I'm on my third chronograph. I bought a Chrony while still in college in about 1990. It worked okay for several years. Then I tried an RCBS, which sometimes was unreliable. Now I use a Competition Electronics I bought from Midway USA for not much more than I originally paid for the Chrony, and it serves my modest needs. It's nice knowing a ballpark figure for my velocities, ranging from 700 fps for target loads in my .45 ACP to nearly 4,000 fps in my .220 Swift, and many points in between. I don't use it a ton, but I also can't imagine living without one, either. Kind of like my 5" .357 Magnum S&W 27-2.
