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Check craigslist constantly. I managed to be the first to call and got a Minoura Mag 500 trainer for a whopping 15 bucks last week. Not at all the best trainer, but for 15 bucks you can't beat it.

I asked twitter last winter and scored a sweet trainer for the cost of shipping.

Stationary trainers are possibly the more boring thing I've ever done, though.

i bought a kurt kinetic off someone here last year. i used it twice and definitely thought it was boring, which is odd because i don't have a problem running on a treadmill. although the big difference is I have a TV to watch when doing the latter but not the former.

i'm debating whether to sell it or give it another try this winter. well, i guess i'll put it up for sale and see what happens. i'll sell it for what i paid ($150), including a couple things i bought myself for another ~$50:

Kurt Kinetic riser ring

Continental Trainer Tire

The trainer itself is a few years old (not sure) and works fine AFAICT... new ones are $300.

I learned that the worst thing you can do on a trainer is try to watch TV. Your speed/cadence are so elevated that television seems to happen in slow motion. Made my 30 minutes of riding seem endless......

Reading worked well for me. Then I scored some videos from a railroad tour that was just the video image from the front of the engine. It was sort of like riding along a rail trail that had not yet been constructed. The pace was still a little off, but 30 minutes of nature viewing worked a lot better for me than slow speed television. Still, if you are starting off on a trainer, start in small increments and build up. The boredom factor may discourage you altogether if you try to to too much in the first couple of "rides."

Stationary trainers are possibly the more boring thing I've ever done, though.

Try rollers.

also get a super long wear tire for using o the trainer. it will DESTROY your rear tire.

The price difference is all thats keeping me from rollers right now.

Salty - pretty sure the reason running on a treadmill is nowhere near as boring is because of how much effort you're putting into keeping your balance. A cycling trainer is more equivalent to someone holding you up by the hips while you skim the ground with your feet. Thats why rollers keep your attention a whole lot more as well.

If I'm on the trainer or rollers I always do a structured workout, which seems to go a lot faster. For example, 5 minutes easy, 5 minutes hard, 5 minutes easy, 20 minutes hard, 5 minutes easy, 20 minutes hard, 5 minutes easy. Mentally it really helps to mix up the intensity, and to have a goal in mind.

I like to have a movie on, too.

I used to have a mag trainer, and now I just have rollers, but I find rollers a lot more tolerable--I just wist I had a resistance unit for them.

I find that when I get the rpms up above my comfort level, it becomes a real physical effort. And a hellacious racket.

(Though to be honest, I really don't ride indoors very much. I find other things to do in the winter instead, like ice skating, skiing, or stairs.)

++ for stairs in the winter. Cathedral of Learning is fun, you can mix it up with different stairwells, and the view from the top is pretty.

won't do a thing for cycling specific muscles, but general work out it can't be beat (and it's usually so warm in there I'm stripped pretty bare by the 4th or 5th round) I think somebody calculated out 62 trips up (from the basement) is the height of everest, but my memory is fuzzy and I could be way off.

http://www.dannychew.com/CoL2everest.html

ok, 66 times is everest It's still a nice, free way to get a warm winter workout in.