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This is the best advice given so far, and I have one piece that fits right in. Without knowing what the 3 pieces of gear are, but assuming that you are a relatively new diver, and you have mask, fins and snerk, you likely need a BCD, regulator, and computer.Okay, having given my snarky answer, I'm going to give a serious one.
First off, understand it's hard to give an accurate answer based on the information provided. We don't know how much money you make, how much you spend on basic living expenses, how good you are at paying your bills, etc. So any answer is likely to not be completely on the mark for your specific situation. That said, there's some things I'm going to try to piece together from what you have wrote so far.
So, the first thing I gather from your statement is "...saving up for yet another year." This implies you've tried, and failed, to save up enough for gear already. If this is the case, I'd recommend not getting a personal loan. If you've already tried for a year to save up the money, you either lack discipline to save or you simply don't have enough disposable income to do so, in which case you don't have enough to pay back a loan, either.
If you simply worded that oddly, and haven't yet tried to save for gear, perhaps it's a different situation and a loan may work for you. Personal loans are good if you know you can pay back the money quickly, and you're trying to get a jump on it. For example, if you know you are going to dive every weekend, rental fees will start stacking up quick and could very well outweigh the cost of interest on a personal loan. If you realistically know how much you will dive, it should be easy to figure out how much rental fees will add up to, and compare that to interest on a personal loan.
In either case, it's my opinion that you should not get a personal loan based on the information you've provided, at least a personal loan for all new, ScubaPro gear. If you got used, mixed brand gear as most of the people here, myself including, are recommending, it'll be a fraction of the cost of new ScubaPro gear, maybe a few hundred $$. In this case, I'd say get a personal loan as rental fees will rapidly grow to be more than the cost of a bunch of cheap used gear, but on the flip side if you need a personal loan for a couple hundred $$ how will you pay for car gas, dive gas, and dive fees to go diving every weekend, and so it probably goes back to you don't have enough money, and therefore shouldn't get the loan.
I get the temptation to buy all new. My wife and I bought a boat last fall, without a vehicle to tow it. The plan was to leave it in the water, we could use it anytime, and eventually we'd get a truck or SUV that could tow it. I decided on a truck, and for quite some time, was really thinking about buying a brand new, $40k Silverado, despite in the past telling myself buying new was expensive and I'd never do it. I finally convinced myself that was needlessly spending more money than I needed, and I'm back to buying a used truck, probably around the $10k range. Either one will pull the boat without a care in the world, one will just cost 4x as much plus extra interest. And yet, I'm still tempted to buy that new shiny truck, and most likely will be from time to time, until I actually buy the used truck, realize it's perfect for what I need, at which point the temptation to buy new will vanish, never to return until the used truck falls apart in 10 years and I have to do the used/new fight with myself again.
My honest recommendation, based on what I've gathered from what you've wrote, is that you should take a long, hard think on buying new ScubaPro gear, then hopefully you'll decide that buying mixed brand, used, cheap gear will get you in the water, without loans, and get you diving. After that, start saving and if in a year or three you've saved up enough to buy all new, shiny Scubapro gear, knock yourself out and buy it! In the meantime you'll actually be diving, not worrying about money, even if you do look like a dork.
If you're looking for a BCD, a ScubaPro classic is one of the finest made. With that said, they must be the correct size, as there is very little adjustment (the downside) but they last forever and a day (the upside, because there are a ton of used ones). As far as regulators go, I've never dived anything scubapro aside from a Mk10/G250 and it was again, a fine regulator. I dive a titanium atomic now, which is a Mk20 clone with a few upgrades. Not a thing wrong with them, and I bet eBay has 20 of them for 1/4 of new. Last, I dove for many years with a Uwatec smart pro, and I still have 2 of them. Simple to use, the only downside is that they must be sent off for batteries.
A downside of having shiny new gear at Dutch is that everyone knows you're a newb. That can be an upside, too, as folks will watch out for you. But showing up in gear that obviously has a little wear on it will stop the chicken looks from those who do such things.
Best of luck to you whichever direction you decide to go.
