ultralight

I dunno, I have the Lanshan 2 Pro and I have found it to be every bit as durable and capable as my brand name tents. I've been using it for about three years now.

What you have to remember is that outside of the cottage industry, the majority of your "real" brand gear is made in China just the same as the knockoff stuff. What you are paying for with a lot of name brand gear is the brand name, and also theoretically some level of warranty and after-sale support. (I am 100% positive I will receive none on my Lanshan if I ever need it, but I haven't needed it.)

Even most of the word-salad-brand-name, all-copies-of-each-other Chinese tents on Amazon and Alibaba are at least to the level a decent department store tent would have been ten or fifteen years ago.

I'm still less sold on the usefulness of knockoff sleeping bags and so forth. A tent is a tent, and as long as it stays up and can be made not to leak is pretty tough to screw up. I guess what I'm getting at is that there are really no specifications to lie about regarding a tent, and all the Chinese non-brands just seem to love to lie about any specification they can. So I would not, for instance, trust the temperature rating on a yum-cha sleeping bag without some outside data to back it up. But if you know what you're getting into in advance (or maybe buy a "20 degree" bag when you're only expecting 40) they are probably serviceable.

When it comes to anything potentially survival related...don't cheap out but don't necessarily buy flashy heavily marketed stuff either. Check stitching and material quality.

I would never buy survival related gear without seeing it in person.

Cheap, light, durable. You can pick two.

Cheap, light = online gear from China, best for occasional or light use.

Cheap, durable = Surplus army gear, heavy but unbreakable no matter what you throw at it.

Light, durable = Very expensive ultralight gear for frequent use. Best for those who've tried all the other gear and know what they want.

I'm mostly in category 2, so I don't feel guilty if I don't take my gear out as often :P Some non-essential convenience accessories from category 1.

Hard to say. On the one hand extra cheap things are usually bad. On the other hand many things which are sold with slogan "you deserve it" etc is the exactly the same AliExpress stuff but labeled differently. So, higher price guarantees nothing either.

This is my general observation, not hiking gear specific.

I adore my aonijie multicolored aluminum poles. Best pole design I think I've ever used, and it's an original design.

My next tent will probably be a langshan. But I don't go out so often so don't need the best, and im short

I generally find that "you get what you pay for" and you don't want to find out something isn't well made when you're in the backcountry, but everyone's got to start somewhere. Over the years I've replaced my cheap stuff with better ultralight gear. I'm pretty happy with my setup now, most of it has lasted several seasons and is easier to carry. Bonus, most cottage-industry makers are hikers too and I like supporting them.

I tend to buy a cheap version to try it out, then invest in the good version. Sometimes things don't work out as expected, and I'd rather not learn that with the costly item.

I did get a Lanshan 2p this year after years of self-supporting tents. It is a good foray into learning trekking pole tents without too much cost. I suspect a Durston XMid 2p is in my future next year-ish so that the dog will fit with us in the tent.