Has anyone on the forum real life experience of using one or the other (or both !) -
Yes.
Titanium has been the industry standard for years and for good reasons, it's absolutely trouble free. Stainless should never be allowed to contact the plating solution, it will break down and cause problems.
It's important to distinguish between the various forms in which nickel metal can be used as anode material. Nickel shot and chips, the commonest form,
must be used in titanium baskets. Solid nickel used in plate or rod form needs neither titanium or stainless baskets to be employed effectively; all you need do is ensure a good electrical contact well above the solution level.
Baskets are only appropriate in heavy production areas; they hold a great weight of metal in a small area. You can therefore plate a huge number of components and use a lot of metal before having to stop production and top them up. Plate or rod anodes are perfectly OK in low and medium volume production baths, and will be a much less costly option. They are usually attached via a titanium hook to the anode rail, but there are other less expensive materials which, if kept out of the solution will be fine.
The other critical issue is making sure that as the anode corrodes sacrificially, it doesn't allow bits of nickel metal to break off and enter the bath; these bits will as sure as God made little apples attach themselves to your workpiece bringing about a condition known as "rough as a bear's *rse."

Within industry, all anodes wether they be in baskets or the solid form, are enclosed in "anodes bags" usually made of terylene or polypropylene. These allow the plating solution to remain in electrical contact with the anodes, but prevent the effects of anode breakdown causing roughness.
In a very small set up, your best bet would be to use solid nickel anodes connected to the circuit by copper wire well above the line where the plating solution will be in contact. You can also buy one of the standard sized anode bags from a supplier and chop it up to the sizes you require, either stitching it together with nylon or "welding" the seams with a hot metal rod. I did just that for years when producing electroplated diamond tooling.
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