I am old-school, so I like to do everything in the darkroom. Not only is it far more fun, it has the added advantage of minimizing any handling of the negatives that inherently results in more effort to deal with dust.
Once the negatives are dry, I am quick to cut them and sleeve them. I then use a *good* loupe (Peak 8x is a good one) to view the negatives against my light panel (you can get one of these off eBay for about $25 usually; they were originally used for viewing X-rays). If you do it that way, you will learn to spot decent images right away, and then you won't fuss with the other stuff.
After that, I just print them using my enlarger (Beseler 23C-IIXL). Expensive? I don't think so, personally, since I will have already narrowed down the image(s) I want from each roll. Processing your own negatives is great, but you are not even 1/2 the way there until you can print your own negatives, IMHO. That is where the real fun is, as well as the very real control you hold. Dodging and burning with your hands is a LOT easier than with a mouse