Backblaze posts stats regularly on their site, for example:

• https://www.backblaze.com/blog/backblaze-drive-stats-for-q2-2023/
• https://www.backblaze.com/blog/ssd-edition-2023-mid-year-drive-stats-review/

Not Gandi. They were very reliable since the beginning of the internet but they sold the company and went downhill since.

https://lowendbox.com/ is usually recommended for cheap VPS.

Do you have a link or was it deleted? I don’t see anything in your history.

I confirm that VPS companies use custom images with additional scripts. I’ve seen those a few times.

First result on any search engine: https://lemmyverse.net/communities

Avoid smart TVs, prefer large screen. IIRC the LG brand was less bad than the others. Samsung is the worst since they put ads on top of your own videos. Anyway, never plug it to the internet, never put the wifi password.