Originally Posted by oldskewel

I have come to realize that the research effort to make decisions like this, combined with the helpless frustration when something would go wrong ends up being pretty costly.

So I almost always try to rebuild things like this myself with proper parts. It almost always comes out perfectly, and when it does not, it feels a lot better to have screwed it up myself than to have paid someone else to do it to me.

Yes it takes some skills and knowledge, but gaining those are a good investment.