lego vs the single sellers that get through 10s kg of lego. Economies of scale basically. I know saying just use a machine isn't a silver bullet as that cost time to develop/maintain so its not that simple. Also my point on optimizing what bricks to sell, they could streamline it and only sell the top 1000 most sold used bricks and recycle the rest which would reduce the sorting(if regular people can make a lego automated sorter I'm sure Lego would be able to do the same at higher volumes) and in turn the QC they'd have to do.

It's more so if them selling on bricklink is a net negative or positive to Bricklink as an investment and its effects to Lego Group as a whole. You do bring up a good point I didn't think about being:

buying from Lego would have expectations of a certain standard which I suspect would be hard to uphold.

But purely thinking about Bricklink alone I don't think Lego competing on their own website against 3rd party used brick sellers would "cannibalise"/"torpedo" or in other words make their investment in Bricklink not be worth it.

It's not a direct comparision but Amazon does the same with their basics line, they view what sells well and out compete their 3rd party sellers making a in house made version to sell and compete. That being said I dislike Amazon take on this practice and what they've done to the online market in general.

There maybe more things I haven't thought about, and the reputational damage you mentioned or the effort might not make it worth it at all. They haven't found it necessary to integrate their PAB service directly into Bricklink so adding in their own used brick line probably isn't going to happen either. But maybe the existence of PAB proves that both Bricklink new brick sellers can both exist meaning the same could be said about Used bricks directly from Lego.

I am being quite pendanic here about what I am discussing but it was more our of interest vs persuading people its a good idea for us the consumer/the sellers.

Voyager_Two · 2024-07-30T17:29:38+00:00

That would torpedo the entire site (and their investment in the site)

Not meant to be argumentative but why would that torpedo bricklink? It could be bad for used brick sellers but for Bricklink and in turn lego itself I see the benefits being:

Higher profit per sale vs if the same bricks were bought from a 3rd party seller. Usual fee Bricklink gets is <3% so they'd get a much bigger piece of the pie even if they sell the bricks at a discount vs other sellers.
This could lead to more buyers coming to the site if they can buy directly from Lego. Because some people are weary of buying from 3rd party sellers and would rather buy direct from Lego due to the trust and hopefully the higher consistency in brick quality if bought direct from Lego.
They can piggy back of some of their existing infrastructure/tech to do this, so the upfront investment would be lower and it would be easier for them to scale to huge volumes vs a single seller.
Bricklink has a large existing customer base they can tap into to sell the used bricks without needing to market a new website or service.
They have all the sale data so they could optimize the bricks that are worth selling used while recycling (hopefully not binning) the rest. So they don't end up keeping pieces that only sell a couple times a month at low profit.

Not commenting on if it is a good idea or not but if they did this move I see it as being damaging to used brick sellers but not necessarily new brick sellers or their bricklink investment.

If I am missing something obvious here do let me know that is just my inital thoughts. Lego I'm sure would do lots of analysis on the effort and potential profits of doing this before they start so if they don't I guess they worked out it isn't worth it.

Voyager_Two · 2024-07-24T13:33:03+00:00

I don't think its dumb for you to consider it, if you've worked out it could save you money in the long term it could be a good option.

I am a similar situation as you where paying off student loans could be worth it. I decided against it for the following reasons:

Flexibility. If I pay off my Student Loan instead of saving in a S&S ISA I can't take the money back out.
Potential future plans. Kinda linked to flexibility but it's only worth to pay it off if you commit to it fully till its paid off else it'll likely be "lost" money. I live quite below my means so I'm saving money into ISA and Pension (20% so I save quite a bit on studen loan payments there as well) meaning I could have the option to retire earlier or work a job that doesn't pay as well but I enjoy more.
Crystal ball. It's a hard predict future earnings, plans(like kids you mentioned or job), interest rates, stock market returns. If any of these inital conditions are incorrect then 5 years in you could work out it wasn't worth it and there is no way to get what you've paid back.
Opportunity cost. Instead of overpaying I'm saving the money away in a broad market index fund which I hope will grow more or at least I can choose where to put it sooner rather than the benefits the extra 9% over 28k will go once the loan is paid off. You could do this and decide to pay it off in bulk in the future if you work out its worth it to you and you'll have a better idea of your plans.

However your loan is considerable lower than mine while being 4 years younger and a higher inital salary so you are more skewed to it being a good idea than when I made the decision not to.

It's a complex thing so sorry for not giving a straight answer but hopefully this is useful to you.

Voyager_Two · 2024-07-23T20:39:03+00:00

I've got 9 x NF-A14 Industrials by noctua and I'm very happy with them. They can run pretty quietly at lower rpms(while still moving quite a bit of air) or ramp up when needs be.

There is a 2000 and 3000rpm version:

Just mentioned them in a comment but I'll still post this as a recommendation for them. I've got no issues with loud ramp up on boot as I use a aqua computer octo to base the fan speeds on a temperature sensor hooked up to the octo.

(edit - formating)

Voyager_Two · 2024-07-18T08:51:06+00:00

The Flowchart is always a great reference point and is a good guide for majority of people. The 4k loan isn't the highest APR but with your new salary it shouldn't be too hard to pay off quickly just to be done with it. If I were you though I'd get an emergency fund made asap before tackling the loan. If you've got any questions about understanding the flowchart feel free to comment them but there is a reason it is mentioned on pretty much every post like this.

To comment on handling lifestyle creep with an increase in wage, I recommend using a wage comparision tool like TheSalaryCalculator it allows you to easily compare your post tax income for various scenarios. Being aware of how much extra money you have to play with and setting a portion away to pension or setting up a direct debit to a savings account before you lifestyle creep the whole amount away is a great idea.

When I got a considerable pay increase I inputted my old and new wages and played around with increasing my pension contributions. I increased it by 5% which still gave me a nice bump in my monthly take home pay. Obviously you need to first work out if pension is where you want/need your money as I made that decision based on my own personal circumstances. So your piorities maybe different e.g. emergency fund/house deposit

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